The U.S. federal government, always full of surprises in recent weeks, landed another one a couple of months back. It's
The reasons for the surprising surge are varied but seem to boil down to a focus on hardware vs. applications, uncertain definitions of what constitutes a “data center,” and that age-old gremlin known as organizational resistance.
There's no doubt that every CIO — and CFO, for that matter — wants to see more consolidation within their data centers or server farms. But there's always the question of what, exactly, will be replacing those rows of server racks, and how new build-outs of infrastructure can be restrained to avoid having more sprawl than what the company started with.
Forrester analyst Doug Washburn
“For too long, IT infrastructure has aligned to silos of technology, resulting in complexity, low satisfaction, poor communication and wasted money,” he illustrates, urging that data centers be designed around applications, and not vice versa." The software-defined infrastructure opportunity, he adds, is actually the sum total of virtualization, automation and orchestration.
He lays out the steps that should be addressed in a consolidation effort:
- Define the vision and build a business case.
- Develop a strategic plan and road map.
- Act on the strategy. Part of this stage also involves a skills assessment.
- Benchmark and measure results, and instill a culture of continuous improvement.
The key takeaway here is that the IT operation needs to be viewed as a business in its own right, and the challenge of consolidation approached as it would if the business itself were being pared down.
Joe McKendrick is an author, consultant, blogger and frequent INN contributor specializing in information technology.
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