VitAL Magazine - May-June 2011 by 31 Media

vital Inspiration for the modern business volume 4 : Issue 5 : May / June 2011

Shared services the way forward?

open source a panacea for the public sector

learning to lead Gill Graves says itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s time for It to take control VISIT VITAL oNLINE AT: www.VITAL-MAg.NET

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It’s good to share Leader A

s a parent I’m for ever telling my kids to share, more in a vain attempt to get a bit of peace than as a way of saving precious funds though, it has to be said. Turning our attention to the national problems of the day – rather than my domestic squabbles – our massive public sector has a huge range of IT requirements it must be possible for some of its services to be shared. Almost a year ago and well before the current coalition Government was sworn in, I interviewed the chief executive of west Lancashire Borough Council, Bill Taylor MBe. He pointed out that the emphasis was shifting from service improvement to cost cutting: “The focus for last decade has been on using technology to assist improvement in public services and that was what determined the nature of investment. It was all about customer focus and quicker access to service. ... using technology to improve public service... There has been a major shift in emphasis. Public sector policy is no longer about step change improvement as it was in the past; the new game in town is all about how we get our costs down while minimising the damage done to service, or pulling off the trick of getting costs down while maintaining or improving service quality.” Having seen Bill in action enthusiastically promoting the virtues of a customercentric approach at a conference couple of years ago, I suspect he is one of our now much maligned public servants who really earns his salary. At the time he talked about chief executives sharing their time and skills with other councils in their regions and we have something of a focus on sharing, amongst other methods – use of open source software being a key one – to cut cost while hopefully improving service. The use of open source software in the public sector is one of the approaches at the heart of the Government’s new ICT policy – as announced in March (see news section). On page 42 of this issue Bertrand Diard of open source integration company Talend expounds on the arguments for weaning the public sector off its reliance on large scale proprietary software projects. I’ve long beaten the drum for IT at the heart of changes in the public sector, let us hope that these initiatives start delivering, for all our sakes. Until next time...

Matt Bailey, Editor

If you have any thoughts, feedback, or suggestions on how we can improve VitAL Magazine, please feel free to email me matthew.bailey@31media.co.uk

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Volume 4 : Issue 5 : May / June 2011

Closing the gap between business & IT Shifting the focus on to business benefits

The human factor in the workp

IT governance

Securing the IT estate

Moving to the cloud The rise of Google Apps

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Unleashing your business potential Filling in the service management gaps FEATURE FOCUS: CONTROLLING THE COMPLEXITY: 22-25 WARE FEATURE FOCUS: SOFT

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vital Inspiration for the modern business Volume 4 : Issue 5 : May / June 2011

Contents 6 News ThE VitAL CoVER SToRy

12 learning to lead gILL gRAVES

The cliché states that highly technical IT professionals are not ‘people persons’, not good communicators and are not good at getting the best from their staff. And recent research from Google seems to back this view up. experienced executive coach and consultant Gill Graves is here to help.

Shared services The way forward? Volume 4 : Issue 5 : May/June 2011

Open source A panacea for the public sector

Learning to lead Gill Graves says it’s time for IT to take control VISIT VITAL ONLINE AT: WWW.VITAL-MAG.NET

editor Matthew Bailey matthew.bailey@31media.co.uk Tel: +44 (0)203 056 4599 To advertise contact: Grant Farrell grant.farrell@31media.co.uk Tel: +44 (0)203 056 4598 Production & Design Toni Barrington toni.barrington@31media.co.uk Dean Cook dean.cook@31media.co.uk editorial & Advertising enquiries Tel: Fax: email: web:

+44 (0) 870 863 6930 +44 (0) 870 085 8837 info@31media.co.uk www.vital-mag.net

Printed by Pensord, Tram Road, Pontllanfraith, Blackwood. nP12 2YA © 2010 31 Media Limited. All rights reserved. vitAL Magazine is edited, designed, and published by 31 Media Limited. no part of vitAL Magazine may be reproduced, transmitted, stored electronically, distributed, or copied, in whole or part without the prior written consent of the publisher. A reprint service is available. Opinions expressed in this journal do not necessarily reflect those of the editor or vitAL Magazine or its publisher, 31 Media Limited. Issn 1755-6465 Published by:

VitAL SIgNS – LIfE IN A woRLd wITh IT

15 entropy STEVE whITE predicting the slow heat-death of everything, Steve White has been playing with IT sandcastles.

VitAL MANAgEMENT

16 anytime, anyplace, anywhere It support dR ANdy hARTER Dr Andy Harter looks at the evolution of remote IT support and how it is transforming the role of the service desk.

20 cutting the cost and complexity of password resets MARLoN BowSER how new technology is helping with the all too familiar lost and forgotten password scenario. Marlon Bowser reports.

VitAL pRofILE

24 raising the standard for It The Institution of engineering and Technology (IeT) is targeting IT practitioners with its ICTTech award standard. vitAL speaks to the Institution’s ICTTech product manager, Jane Black.

VitAL SUpppoRT

28 Internal It services as a Business NoEL BRUToN Is it time for internal IT services to behave more like businesses? Noel Bruton says it’s one of the best ways of overcoming IT’s ‘techie’ culture.

32 Improving healthcare with It implementation vitAL Magazine, Proud to be the UKCMG’s Official Publication ITIL® is a Registered Trade Mark, and a Registered Community Trade Mark of the Office of Government Commerce, and is Registered in the U.s. Patent and Trademark Office.

NEIL MALCoLM Neil Malcolm assesses the importance of procuring an easy-to-use, ﬂexible and responsive IT booking system for the local health authority in ensuring that carers are supported and respite care opportunities are maximised.

SUBSCRIBINg To VitAL MAgAZINE

VitAL Magazine is published six times per year for directors, department heads, and managers who are looking to improve the impact that IT implementation has on their customers and business. For a Free annual subscription to vitAL Magazine please visit: www.vital-mag.net/subscribe May / June 2011 : VitAL 3

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CONTENTS

Contents VitAL INTERVIEw

56 remote control

38 strength through breadth It is an exciting time for frontrange, with the recent launch of its SaaS2 software-as-a-Service solution as well as new versions of its IT Asset Management on-premise products. vitAL caught up with the company’s vice president, eMeA, Ian McEwan.

42 What open source offers the public sector BERTRANd dIARd Can open source software offer significant savings and tangible benefits to the public sector? Bertrand Diard reports.

VitAL pRoCESSES

46 Proactive Itsm – the evolution of the human touch

ChRISTIAN NAgELE It seems like we are in the middle of a ‘perfect storm’ of IT advances and developments. Cloud, virtualisation and mobility have all added layers of complexity to the IT estate. While this evolution is widely acknowledged, its impact on IT management is perhaps less understood. Christian Nagele says this is where remote management can come into its own.

VitAL EyES oN

59 tweet to who? JoNAThAN wESTLAkE Jonathan Westlake contemplates the significance of Twitter as the pithy social network hits the five year mark.

60 It training – a sound investment in an uncertain economy SUE BIRd As the first faltering steps are taken towards recovery, is training now back on the agenda? And if so, how can companies calculate the return on their investment? Sue Bird discusses.

66 testing virtual applications MAREk kUChARSkI Application virtualisation can be a tremendous aid to the production, testing and implementation of modern IT systems. Marek Kucharski, president of parasoft SA explains.

pATRICk BoLgER The ‘human touch’ is an ethos whereby ITSM is delivered from a customer-centric perspective. Users aren’t treated as a homogenous group but instead as individuals, with varying degrees of knowledge and indeed expectations around the role of IT. Patrick Bolger reports. cloud computing plans?

48 Bringing cloud computing to the investment banking world LANCE SINCLAIR It’s fair to say that there is a degree of wariness about cloud computing, but nowhere is this more pronounced than in the banking sector. Lance Sinclair shows how finance industry IT operatives can overcome their concerns with security and compliance.

52 Why It staff shouldn’t tackle online security – without a little help from marketing oLIVER wILkINSoN Oliver Wilkinson, director of SSL247 says it shouldn’t always be left to the IT guys to sort out online security, perhaps some more emotional input from Marketing would be valuable.

VitAL pRofILE

54 enterprise cloud? Itsm 2 the rescue With the rise of virtualisation and cloud computing, has traditional Service Management become outdated? vitAL speaks to Matt Bateson about the launch of ITSM 2.0, a next Generation Service Management framework developed using vMware technology, and designed for the cloud era. www.vital-mag.net

VitAL dRIVE – IT hITS ThE fAIRwAy

69 Diary dates gERAINT LEwIS Geraint Lewis salutes the new Master and looks forward to Summer 2014 when Microsoft ends support for Windows Xp.

VitAL pLANET

70 a greener approach to It SUMIR kARAyI even in this era of economic crisis the adoption of a greener approach to IT is still very much a dominant issue. According to Sumir Karayi an organisation’s brand image and green credentials can be vastly increased if a push to ‘go green’ is widely acknowledged.

76 secret of my success Geoff Collins, product manager at 1e shares his insights. May / June 2011 : VitAL 5

news

UK Government launches IT strategy T

he UK Government has launched its Strategy Document on the direction of central government ICT and the key actions it envisages it will deliver over the next year. The report, which sets out how government ICT will enable the delivery of public services with a ‘different approach to deliver this strategy, characterised by a strong centre and continued commitment to greater transparency through regular and open reporting.’ The document announced that ‘the Government will create a common and secure ICT infrastructure based on a suite of agreed, open standards which will be published and updated... The adoption of compulsory open standards will help government to avoid lengthy vendor lock-in, allowing the transfer of services or suppliers without excessive transition costs, loss of data or significant functionality.’ Government ICT has had a bad name, at least this is how Francis Maude, Minister for the Cabinet Office started his report announcing the new Government ICT strategy. Problems such as complexity, wasteful duplication, interoperability, and poor integration are seen as the main problems that need addressing. “The big principles of adopting open standards and agile deployment; consolidating data centres and leveraging cloud services; and, the inclusion of SME’s in the supply chain are all positive moves that will have impact,” comments Andy Burton, chair of the Cloud Industry Forum. “It is no easy task to bring about this scale of change and in the process avoid making knee jerk reactions that could cause the real focus of efficient and effective

ICT to be lost in pursuit of principles over the true test of fitness for purpose. Technology was never the cause of the issues that we believe exist today, rather it was the contracting and supply process was the driver for the design and method of what got implemented. What is vitally important is that there is truly a level playing field with all solutions judged on their merit and not a positive discrimination of one form over another. We are particularly excited about the launch of Government Skunkworks, established to develop low-coast, fast and agile ICT solutions, providing a new channel for SMEs to participate in government IT.” Bertrand Diard, CEO of Talend, providers of open source integration software, welcomed the announcement to create a level playing field for open source software. “Clearly, the Government is looking at every opportunity to reduce waste and improve efficiency across all departments and I have long advocated the use of open source software to help meet these targets. By providing users with transparency when implementing software and flexibility when integrating with legacy systems, open

source reduces operating costs and human resource waste. “The Government have laid a foundation for a widespread change in attitude towards open source in the public sector. The advantages go beyond the economic benefits of lower implementation and operating costs. The strengths of open source directly combat all of the issues highlighted in the strategy report. I am delighted to see Government not only endorsing open source as an alternative but also trailblazing education on the subject.” The report encompasses waste reduction and project failure as well as the role of ICT in stimulating growth, but perhaps the most important announcement covers the drive to common technology standards as well as the recognition that cloud computing delivers infrastructure, platforms and software as a service. It recognises that the cloud can and does deliver the capability to respond to changing operational needs. “This really does give teeth to the G-Cloud initiative and we applaud that,” concludes Andy Burton.

CIOs struggling to meet increasing demand for collaboration T he findings from a study, commissioned by Workshare, a leading provider of document collaboration software, shows that the majority of UK CIOs and IT directors have already granted business users access to corporate documents via mobiles or tablets, or plan to within the next 12 months. The results point to an increasing demand for collaboration technologies to give users access to information on the move. The rise in mobile and cloud-based collaboration tools presents fresh challenges for IT teams responsible for safe-guarding corporate documents and systems. The survey shows that, while desktop email is the preferred collaboration tool for 71 percent of

6 VitAL : May / June 2011

workers, over half (53 percent) say SharePoint is helping employees collaborate with colleagues, clients and suppliers. Despite 87 percent of respondents already having deployed SharePoint, with this number increasing to 92 percent for organisations with 3,000 or more employees, over 50 percent have expressed concerns. 22 percent of senior IT professionals are frustrated by a poor user interface, and 51 percent – rising to 64 percent in the financial sector – say it requires a high level of customisation. This presents an opportunity for integrated software tools that can reduce the level of customisation required. Limited reporting and analytics features are another sticking point for IT, according to the survey.

John Safa, vice president of engineering, Workshare, comments on the findings, “With more users requiring access to corporate documents and repositories on the move, IT are looking to reduce the time spent customising these tools to meet specific business requirements. But customisation and a poor user interface aren’t the only pain points for IT. They also face the challenge of how to extend that access to mobile and the cloud. The bottom line is that collaboration technologies are being deployed to give users productivity gains. So, if they aren’t easy to use and users aren’t adopting the systems, that investment is wasted. At the end of the day these solutions are meant to help employees get their jobs done more quickly.”

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news

Explosive growth predicted for the cloud O ver 80 percent of those organisations already using cloud services are expected to increase their commitment to this new supply model over the next year according to the latest findings issued by the Cloud Industry Forum, following an extensive market research programme conducted earlier this year. With almost half (48 percent) of all organisations in the UK already using cloud computing in some form, 85 percent of existing user are confidently predicting further roll-out of cloud provisioning across a number of core business applications. Central to this drive is the adoption of email management, data back-up and disaster recovery, storage and webhosting services, closely followed by accounting, service management, CRM, security, and Unified Communications. Of those organisations not currently employing cloud services, almost a third (31 percent) said that they anticipated adopting them in the next year, a further third (32 percent) unsure at this time, and a slightly higher proportion (36 percent) reporting that they had no plans to move into the cloud. Closer analysis of the figures indicates that the drive to the cloud amongst those not currently using it is highest amongst the larger organisations with 42 percent stating they planned to migrate over the next year. This is

in sharp contrast to organisations employing under 20 staff, where the figure dropped to 20 percent. The research, conducted in the first two months of 2011, polled 450 senior IT and business decision-makers in enterprises, small-to-medium businesses (SMBs) and public sector organisations; as well as 200 respondents from the channel. The research highlighted that there are still several areas of concern that are limiting the rate of growth of cloud computing. End user organisations continue to express anxieties about data security, privacy and sovereignty, all of which were cited by a majority of respondents and in response to which the cloud industry needs to provide more practical guidance and comfort. It was also interesting to note that 41 percent of the participants did not want their data hosted outside the UK (sovereignty) and that this percentage increased for smaller businesses and public sector to exceed 50 percent. This is an interesting development as it reflects natural concerns driven by regulation (such as the Data Protection Act) but also has a sense of national law providing a higher level of comfort to cloud users. This is particularly relevant as it requires end users to understand where their potential data will reside in a hosted environment and requires the cloud industry to

ensure that it caters for clarity and choice in the design and delivery of SaaS and IaaS solutions as a one-size-fits all delivery will not meet all organisations requirements, regardless of c ost benefits. Adoption of cloud services relating to employee or customer data was perceived by most users as to be higher risk than any other IT activity. Again there is a lack of confidence and clarity surrounding the protection of data online that the industry should seek to educate the market on to build confidence and trust on this critical topic. Andy Burton, chair of the Cloud Industry Forum, stated: “The migration to the cloud has been rapid and its adoption is already widespread within all manner of organisations, from large enterprises to small businesses, and in both the public and private sectors. While satisfaction with cloud services is, at 94 percent, extremely high, what is truly remarkable is that cloud adoption is happening successfully across all types and sizes of organisation across every industry sector. This simultaneous move to a new type of technology-led business model is a rare and perhaps a unique phenomenon in business IT: it is usually only the large organisations and enterprises that can afford to be the pioneers of new technology.”

Big businesses can cut cost A new report shows how enterprises can make significant cost savings by taking an efficient approach to the management of their software assets. A report titled Managing Software Estates in the Enterprise puts forward the case for software asset management (SAM) within big businesses. It is the latest whitepaper from the Software Industry Research Board (SIRB), an association created by vendors including Microsoft, Symantec and FrontRange Solutions aimed at improving software management. Larger enterprises can spend tens of millions on technology annually, and software is one of the biggest single elements of enterprise technology, typically around a third of all IT spend. Enterprises could thus be losing millions through inefficient management of applications throughout their lifecycle. The report shows that by ensuring full visibility and easy management of every piece of software throughout the business, enterprises can ensure that they minimise the costs of software acquisition, rationalise licences, make use of redundant assets and protect themselves from financial penalties for accidental under-licensing. The SIRB chairman and FrontRange Solutions ITAM director, Matt Fisher, comments: “In these uncertain economic times, enterprises face the twin challenges of cutting costs, yet remaining competitive and ensuring that employees have access to the resources they need

8 VitAL : May / June 2011

to do their jobs effectively. With effective software asset management processes and technologies in place, enterprises can ensure they can keep track of the proliferation of the software applications that they increasingly rely on, ensuring that they eliminate any opportunity for overspend, whether through unnecessary software acquisition, inefficient use of existing assets or through fines for breach of licences. “Just as it would be unimaginable for any enterprise not to have full visibility of human or financial resources, it should be equally unthinkable for any large organisation to have no facility to keep track of software assets. That’s why we’ve made our latest report available to any enterprise that wants to turn software from a cost centre into a strategic asset.” In addition to the latest report, previous white papers and research articles published by the SIRB can be downloaded free of charge from www.sirb.co.uk.

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news

regulatory compliance is top concern in 2011

eGULATOrY COMpLIAnCe will be the top business issue affecting enterprise information technology in the next 12 to 18 months, according to a major new ISACA member survey of more than 2,400 IT, security, and audit and assurance managers from 126 countries worldwide. Conducted by IsACA, a global association serving more than 95,000 IT governance, assurance and security professionals, the survey found that the business issues that traditionally challenge its members – such as compliance, governance and information security management – continue to dominate the list, but the increase in regulations, data breaches and new technologies such as cloud computing and the rise of personal technology in the workplace are accelerating complexity and risk. The findings are available in Top Business/Technology Issues survey

Results 2011, offered as a free download at www.isaca.org/deliverables. “This year’s survey shows more clearly than ever that information technology cannot be managed in a vacuum. From the growing number of government regulations to consumer privacy concerns to hacktivist attacks, enterprise IT assets are being challenged in ways that go far beyond the server room,” said Tony noble, CIsA, a member of IsACA’s Guidance and Practices Committee and vice president of IT audit at viacom. “The study also reveals a marked perception that the business side of the organisation believes IT is managed in a silo, which indicates an opportunity for better aligning business with IT to unlock greater value.” According to IsACA the survey shows that there is a growing focus on enterprise-based

IT management and IT governance. This finding aligns with the IT Governance Institute’s global status report on GeIT, which showed that 95 percent of the C-level executives surveyed consider governance of enterprise IT important. According to the Top Business/Technology Issues survey, managing IT project risk tops the list of concerns within this area, rated as most important by 45 percent. Disaster recovery was also highlighted as an area for deep concern – more so in the wake of the earthquakes and tsunamis in Japan earlier this year. Despite advances in software, continuity remains an elusive goal according to the survey. The biggest problem (87 percent) is the lack of awareness among business managers that they are responsible for being able to maintain critical functions in the event of a disaster.

co-location cuts carbon footprint The top ten reasons for organisations to co-locate their data centres consist of the following:

UTTInG CArBOn footprint has been cited as one of the top ten reasons for co-locating a company’s data centre according to a report commissioned by Sentry42. According to the report, the majority of UK data centres are under 500ft2 and as a result the power cost and carbon emissions per rack are high – for many small to medium-sized data centres a co-location facility would providethe economies of scale that substantially reduce the overall power requirement, cost and associated carbon footprint. “Additionally,” commented sentry42’s managing director, Alex Rabbetts, “when a data centre represents a small part of an organisation’s overall activities it is rarely the focus of energy saving initiatives such as investment in new energy-efficient equipment. For co-location facilities this is ‘core business’ and we can afford to invest in the latest, greenest, data centre technology.” 10 VitAL : May / June 2011

1. Capex Savings. The credit crunch has focussed many companies on their ‘capex-free’ options – co-locating their data centre provides an opportunity to pay-as-you-go. 2. Service Reliability. Reliability and uptime are vital and co-locating means that companies can contract to the assurance of a 99.99 percent uptime guarantee. 3. disaster Recovery. Co-located data centre facilities invest substantially in infrastructure to protect against power outages and other external threats to service. 4. flexibility. Co-location services grow easily with the requirements of customer organisations – extra cabinets, power and bandwidth can usually be provisioned within hours. 5. Security. Co-located data centres are able to invest more in security than dedicated, stand-alone data centres. 6. Skills & Expertise. Co-located centres have dedicated full-time data centre management teams and their skills are maintained to a high level. 7. 24/7 Support. with a co-located facility, customer organisations are buying service reliability and this mean round-the-clock support provided by trained staff. 8. Remote control. Many co-located data centres offer customers remote monitoring tools as well as access to engineers on-site to make service modifications as required. 9. Quality of service. Co-located data centres offer service level agreements (sLAs) which allow organisations to make quality of service guarantees to their customers in turn. 10. It’s greener. Co-located data centres are the ‘greener’ choice for many organisations because of the power efficiencies provided by their scale and their investment in the latest equipment. www.vital-mag.net

COveR sTORY

Learning to lead The cliché states that highly technical IT professionals are not ‘people persons’, not good communicators and are not good at getting the best from their staff. And recent research from Google seems to back this view up. experienced executive coach and consultant Gill Graves is here to help.

12 VitAL : May / June 2011

www.vital-mag.net

COveR sTORY

AnAGerS WhO are technically and functionally competent are not getting the best results out of their staff. Many managers who lack important communication skills are struggling to build rapport with staff, which in turn is affecting business results. recent internal research by Google looking at the top eight management skills in the eyes of employees, saw ‘technical skills’ languishing at number eight; this confirms that management communication skills and the ability to build rapport with staff leads to improvement in organisational performance through better employee engagement. At the start of 2009 statisticians inside Google embarked on their biggest challenge to date – Project Oxygen. Far more important to the future of Google Inc than its next search algorithm or app, Project Oxygen set out to crack a burning conundrum – what makes a highly effective manager? After months of research Google produced ‘eight Habits of Highly effective Google Managers’. Initially top management were somewhat underwhelmed by the results with ‘empower your team and don’t micro-manage’ and ‘be a good coach and help your employees with career development’ all featuring, somewhat predictably, in the eight habits. However, a different pattern emerged when these ‘habits’ were ranked. ‘Have key technical skills so you can help advise the team’ was rated the eighth out of eight. Google’s recruitment culture was steeped in tradition – hire smart people, let them get on with the job; if they become stuck they’ll ask for help from their bosses whose deep technical expertise propelled them into management in the first place. Yet employees were now telling top management that what they most valued were bosses who were excellent communicators and who listened to their team, who made time for one to one meetings, who helped people solve problems by asking questions rather than supplying answers and who took an interest in employees’ lives and careers. Further probing all supported Project Oxygen’s

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initial findings. Managers were shown to have a greater impact on employees’ performance and how they felt about their job than any other factor.

emotionally intelligent leaders Although Project Oxygen was a Googlespecific research project, its finding are pertinent to many other technically-driven organisations. Fantastic individual performers are all too often promoted to managers without first acquiring the necessary skills to lead a team. Consequently too little time is spent communicating with team members and coaching them so that they continue to grow and develop. Google’s findings are hardly groundbreaking. In fact many would argue that they simply reinforce the importance of having emotionally intelligent leaders, rather than relying solely on promoting bright individuals with high IQs. Daniel Goleman, a renowned researcher in this field, has argued the case for emotional intelligence for several years, creating the well-known model depicting the four tenets of emotional intelligence – self awareness, self control, social awareness and relationship management. Back in 1998 Goleman wrote: “Moreover, my analysis showed that emotional intelligence played an increasingly important role at the highest levels of the company, where differences in technical skills are of negligible importance. In other words, the higher the rank of a person considered to be a star performer, the more emotional intelligence capabilities showed up as the reason for his or her effectiveness. when I compared star performers with average ones in senior leadership positions, nearly 90 percent of the difference in their profiles was attributable to emotional intelligence factors rather than cognitive abilities.”

Fantastic individual performers are all too often promoted to managers without first acquiring the necessary skills to lead a team. Consequently too little time is spent communicating with team members and coaching them so that they continue to grow and develop.

honing your communications skills ‘All very interesting, but what’s the solution?’ you may be asking. How can highly technically skilled managers hone their communication skills? May / June 2011 : VitAL 13

COveR sTORY

These are skills that we can all learn and skills that pay off many times over – whether we want to influence our boss, make more sales, make change happen, mobilise support for our cause or inspire our people. Here is my top five tips for communicating and presenting yourself with impact: 1. Present your compelling vision. Articulate a clear vision and strategy for your team so that, even amid turmoil and change, the team can keep focussed on the goals and strategy. Think about how you present your message. Headline what you are going to say. Make the title thoughtprovoking, intriguing and exciting so that even before you start speaking your audience is eagerly anticipating what you are about to say. Be specific. Use positive language – focus on what you want to achieve rather than what you don’t want or want to avoid. vividly describe what success will be like. what will the team be seeing, hearing and feeling when they have achieved their goal? Begin with the end in mind. 2. own your message. Always totally own the message you are presenting. Make it yours and make it in your own words. Consider the impact of the following two statements. ‘we’re carrying out appraisals because HR say we have to’ versus ‘Appraisals are very important to this organisation and I want to make sure we get the most out of this’. with the first statement there is no ownership and an attempt to side-step taking responsibility. In the second statement the speaker takes full responsibility for the outcome (regardless of his/her personal opinion). Far more impactful! 3. Build rapport. ‘express interest in employees’ success and well-being’ features highly in Google’s top criteria. 14 VitAL : May / June 2011

when asked what exactly this meant employees spoke of managers getting to know team members as people with lives outside of work and of the importance of making new team members feel welcome and part of the team. Genuine interest cannot be faked. Genuine interest goes beyond a quick ‘how are you?’ Put another way being genuinely interested in our team members and outstanding them as individuals is about building rapport with them. It’s about taking time to talk to people, to listen, or rather to actively listen to them as unique individuals. Taking time to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes and consider what is important to them. what are their needs? what do they want from us as their manager? The impact we create is ultimately a combination of three things: the words we use, the tone/volume/pitch/ modulation of our voice and our body language. Are these all in alignment for us so that our message is clear and consistent? Are we using all three to maximise our impact? 4. engage all the senses. All too often communication is purely verbal. A conversation consisting of words alone, many of which will be instantly forgotten once the interaction has ended. Individuals have different preferences for taking in and processing information. some of us like to see images – be it pictures, PowerPoint slides, graphs or video clips. Others will be more sensitive to feelings and emotions – the general ambiance of the meeting, how much of the message was put in a personal context. whereas some will be more auditory and tune into the words used, the voice tone and volume and need time for discussion. Practise enriching

your message by engaging all the senses, be it in a formal presentation or a less formal meeting. Use images and words to bring your message to life and tap into the feelings and emotions of your audience. 5. Use inﬂuential language. The language we use can either enhance or limit the impact we make. Consider the impact of the following sentences. ‘I am going to try and give you an overview of the project’ and ‘I’m going to give you an overview of the project’. which sentence has more impact? I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s the second. with the first there is an element of risk – I might succeed but equally I might not! whereas the second statement has no inbuilt element of doubt. Focus on what can be done, rather than focussing on what can’t be done. ‘Can’t’ sounds final whereas ‘can’t yet’ leaves the door open. In times of change and uncertainty get the team to step into the future and imagine what it will be like when the change is implemented or the new project is live and fully operational. Invite team members to create their own images of success.

Doing more with less The Google research highlights the need for highly professional technical and functional managers to hone their communication skills and so, become better leaders. Managers require a range of non-technical skills, for example providing feedback, coaching, listening, building rapport, setting goals, handling meetings and asking questions. At a time when many organisations are trying to do more with less, a low cost solution for enhancing productivity is to equip managers with the ‘soft skills’ they need to become highly effective. VitAL www.iridiumconsulting.co.uk www.vital-mag.net

vital sIGns: LIFe In THe wORLD wITH IT

Entropy

Steve White has been playing with IT sandcastles.

At a time when many organisations are trying to do more with less, a low cost solution for enhancing productivity is to equip managers with the ‘soft skills’ they need to become highly effective.

www.vital-mag.net

’M A fan of professor Brian Cox. While I already knew most of what he has recently said on the Solar System and the Universe, I can sit with my kids and watch him articulate complicated research results with passion and clarity, and they now understand new things. And one concept which was so beautifully presented recently, in the form of a sandcastle, is entropy. entropy is almost the only quantity in the physical sciences that requires a particular direction for time; physicists call it an ‘arrow of time’. As one goes ‘forward’ in time, the second law of thermodynamics says that the entropy of an isolated system will increase. Hence, from one perspective, entropy measurement is a way of distinguishing the past from the future. while the physics is interesting, practicalities are that I battle entropy at home every day – I tidy up on a given saturday and create an environment of low entropy, but my children – my little entropy engines – go around leaving their stuff all over the house and by the following saturday morning there is a high degree of entropy which needs to be cleared up. Are service organisations battling (at this level of order versus chaos) entropy? A support organisation would be perfect if no-one changed the system, so if the IT support organisation requires a low degree of entropy to deliver a stable environment, then there are two different approaches they can take to risk – risk management and risk avoidance. Management indicates that risks can be taken, that there is a probability of disaster and that the event will be managed if the risk does not come off. Risk avoidance suggests that if there is a risk, that risk is managed out. I also see that there is a much bigger development of entropy going on in the IT world. Once, there were mainframes

and entropy was low, people in brown lab coats looked after the equipment and all was good. now there is talk of how IT support organisations handle the ‘second screen’ in training and business, and educational establishments are contemplating a tech classroom which contains a teacher, a whiteboard and students who have personally provided themselves with a tablet or other device through which they have independent access to content which is ‘off corporate net’. A bus is being driven through the control the IT department had on employee access to information, and there will come a time when the corporate network and the personally provided devices are in direct competition for attention. Do we ban personally provided devices with screens in the workplace or school? Do we embrace the new technology and slowly do away with centrally provided hardware, and ride the tide of personally provided devices? will employees provide their own access devices with the IT department providing policy, applications and infrastructure only? This is entropy on a worldwide scale – the previous computing order is turning to chaos, and IT will be a totally different landscape for many companies in the next few years. I used to think that the complexity of the IT that is being deployed would lead to a ‘nuclear Disaster’ event, where a large company would catastrophically collapse as a direct result of over-complex IT, and that it would be of such a size that CIOs around the world would refocus their effort on stability over features. I believe that while an IT ‘nuclear Meltdown’ is inevitable, it will not stop the tide of entropy, the arrow of time will continue on and IT will only become ever more complex, more fractured, harder to manage and harder to support. VitAL May / June 2011 : VitAL 15

vitAL MAnAGeMenT

Anytime, anyplace, anywhere IT support Dr Andy Harter Harter, CeO of realvnC looks at the evolution of remote IT support and how it is transforming the role of the service desk .

AST AnD efficient IT support has never been more important. We have become so reliant on technology that without our powerful computing devices and broadband connections work as we know it, simply comes to a grinding halt. The traditional role of the IT support team has been somewhat like the AA. At the first sign of trouble, they would get a call and despatch an IT technician with seemingly mystical powers for a desk-side visit to remedy problems facing their less tech savvy colleagues. while effective in terms of identifying and fixing IT issues, call outs are a time-consuming solution which can be costly if employees are spread across buildings, sites or countries; and unfeasible if employees are constantly working on the road or from home.

16 VitAL : May / June 2011

As organisations embraced more and more sophisticated, complex and disparate technology, the demands on the IT support teams also increased, leading to the introduction of first line telephone support and the drive to encourage self-help through online diagnosis and FAQs. But self-help can prove frustrating and un-productive for the end user, while conducting troubleshooting and stepby-step problem fixing over the telephone with reluctant non-techies can be challenging and time consuming. Around a decade ago, a major innovation in IT support started to appear. For the first time, IT technicians could gain direct access and take control of problem desktops remotely without the need for a desk-side visit. One of the original technologies was

vnC â&#x20AC;&#x201C; or virtual network Computing â&#x20AC;&#x201C; developed by engineers in Cambridge. As the software was made open source, millions of people downloaded it for a wide range of applications from accessing remote documents and files to fixing the PCs of relatives and friends without having to visit. now fully re-engineered and commercialised by the original developers, vnC is used for a wide range of business applications from remote IT maintenance, IT helpdesk support, home-working, business collaboration and training.

Feel the benefits Using remote support technology such as vnC, an IT technician at one computer can simply access and control another computer, www.vital-mag.net

vital management

irrelevant of its location, just as though they were right in front of it. VNC supports a wide range of operating systems, from Windows and Macintosh through to UNIX, making it ideal for multiplatform environments. The business benefits of this are not difficult to see. As the IT support team no longer has to make desk-side visits in order to troubleshoot and fix problems, faults are resolved quickly, downtime is reduced, and ticket throughput is increased. The result is improved IT productivity and better resource utilisation as technicians can be freed up to provide expertise in other areas. In addition to providing remote troubleshooting, VNC technology can be used for routine administration, maintenance and software upgrades for both desktops and servers. This can be done from home or a remote location in a different time zone, eliminating after hours trips to the office and reducing disruption to employees during the working day. Manufacturing companies are also adopting anytime, anywhere remote support to keep critical production systems up and running 24/7. Boston Valley Terra Cotta, a specialist manufacturer of pottery, uses VNC to allow IT support staff around the clock access to production systems in order to mitigate the risk of costly downtime or faulty products.

Good for the environment While pressure on support budgets is driving the push to increase productivity and reduce support costs, organisations are also under increasing pressure to be more aware of the negative impact that their operations might have on the environment and improve their www.vital-mag.net

green credentials. Simply reducing the number of service trips – whether local or long distance – can have a dramatic impact on cutting the carbon footprint of support operations. The IT support team at legal firm Berwin Leighton Paisner based in central London is able to support their offices in Abu Dhabi, Brussels, Paris and Singapore. In addition, the firm also uses the same technology for collaborative working as well as training new starters in its overseas offices to avoid air travel and time out. Another organisation that avoids making a drama out of an IT crisis is the Royal Shakespeare Company. With over 500 production staff responsible for putting on performances to over half a million theatre goers every year, VNC allows its IT helpdesk team to remotely access PCs or laptops anywhere in the world and provide remote monitoring for box offices and support for electronic kiosks to ensure a perfect performance every time. While in Australia, Interflora is using remote access technology across its entire network of retailers. The instore PCs used for inventory control and ordering can now be supported by the IT team in Interflora’s Melbourne HQ without travelling from one side of the country to the other – and ensuring customers can always say it with flowers. These examples highlight how remote support for front of house or front of store computers is vital in the delivery of good customer service and should form part of a full holistic remote support strategy embracing employees, systems and customers. In the public sector too, remote support is playing its part with government agencies such as health services, fire and rescue, May / June 2011 : VitAL 17

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local councils and law enforcement bodies recognising the opportunities for cost savings and wider societal benefits. In the case of Dublin City Council the technology is used to monitor and maintain systems that manage the city’s road network, helping prevent disruption to road users; while Alexandria Police Department in the US has issued every patrol officer with a ruggedised computer with VNC installed. This means that problems can be resolved without returning to HQ, which keeps cops on the beat. In addition to in-house IT support, product and system companies are using the technology to deliver remote troubleshooting and support. FujiFilm in the UK uses VNC to support its medical imaging equipment used in hospitals, vets, clinics, chiropractors and even on cruise liners. Engineers at FujiFilm’s Medical Systems Strategic Business Unit (SBU) can fix most problems immediately without travelling long distances to make on-site visits. With customers spread across the UK, Ireland and Channel Islands, this has significantly reduced support costs and enhanced service levels. Previously, engineers would have to travel to remote parts of the Scottish Isles simply to adjust the image colour or change a setting.

Going mobile Today’s IT infrastructure is increasingly mobile, driven by ubiquitous broadband and a new generation of smartphones and tablets that are as powerful as many desktops. For IT support, this presents an opportunity and a challenge. The same remote access technology used to allow one computer to take control of another computer has now migrated to mobile platforms. This means that IT support can troubleshoot and fix faults, 18 VitAL : May / June 2011

literally from wherever they are. This ability adds a new level of immediacy if something goes wrong out of hours or while key support staff are on holiday. There are even VNC apps for the iPhone, iPad and the increasing range of Android smartphones and tablets. Conversely, a growing number of employees use these same devices for accessing email, files and corporate applications on their remote machines. This facility also acts as a contingency should they be unable to get into the office due to sickness, snow or even volcanic ash clouds.

Beneath the OS One potential limitation of remote access technology is that it requires the operating system on the machine under investigation to be running. This is changing as Intel is now embedding VNC directly onto its new generation of Core™ vPro™ processors. The convergence of these technologies gives IT technicians additional management capabilities such as remote reboot and even IDE redirection. This means that complex issues such as OS failures and boot record corruption can be remedied remotely, without needing to visit the problem systems. Companies can also save energy with better power management of PCs due to power on/off functionality. It is clear that technology will continue to play an increasingly important role in our work and leisure time, and to reduce the inconvenience of long periods of downtime the focus on support and helpdesks will only intensify. While remote support is not a panacea; those businesses that harness the technology will see gains in productivity, cost-savings and reduced travel, helping the environment at the same time. VitAL www.realvnc.com

To infinity and beyond When you are perched on the summit of Hawaii’s dormant Mauna Kea Volcano, remote access is more than a luxury. That is the case for scientists and engineers working on the world’s largest optical and infrared telescopes at the W M Keck Observatory. By deploying VNC technology, screens from the giant twin telescopes are displayed on desktops at the Observatory’s headquarters in Kamuela, on Hawaii’s Big Island, as well as at research facilities across the United States mainland. It is also being used to provide remote control and management capabilities for Keck’s engineers and IT administrators who can make round-the-clock adjustments, trouble-shoot, perform upgrades and install new software. And at Telesat Canada – the world’s fourth largest fixed satellite service operator – VNC technology is used throughout its Satellite Control Networks for remote access to a wide range of Windows, Linux and UNIX based systems. Engineers and flight dynamic experts can monitor the status of Telesat satellites and manage remote base stations. VNC also helps antenna specialists control the radio dish drive systems that track the satellites in orbit; and with a number of sites located from Spain and Austria to Brazil and across North America, it allows problems to be fixed instantly and dramatically reduces the time and cost of engineers travelling to remote facilities.

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vitAL MAnAGeMenT

Cutting the cost and complexity of password resets Marlon Bowser of hTK looks at how new technology can help when we canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t remember our passwords.

20 VitAL : May / June 2011

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vital management

eports of the death of the password have been greatly exaggerated. In fact, despite fears that passwords aren’t secure enough and the appearance of alternative methods of authentication such as fingerprint scanners, tokens and smartcards, we are using them more than ever. According to IDC, in a 10,000 user organisation the average employee will have 14 different corporate passwords to remember; and with more devices and applications being added to the enterprise and the growing popularity of cloud computing, this number is only likely to increase. Not only do we have more passwords to remember, they are getting more complicated. With growing threats to corporate data from sophisticated attacks and the fear that weak passwords can be compromised, organisations are setting increasingly strong security polices. They may mandate that users cannot use easily discovered words such as pet names or favourite football clubs. Stronger passwords using at least eight characters, with upper and lower case and including at least one number, is a typical rule, but of course this makes them much harder to recall. And when you add the fact that passwords often have to be changed on a regular basis as part of the company policy, it’s no surprise that forgotten passwords and scheduled password changes can account for up to 25 percent of a helpdesk’s activity.

Service desk under strain Without a doubt, password resets put a strain on IT helpdesk resources, costing between £20 and £40 every time. This can amount to thousands of pounds a year and at a time when IT budgets are more stretched than ever before it’s an area that organisations must address. It’s not just the strain in IT that needs to be considered. Calling the helpdesk to reset a forgotten password takes time and means users are unproductive while they are locked out. And what happens out of office hours? With an increasingly flexible and mobile workforce it is commonplace for people to be working hours outside the traditional nine to five, or they may simply be in a different time zone. In many cases these users will lose valuable time while they wait until the helpdesk opens. www.vital-mag.net

Stronger passwords using at least eight characters, with upper and lower case and including at least one number, is a typical rule, but of course this makes them much harder to recall. And when you add the fact that passwords often have to be changed on a regular basis as part of the company policy, it’s no surprise that forgotten passwords and scheduled password changes can account for up to 25 percent of a helpdesk’s activity.

May / June 2011 : VitAL 21

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Anything that can help automate and speed up the password reset process, without compromising security, will cut IT costs and avoid down-time when employees can’t access systems and resources.

Getting the balance right Web-based self service solutions exist that enable users to reset their passwords online and certainly these can help. Typically, these automated solutions will use a registered email address or known information such as mother’s maiden name to initiate the process. But it’s not hard to see why these are flawed. Most questions asked are relatively simple for a third party to discover; and in fact sometimes easier than guessing a weak password in the first place. Once a password is reset by a third party, the damage is done. One way round this is to make the questions harder; but then you are faced with the likelihood that the legitimate user will not remember the answers. An example of this is ‘memorable place’ – unless the user is disciplined in password management, months down the line they may not remember if it was a favourite holiday destination, home town or where they walk the dogs on a Sunday. This is one of password security’s biggest problems. The more secure you make a system the more difficult it is to gain legitimate access. Getting the balance right is difficult and all too often results in a relaxing of security policy. Another major problem with web-based solutions is that they require web access. It may well be that the user is locked out of their PC or laptop altogether. And even if they can access the web, the reset may require validation through an email to complete the process. It is also important to remember that accessing the web from an internet café, for example, or ‘borrowing’ a colleague’s PC login could in itself create a security hole with no audit trail.

Password reset solutions In an attempt to find another way, a new generation of password reset solutions have emerged that attempt to overcome the problems with simple web-based solutions, while also ensuring that password resets are automated, quick and easy and don’t compromise either security or productivity. With new self-service solutions, such as HTKs hosted password reset service, users 22 VitAL : May / June 2011

simply call an IVR (Interactive Voice Response) service and are taken through a set of predefined steps for identification and verification. This enables multi-factor security to be defined and set up without the need for users to remember complicated Q&As or carry a dedicated security token. Organisations simply choose from a range authentication options, depending on the level of security required, including recognition of the registered phone number, the keyed-entry of digits, biometric speaker verification using a pre-enrolled passphrase, and even a ‘challenge-question and response’ using SMS text messaging. This gives organisations the flexibility to tailor authentication options to specific user-groups and, depending on the level of access required and the sensitivity of the data, to provide an optimal blend of security and convenience.

Voice recognition The use of voice recognition is made possible by the recent advances in the latest IVR-based biometric technology that can achieve an ‘equal-error rate’ of just 3 percent. But these systems can also be configured to ask for additional information – such as a numeric PIN – if the confidence-level is below a defined threshold. SMS and email notifications can also be configured to let users know that their password has been reset, or to alert a system administrator when a reset has been attempted but blocked. Having this ability to deliver a range of real-time notifications adds a further layer of security and confidence. Any biometric password reset solution should be integrated with corporate directories such as Microsoft Active Directory, LDAP and other password systems and be certified with the ISO27001international standard for information security management. Getting the balance right between ensuring passwords can be easily reset at any time, in any place, while also ensuring that security policy is not relaxed, no longer has to mean a compromise or a time-consuming and expensive 24/7 helpdesk. By implementing an IVR-based service the problems are solved; not only cutting the time and cost in dealing with password resets, but ensuring that that users always have a fast and convenient way to secure access to their corporate networks. VitAL www.htk.co.uk

The use of voice recognition is made possible by the recent advances in the latest IVR-based biometric technology that can achieve an ‘equal-error rate’ of just 3 percent. But these systems can also be configured to ask for additional information – such as a numeric PIN – if the confidencelevel is below a defined threshold.

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vitAL InTeRvIew

Raising the standard for IT The Institution of engineering and Technology (IeT) is targeting IT practitioners with its ICTTech award standard. vitAL spoke to the Institution’s ICTTech product manager, Jane Black.

he InSTITUTIOn of engineering and Technology is a professional body for those working in engineering and technology in the United Kingdom and worldwide. It is the largest professional society for engineers and technologists in europe with over 150,000 members in 127 countries around the world, making it a truly global organisation. Its aim is to be a professional home for life for its members supporting them throughout their careers. The IeT has teams of experts looking at issues such as energy, transport, ICT, design and production, education, and the built environment, but recently its attention has been drawn to the increasingly important disciplines of the IT sector and it has specifically tailored its ICTTech award standard for IT professionals. In the wider engineering and technology world, the IeT assists the UK Parliament and

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government in making public policy and it is helping to plug the shortage of future engineers and technologists by working in schools to show young people the benefits of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (sTeM) careers. It provides around £200,000 every year in awards and scholarships and gives undergraduates and post-graduates scholarships of up to £10,000. It grants Chartered engineer, Incorporated engineer, ICT Technician and engineering Technician designations. not reliant on taxpayers’ money, the IeT has an annual turnover of £55 million and most of its surplus is recycled back into its products and services. Bringing together engineering and technology expertise in an environment that is non-partisan and not-for-profit, the IeT is based purely on the best evidence and research. www.vital-mag.net

vital interview

“We see the IET as the home for life for organisational support and development for engineering and technology professionals from start to finish through all the different stages. We aim to offer help and support throughout our members’ careers.

Rolling out to the IT sector As ICTTech product manager, Jane Black has responsibility at the IET for rolling the award out to IT professionals. Like many people who find themselves involved in IT she didn’t start out in the field, in fact she graduated in Biological Sciences and Education. Working with the IET for almost nine years, she started in the Academic Accreditation Department, going to UK and international universities as part of a team to give an independent review and international benchmark of the engineering and technology programmes (including IT). It was during this time that she started to gain an understanding of IT education. In 2009, the IET along with the Engineering Council launched its then new professional award ICTTech aimed at individual practitioners supporting the users of IT systems and applications. Black started to become involved in the ICTTech award when she joined the Global Operations department focusing on developing the Indian and Chinese markets, including the professional awards. Her main focus now is supporting and developing the ICTTech award and the Institution’s interaction with the IT industry. The IET helped to develop the SFIA framework, giving a common reference for the ICT industry, it continues to work closely with the Foundation Committee as it adopts the framework to meet the needs of industry. As the ICTTech is linked to SFIA Framework at level 3, Black has also been trained in implementing and using the SFIA Framework in the work environment.

A historical presence in technology The Institution has a long and distinguished history. “The IET was formed in 1871 as a membership organisation for telegraph www.vital-mag.net

engineers,” says Black. “It has been through many changes in the last 100 years or so. It now has around 150,000 members around the world in 127 countries, in the information technology and engineering sectors. A typical member is an engineering or IT practitioner, which could cover anything from a humble technician right the way up to Nobel Prize winners. “The organisation as we know it today became the IET in 2006. Our focus is on the sharing of knowledge to support the engineering and technology sectors, including IT. Our products include everything from specialist books, periodicals and publications, an extensive programme of technical talks on a range of subjects to a database for research. Our focus is firmly on sharing knowledge. “We also support professional development and run courses on subjects from project management to presenting skills and professional development. We support companies with graduate development schemes and go into universities to support their technology programmes. We also go into schools and colleges, offering information and running competitions. We organise and run four professional awards programmes plus a whole lot more. “We see the IET as the home for life for organisational support and development for engineering and technology professionals from start to finish through all the different stages. We aim to offer help and support throughout our members’ careers. We have offices in Beijing and Hong Kong in China, Bangalore in India, New Jersey in the USA as well as in Stevenage here in the UK. The IET aims to support the development of people in the engineering and technology sectors – and the individuals and companies who interact throughout that sector across the May / June 2011 : VitAL 25

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“Beyond the ICTTech standard, we would like to give greater access to IT Professionals to our other professional awards Incorporated engineer and Chartered engineer standards are written generically, so those working in a range of roles and industries can apply their skills and knowledge to meet them. we are trying to put it in a context where those in the industry can understand and relate to it.”

26 VitAL : May / June 2011

globe, from childhood – supporting teachers in schools – through to universities with tools set up to help on courses and into careers and occupations.”

Products and services As an institution, the IeT has much to offer the IT professional. “In the IT arena, the IeT offers the ICTTech, a professional qualification aimed at practitioners and users in the IT field. The engineering Council sets the standards which we are licensed to deliver. The knowledgesharing products we provide are also getting more specialised in the IT area. As IT has become more important and more information is coming out of the sector we have seen more interest in and have become more focused on the IT sector,” says Black. “The IT industry as a whole is at a very interesting point in its development; it is becoming a global industry and IT issues are coming over into the mainstream media every day. As never before there is now a need for IT practitioners to be seen as a professional workforce – a visible professional group across the globe – the ability to benchmark knowledge and experience is crucial to this process. we need to know that those working in, say, Bangalore have the same standards and abilities as those working at the same level in the Us, UK or China,” she adds.

serving the customer “The ICTTech standard is for individuals – to give them the chance to demonstrate they have the knowledge and experience of working in specific areas,” explains Black; “but it is also suitable for companies and organisations. If they can say they have professionally registered staff and members, the benefit is there for the company, but it is really about individual competence. Our customers are individuals and also companies. “Beyond the ICTTech standard, we would like to give greater access to IT Professionals to our other professional awards Incorporated engineer and Chartered engineer standards are written generically, so those working in a range of roles and industries can apply their skills and knowledge to meet them. we are trying to put it in a context where those in the industry can understand and relate to it.

“But we are starting off with ICT Tech at the practitioner level in the UK and rolling it out to India which is also a very important geographical area. It is a means of demonstrating that your workforce is at the right standard and I predict that people using outsourced IT expertise will start to demand professional registration in these contractors and independent benchmarking for their staff. And the organisations contracting should also be professionally registered themselves to lead the way and set the example.”

a commitment to corporate responsibility In spite of what seems to be an overarching focus on the bottom line in the wider IT sector, Jane Black still sees the importance of an emphasis on corporate responsibility. “An important part of being a professional engineer is to sign a code of conduct stressing commitment to reducing your impact on the environment,” she says. “They have to demonstrate their personal responsibility for their carbon footprint. They should be considering the impact of everything they do, even down to switching off a monitor at the end of the day or following the industry standards and codes. These are the things we will be looking for; making sure they are aware of them and abide by them too.” And it isn’t just corporate responsibility that may be affected by the economy. “we have noticed that the need and demand for professional registration increases in hard times because people need that extra advantage, something to put them a step ahead of the competition, to succeed in an era of cuts and redundancies,” says Black. “Also in this era, the IT services industry can really not afford to get things wrong and this fact too will fuel a drive for greater professionalism.”

moving ahead As an organisation at the cutting edge, clearly the IeT can’t stand still. “As I mentioned before, we hope to move from the ICTTech standard to give greater access and understanding of the Incorporated engineer and Chartered engineer standards in the IT sector. But we www.vital-mag.net

vitAL InTeRvIew

are taking this a step at a time and making sure it is demanded and wanted by the industry and that we have the resources to do it properly. we are also always looking to develop our partnerships with companies and organisations, including the larger IT suppliers,” says Black. “Benchmarking on a wide global stage is increasingly important and this is where we fit in. I believe that the IT industry is at an interesting point in its development. As companies become more global the need to create a more visibly professional work force across the globe will become more important and the ability to benchmark their knowledge and experience to their clients and the wider public and uphold professional and ethical standards becomes ever more important,” concludes Jane Black. VitAL www.theiet.org

The IET at work – The world was introduced to the idea of fibre optics through the IeT. Fibre optics are now the back bone of the internet and mobile phone network. – every qualified electrician in the UK uses the IeT wiring regulations. – Right now IeT members are working on major projects in China, India and the UK – on projects like the 2012 Olympics. – The institution is at the forefront of thinking on the UK’s future smart grid system. – Its volunteers work in hundreds of schools across the UK helping young people find out how exciting it is to work in technology or engineering

“we have noticed that the need and demand for professional registration increases in hard times because people need that extra advantage, something to put them a step ahead of the competition, to succeed in an era of cuts and redundancies,” says Black. “Also in this era, the IT services industry can really not afford to get things wrong and this fact too will fuel a drive for greater professionalism.”

– The IeT has the world’s largest tool for research and discovery in physics and engineering, called ‘Inspec’, with over 11 million abstracts.

www.vital-mag.net

May / June 2011 : VitAL 27

vitAL sUPPORT

Internal IT Services as a Business Is it time for internal IT services to behave more like businesses? Noel Bruton says it’s one of the best ways of overcoming IT’s ‘techie’ culture.

n The face of it, the IT department is a section of the corporation serving the information and communication needs of the business. Its primary focus is technology, its people are largely engineers. This is one way of looking at IT, but it is one-sided and divisive. It is the view from outside IT. Technology? engineers? These are simplistic terms, mere categorisations. The problem comes when the IT department comes to see itself in these terms, in other words adopting a view of itself as created by those who never really understood IT in the first place.

It culture This misconception is of course often assisted by IT’s internal structure and culture, an all too typical scenario. Our technological legacy means that management attention and remuneration tend to go to those who have the most experience, and this experience tends to be technical. Too often this can cause senior 28 VitAL : May / June 2011

technicians to get promoted in order to stop them from leaving, because the system says they can only be paid more if they are given management rank. This is especially problematical in the public sector, where market forces usually apply with less impact than a committeedesigned, union-negotiated, uniform grading structure. so we find ourselves promoting people beyond their level of competence. The risk is that these appointees continue to be technicians and make a hash of their management responsibilities. In the middle of all this, we are under pressure to improve the service ethos in IT. But that’s immensely difficult because our departmental managers are predominantly ex-technologists. However, we find there’s a part of IT that apparently already has a service culture – namely the first line, known as the ‘helpdesk’ or ‘service Desk’, because they talk to the users all the time – so we send that group on customer service courses to www.vital-mag.net

vital support

make them even better at the ‘customer service’ side of things, while the deeper technicians often get to avoid those courses because they see themselves as having been promoted beyond the need to provide a service as such. So we have now made a faithful nod in the direction of ‘customer service’. We have all the calls go through the helpdesk, where service culture has been concentrated. We’ve also pulled off the political coup of simultaneously exonerating all other parts of IT from having a service responsibility. And meanwhile, we can now brag that we have a service culture because the helpdesk call-takers have been on a customer service course. In other words, it is a common failure to see IT as a technocracy first, which happens to provide services to customers, with the merest, almost grudging acknowledgement of the service imperative at the heart of what we do. You can see this in the industry press. How often do you see an article about service management design, delivery and technique in the industry’s leading titles ‘Computer Weekly’ or ‘Computing’?

Another way is to see IT as a business that merely exploits the raw material of technical knowledge for its core purpose of providing services.

IT Services as a business It starts from a reconsideration of exactly what the IT department is. We’re often accused of not being sufficiently ‘business-aware’. The business itself can claim this accolade, because it has external, paying customers or clients, whereas we, apparently, do not. Too often, the accusation is well founded. While we continue to see ourselves as a discreet department within a business, I would argue, the foundations of that accusation will remain firm. Another way of seeing the IT group, however, is as a business in itself rather than as a functional department. IT has everything any business would have: • A market (the userbase); • Untapped opportunities within that market (use of ‘vertical’ applications with imported user support, new business needs, new versions of technologies etc); • A set of products and services;

We find ourselves promoting people beyond their level of competence. The risk is that these appointees continue to be technicians and make a hash of their management responsibilities.

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Simply submit your CV to find out more: icttech@theiet.org www.theiet.org /icttech The Institution of Engineering and Technology is registered as a Charity in England & Wales (no 211014) and Scotland (no SCO38698). The Institution of Engineering and Technology, Michael Faraday House, Six Hills Way, Stevenage, SG1 2AY

www.vital-mag.net

May / June 2011 : VitAL 29

vitAL sUPPORT

It is a common failure to

acknowledgement of

• A production line (the various end-to-end services and processes that produce them); • Resources (staff, skills, technology) to produce those services; • Identiﬁable cost of production. In fact, about the only factor missing from that list is an identifiable profit or margin above our production cost. Or even if the accounts system in the corporation does not allow for individual departments to profit off others, then perhaps what is missing is a range of formulas for cost-justification. If we could complete that list and view the IT department from that standpoint, then customer service would become as much a part of our modus operandi as it is for the business proper. Instead of seeing ‘the business’ as a parent, let us see them as our marketplace.

the service imperative

the consequence of competition

see IT as a technocracy first, which happens to provide services to customers, with the merest, almost grudging

at the heart of what we do. You can see this in the industry press. How often do you see an article about service management design, delivery and technique in the industry’s leading titles ‘Computer weekly’ or ‘Computing’?

30 VitAL : May / June 2011

Once we start to look at it that way, we start to see other commercial factors creeping into our philosophy. Chief among these is the concept of competition. It may appear, because our user base is effectively a captive market, that we are free from the ravages of competition, but this is not so. Competition arises when there are several suppliers or potential suppliers of the same thing. Perhaps the users have to get their computer equipment from us, because it must be connected to the corporate network, which we own and administrate. That’s a monopoly, not competition. Perhaps the users must always call the helpdesk for user support, because we’ve stipulated for the purposes of controlling support costs that all enquiries must be formally logged. so our helpdesk too is a monopoly. But that’s not the point – this type of monopoly is a mirage. First, they certainly may get their kit from us, but that doesn’t stop them reading the computer magazines and finding that in the real world, computers often cost a third of what we charge for twice the processing power and features. second, the rule may state ‘log all enquiries with the helpdesk’ but that doesn’t stop the users from first asking each other. There are two ways to deal with competition. One is to remove it from the marketplace by a takeover. I’ve seen this done, in a company that used several vertical applications in addition to its standard, horizontal office software. The specialised software and associated support were provided by external parties, often trading directly with specific groups of users. In some

cases, the only thing IT services knew about these, was that they existed and servers had to be provided to house them. But the service Manager had other ideas. He knew that his department was not the only group providing some form of IT support to the users, and that the standards of those alternative support offerings varied enormously. so he determined to set an overall standard for IT product and service provision to the corporation’s users, regardless of source. He then made that insistence on these external companies and took full responsibility for their performance. In effect, he acquired those external provisions because in terms of service quality they must report not to the users who engaged them, but to the IT services department. The other way to tackle competition is to defeat it by adding value to our own provision. If the user sees his request as being satisfied solely by the provision of a hard product or solution to his enquiry, then that licenses him to seek alternative providers of that product or solution. But our response should be to take the focus away from the hard end-product – to make the user value it not for what it is, but for what it means. For example, we don’t just deliver technical answers, we do that in the context of an ownership-taking service, to guaranteed availability and response times – sure, Mr. User, you could ask the bloke next door – but does he guarantee to be available to you and to fix your problem, as we do? IT services delivers its offerings to a captive market. nevertheless, competition exists in that market. I believe that the acknowledgement of this existence of competition is a crucial philosophical leap in seeing our own function as a business in its own right. with that leap having been taken, then IT services must necessarily be as ‘business aware’ as the corporation that hosts it – simply because it too is a business. Therefore, all the functions of IT, including those placed furthest from the users, can be said to be at least as ‘business aware’ as those employees of the corporation at large who are similarly removed from the commercial front line. VitAL www.noelbruton.com The above is based on an extract from Noel’s book, ‘Managing the IT Services Process’. For more information on Noel Bruton’s work as an independent consultant and trainer in IT user support management and practice, call 01559 370270, Email noel@noelbruton.com or see his extensive Website at www.noelbruton.com. www.vital-mag.net

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If this is an area that is of interest then the latest in our series of free breakfast briefings is just for you. In an open and relaxed atmosphere, some of our clients will be sharing their service transition experiences. The session will also allow you to make contacts with like minded people who have been through, or are going through, this challenging exercise.

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vitAL MAnAGeMenT

Improving healthcare with IT implementation Neil Malcolm, service review manager at Oxfordshire Country Council assesses the importance of procuring an easy-to-use, ﬂexible and responsive IT booking system for the local health authority in ensuring that carers are supported and respite care opportunities are maximised.

he pOpULATIOn of the UK is ageing and consequently, the focus of service commissioners throughout the country has begun to shift towards ensuring that the social care sector is adequately prepared for these changes. Oxfordshire County Council has recognised a need to improve its respite care booking procedure, with approximately 100,000 citizens over the age of 65 populating the area.

the challenges of an ageing society with one of the most dispersed rural populations in the south east, Oxfordshire’s ageing population can make supporting carers a particularly challenging task. we realised the need to improve the productivity of our investment in short break bed capacity, while improving the quality of service we provide. In order to achieve this, a responsive respite care IT booking system, which could automate the booking process and provide greater management of the bed contracts, was needed. Overly complex and inflexible systems can result in missed opportunities, due to last minute cancellations for example. If an opportunity suddenly becomes available due to a cancellation, ideally we would hope that someone else could benefit from it. Yet, if cancellations are not easily and immediately visible on a system, we are unable to flag them up and make available to others.

overcoming the challenges we recognised that an efficient booking system would be instrumental in maximising use of our bed placements. A key challenge was to overcome the time-consuming and often impractical aspects of the process. 32 VitAL : May / June 2011

with bookings made via whiteboards and spreadsheets by local managers, this proved unproductive. As part of our aim at Oxfordshire, we strive to maintain an easily accessible level of service to help as many carers as feasible, and it was important to improve the 70 per cent efficiency rate for respite care bed capacity we were running. However, bed occupancy figures were not the only area we wanted to develop; achieving smooth administrative procedures while alleviating staffing constraints associated with respite care services were also key requisites.

automation is the solution we selected OLM’s CareBooking, a webbased, securely hosted software system for service commissioners. It enables them to book beds and automatically match client needs. The system allows safe, passwordprotected access for staff when inputting, viewing and altering booking information. Using the calendar function, commissioners can see full care home and bed details when entering booking records. Clicking on a bed icon displays the booking form and automatically flags the client’s specific needs so that the right bed is booked. entering details is quick and easy, with bookings saved instantly and securely on the system. As the solution is web-based, it can be accessed equally efficiently by staff working in different office locations. To support the calendar is the email/fax system, which automates the booking process after relevant information has been entered. Clients, commissioners or social workers receive an email including details of bookings, as well as alterations, including reasoning for cancellations or amendments.

It offered a future-proof solution which was fully hosted so there was no requirement for us to install software on our systems, therefore providing us with a significantly reduced cost of ownership. Management information is readily available, and with its easy reporting engine, managers can run reports in minutes which previously took hours, even days to compile. Oxfordshire can strategically plan for the future with key commissioning information always just a click away.

reaping tangible rewards The ease of booking has resulted in management and administration savings. we are able to easily access information regarding availability and current bookings, and re-booking cancelled beds is also simpler. The improved visibility means the entire process is enhanced. we have witnessed a 25 percent increase in bed usage rates since the solution’s introduction. Taking into account the historic management process, while also considering the resources saved, we have made savings of around £250,000 per annum. with less time and effort necessary to manage the process, valuable resources have been reallocated.

Going forward Our future plan is to allow remote access to CareBooking. This will provide carers with access to the system to make their own bookings without direct involvement from commissioners; something we hope will streamline the entire service and be faster and easier for clients, carers, advocates and brokers. Delivering an infinitely important service to the elderly and vulnerable citizens they care for, our carers play an essential role and we must support them www.vital-mag.net

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vitAL MAnAGeMenT

Caring and sharing

Craig Beddis

Jason Liu

The public sector has been under the microscope for some time now, with Government desperate to prove value for money to the tax payer. One of the principle ways that public sector organisations are addressing this is through shared services. vitAL editor Matt Bailey spoke to Craig Beddis, Svp rest of the world and Jason Liu chief executive of IT automation specialist UC4 about how it is helping to deliver shared services for the nhS.

OST peOpLe in the UK have strong feelings about the national health Service. If anything can be said to have become a national institution, then the nhS is a prime example. Although there has been massive investment for the last decade, the financial crisis has ensured that the ﬂow of money is under close scrutiny and cuts are beginning to bite. One method the public sector – and indeed parts of the private sector too – has used to save money is shared services. The benefits of sharing capacity – and costs – with other similar organisations, especially in the IT realm are obvious. “Although cost-cutting is not a cause for celebration, it can deliver unexpected opportunities to bring about new methods and ideas for how things can be done,” says Craig Beddis, svP rest of the world for UC4, the independent software automation company that provided the automation platform for nHs sBs. “In terms of IT, the government needs to embrace new innovative and effective models that are currently being used in the 34 VitAL : May / June 2011

public sector, especially shared services and forays into cloud and using software as a service. sharing critical business and IT services has been proven to cut costs, reduce errors and improve productivity, yet the issue is that most public sector organisations’ core competencies don’t lie in delivering IT services. For a progressive government this is an obvious opportunity to use these models more and increase understanding of them through pushing the concept of joint partnerships with established service providers. “new IT service delivery models, such as shared services, have the potential to enable huge costs savings across the public sector. This has been evidenced through the success of joint business ventures such as nHs sBs where in excess of 130 primary care trusts use a common set of finance, accounting and payroll services that are fully automated and deliver the information they need to support their operations. Relinquishing the daily operations and maintenance overheads of managing individual IT systems www.vital-mag.net

vital management

has enabled each of these trusts to realise significant cost reductions as well as offer a better quality of service to society.” UC4 chief executive Jason Liu sums up the shared services paradigm with an analogy: “Shared services as a concept is a bit like the airline business,” he says. “Historically, every airline had its own runway but now they are all using the same one. In this world the importance of the air traffic controller grows exponentially and this is where we come in. Automation is the thing that glues it all together – someone has to allocate the competing precious resources. We were doing that in a client server world but increasingly moving to the cloud. The UK public sector is leading the way in this field.”

The urge to share In both the public sector and the commercial world there has been a movement towards shared services in IT. It makes sound financial sense. Any medium to large organisation with perhaps a wide geographical spread and different divisions should be able to see the benefits, especially if they have many repeatable manual processes that are ripe for automation. According to Craig Beddis, many organisations that have outsourced certain functions may well have been served better using a more local shared services model. “Lots of organisations have adopted shared services through outsourcing – but have not seen the consistency or flexibility they would have expected,” he says. “It can be cheaper but it’s not necessarily better or more efficient because of churn at outsourced companies. Automation can bring this consistency and repeatability to these sorts of tasks regardless of location or business, and do this intelligently by even being able to predict events or problems before they occur. “Shared services is about automating business processes and taking out the repeatable manual tasks, thus reducing the scope for errors and creating predictability. These process flows can then be modelled and through parametising can be adapted for other similar organisations. In this way we modularise business and IT processes and make them repeatable and scalable.” Savings in manpower, resources, time and money should flow from adopting a shared www.vital-mag.net

services model. But it’s not about getting people out of jobs stresses Beddis, “It is about efficiency and consistency, eliminating delays and hitting those all important SLAs. “We reduce the time to do things – make them repeatable and scalable, without taking on extra workforce. And this is becoming a big issue for those that run shared services. We can mitigate risk by eliminating human error and enable compliance by making processes more easily auditable,” says Beddis. As with everything else in the IT world the obvious topical question is can it be delivered through the cloud? “With the caveats of security and data protection there is no reason why it shouldn’t be delivered through the cloud,” says Beddis, “it would just be a case of adapting that utility-based model to the market.”

Shared business services NHS Shared Business Services (SBS) was launched in 2005 as a 50-50 joint venture between the Department of Health and Xansa (which was acquired by Steria in 2007). It primarily provides finance, accounting and payroll services to support NHS Trusts, and also provides a number of value added services to enable trusts to have improved financial reporting systems. It has over 130 clients supported by service centres in Leeds, Bristol and Hampshire, using the Oracle Financials 11i platform. “NHS SBS was created with the NHS as a partner to offer a common set of IT business services to all the different health trusts but it had to compete for the business in the same way as any other commercial company would,” explains Beddis. “Each health authority needs to do its own accounts and has its own way of doing this with a range of different software and systems used across the service. Although there is a common set of finance and accounting services required many different suppliers were used, so there were none of the economies of scale associated with central procurement.” In addition to building shared services to support clients, NHS SBS needed to develop and deploy a solution capable of supporting rapid business growth. As more NHS Trusts joined SBS, there was an increased demand on financial transaction processing, in turn leading to an increased IT workload. Integral to the success of NHS SBS is the ability to scale

In terms of IT, the government needs to embrace new innovative and effective models that are currently being used in the public sector, especially shared services and forays into cloud and using Software as a Service. Sharing critical business and IT services has been proven to cut costs, reduce errors and improve productivity, yet the issue is that most public sector organisations’ core competencies don’t lie in delivering IT services.

May / June 2011 : VitAL 35

vitAL MAnAGeMenT

For organisations with outdated ITsM systems in place, but without the budgets to replace them with new solutions, vendors like FrontRange now offer an easier way to access new technologies with saasbased versions of their solutions. This keeps the initial acquisition costs to a minimal level, but enables the customer to move to an on-premise solution as their needs demand in the future.

36 VitAL : May / June 2011

its operations to provide maximum service quality and value to its clients. Period end close and month-end reporting are recurring peaks in accounting calendars that have to be completed by all Trusts to fixed timetables. At nHs sBs, a real advantage to managing the transaction processing during these peak times was to automate systems where possible.

automate or else Manual interaction between people and systems needed to be automated wherever possible. The processing workload would have to make optimal use of available IT resources if customer service Level Agreements (sLAs) were going to be met. The impact of files not being available for processing, decisions not being taken and other operating delays had to be minimised. Addressing these issues would allow nHs sBs to establish a scalable platform that would support delivery of its shared service offering to all nHs organisations. “At nHs sBs, our goal is to deal with increasing volumes while maintaining efficiencies and delivering real value to our clients,” explains Dominick smyth, service delivery lead for nHs sBs. “we knew we would need some sort of automation tool if we were going to achieve this. we looked at the pinch points in our finance processes – notably around month-end – and figured that if we could automate these we could deliver real quality and efficiency for clients. “we became aware of UC4 software through the recommendation of one of our colleagues. It offered out-of-the-box templates that could automate finance and accounting procedures. It also had certified interfaces into Oracle 11i and there were no other products doing this.” nHs sBs uses the UC4 platform to ensure all financial accounting rules and validations are performed throughout the month end close process. Thorough checks ensure that payment runs and journal imports are complete. Once the books have been closed and end users have logged out, the period end reconciliation and reporting jobs that need to run are initiated automatically. There are over 80 individual steps that need to be executed in a precise sequence on behalf of each nHs Trust. The UC4 platform manages the exchange of data between steps, checks job outcomes and report content before deciding what to do next. If figures

don’t reconcile, staff are immediately alerted to investigate and resolve discrepancies. “Automating month end close was key,” continues smyth. “UC4 has provided us with other potential benefits – mainly to do with report delivery. Reconciliation reports now go straight to the General Ledger teams – they don’t need to be manually requested.”

scaling new heights Having found an automated solution to the month end close challenge, nHs sBs has plans to extend use of the software platform to tackle other issues. Options include scheduling daily report requests on behalf of clients, optimising inbound file transfer received in multiple formats, overnight refreshes for the nHs sBs web portal and integration with Oracle Discoverer to deliver formatted reports. “now month end has been a success with our financial processing teams, we realise we’ve uncovered the tip of an iceberg,” concludes smyth. “we’re now starting to look at the bigger picture – process automation and reporting. There are many areas in which we can improve process and provide users with the tools and information they need to do their jobs. As we move forward, we expect that the UC4 platform will play a key role in supporting us to improve the quality of service we deliver to our clients.” while half of nHs sBs is effectively in public hands being owned by the nHs, it is very much a commercial organisation which is out in the market competing for business with other companies. Any profits the company makes are split and a proportion will be paid back into the nHs. This approach can be problematic though. There have been initiatives by local government IT departments to sell their services (or share their services in return for part of the IT budget) to other authorities. But surely, the argument runs, local authorities are there to provide services to residents, not to run IT commercial businesses. what happens when one of these organisations starts to make money? Anyone in the public sector faces this problem when they go in this direction. “There is a need for a top-down leadership approach,” says Craig Beddis. “Organisations need to be more efficient but they can only do this by being more streamlined and aggressive which may clash with the mandates of local councils.” VitAL www.sbs.nhs.uk www.uc4.com www.vital-mag.net

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vitAL PROFILe

Strength through breadth It is an exciting time for frontrange, with the recent launch of its SaaS2 software-as-a-Service solution as well as new versions of its IT Asset Management on-premise products. vitAL caught up with the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s vice president, eMeA, Ian McEwan.

38 VitAL : May / June 2011

www.vital-mag.net

vitAL PROFILe

eADQUArTereD In pleasanton, California in the USA, frontrange is a leading provider of powerful and affordable IT Service Management, IT Asset Management, and Customer Service Management solutions. The company says that these solutions enable IT and Services Transformation by providing enterprise-class capabilities that deliver fast time to benefit, high ease of use, and rapid return on investment. with an award winning tradition and recognised as a leader by industry analysts, the company’s products and solutions are used by over 13,000 customers in more than 80 verticals and 45 countries to quickly improve interactions with external and internal clients and achieve better business results. Ian Mcewan is responsible for FrontRange’s sales operations across europe, the Middle east and Africa. He has over 15 years experience in the IT sector, primarily in the Help Desk and service Management markets, and a successful history of sales management to Fortune 100/500 customers. Prior to joining FrontRange, Mcewan held a number of senior sales and management positions with Peregrine, BMC, IBM and vignette. He is currently playing a central role in the company’s continued expansion in the eMeA region. VitAL: what are the origins of the company; how did it start and develop; how has it grown and how is it structured? Ian McEwan: FrontRange solutions is headquartered in California, with the hub www.vital-mag.net

of its european operations in newbury, UK. The company realises around 45 percent of its global revenues in the eMeA region, and has all major functions (engineering, sales, marketing and support) based in the UK and Germany. It was incorporated in 2000, when the companies behind HeAT helpdesk and GoldMine customer relationship management (CRM) solutions merged. The company capitalised on its dominance in the sMe helpdesk market to launch its fully fledged IT service Management solution in 2005. More recently it has further expanded its portfolio with an IT Asset Management solutions division with the acquisition of enteo (developers of the solution now known as FrontRange Desktop & server Management) in 2007 and Centennial software (FrontRange Discovery and License Manager) in 2008. VitAL: what is the company’s specialist area or product group? IM: The FrontRange solutions portfolio spans three core areas of a company’s operations: IT service Management, IT Asset Management and Customer service. All three are critical to our and our customers’ success and it’s this breadth of offering that we feel is our real strength. To complement this, we recently launched our saas2 (solutions-as-a-service model.) This enables customers to choose the most appropriate method of technology acquisition both today and in the future – FrontRange is the only vendor offering a fast and painless transition between saas and on-premise solutions.

we recently launched our saas2 (solutionsas-a-service model.) This enables customers to choose the most appropriate method of technology acquisition both today and in the future – FrontRange is the only vendor offering a fast and painless transition between saas and on-premise solutions.

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vitAL PROFILe

It is the breadth of the solution portfolio that stands FrontRange apart from rival competitors. That breadth is represented both in terms of the sheer capability of the solutions on offer – everything from PC and software auditing, through to desktop management through to fully ITIL-compatible service – as well as the technologies employed to deliver these solutions to the customer – be it on-premise or through the cloud (saas). 40 VitAL : May / June 2011

VitAL: Is that specialisation to make the best use of skills in the company or because it fits the company’s world view or has it simply evolved? IM: For most organisations, public or private, the service they deliver to their internal and external customers is paramount. without delivering excellent IT services, staff can’t function; without delivering excellent customer care, the organisation has no future. This is why the FrontRange portfolio has evolved to incorporate an integrated suite of solutions that enable organisations to manage their IT assets, IT service delivery and external facing customer service – three inter-linked disciplines that are all critical to the viability of the organisation. The nature of the solution range is far from accidental. For example, the acquisitions of enteo and Centennial software both brought with them not only an important additional revenue stream to FrontRange, but they also strengthened our service Management solutions with asset and configuration management being natural extensions to the solution. VitAL: how has any specialisation inﬂuenced the company’s general stance? IM: Rather than specialism, it is the breadth of the solution portfolio that stands FrontRange apart from rival competitors. That breadth is represented both in terms of the sheer capability of the solutions on offer – everything from PC and software auditing, through to desktop management through to fully ITIL-compatible service – as well as the technologies employed to deliver these solutions to the customer – be it on-premise or through the cloud (saas).

VitAL: who are the company’s main customers today and in the future? IM: Because of the nature of the solution portfolio and its routes to market, the FrontRange customer base is incredibly broad in character. From large enterprises who use the FrontRange ITsM and Desktop server Management solutions to manage their IT operations down to sMes who rely on the GoldMine CRM solution to maximise the profitability of each and every customer interaction. Tomorrow, this breadth of customer base will continue and may become broader still as more organisations like to implement hybrid saas / on-premise solutions. VitAL: what is the company’s business model, ie, does it select a market and then design solutions to meet the needs of that market or does it specialise in particular solutions and seek markets where those solutions are needed? IM: The majority of FrontRange solutions are, by their nature, horizontal rather than vertical. The customer service or IT asset management challenges facing an organisation in one industry are unlikely to differ greatly from a company in another vertical. As such, it is fair to say that the FrontRange portfolio is shaped by looking for common issues faced by many organisations and how a solution can be created to deliver the maximum benefit with the minimal customisation. some solution areas such as IT service Management are always going to be subject to some ‘tailoring’ to the individual organisations’ needs, but the difference is how the solution is engineered to accommodate this level of personalisation while still retaining its core product differentiators. www.vital-mag.net

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VitAL: how is the company encouraging social responsibility in its customers and the wider world? IM: The green agenda, and becoming more conscious of energy use in general, has some close synergies with IT Asset Management and so this is one potential route for the FrontRange solution portfolio moving forward. VitAL: how does the company communicate with vendors and customers? IM: FrontRange employs a true multi-channel communications strategy for partners and customers. This ranges from the open FrontRange ‘Connect’ forum to customer and partner-specific support sites, where they can access comprehensive knowledge bases as well as the latest product downloads. Telephone support for both technical and commercial questions is only a call away and customers and partners are both encouraged to take advantage of FrontRange’s regular roadshows and in-office meetings. VitAL: what does the product range cover? IM: As outlined above, there are essentially three pillars to the FrontRange product portfolio: service Management, IT Asset Management and Customer service. within these areas there are a number of distinct product areas, from audit to license management, voice enablement to web-self service – but each and every component of the portfolio contributes an important role towards the overall aim of enabling organisations to maximise the productivity of their staff and IT operations as well as leverage the full value of their customers.

in business and the economy in general, the challenges and the opportunities? IM: It is somewhat of a cliché to say ‘do more with less’, but with IT budgets generally static there is a strong need to make IT service delivery more efficient and to ensure that each and every pound allocated to IT is spent wisely. Integration and automation are the keywords here, and the FrontRange portfolio is ideally placed to deliver both, with integrated IT service Management and Asset Management. Automating key tasks such as software application deployment or restoring user profiles from a central console integrated with the ITsM system can provide a massive labour saving for IT. For organisations with outdated ITsM systems in place, but without the budgets to replace them with new solutions, vendors like FrontRange now offer an easier way to access new technologies with saas-based versions of their solutions. This keeps the initial acquisition costs to a minimal level, but enables the customer to move to an onpremise solution as their needs demand in the future. VitAL: what are the future plans for the business? IM: It is an exciting time for FrontRange, with the recent launch of our saas2 solutions as well as new versions of our IT Asset Management on-premise products. The future is to grow these solutions in parallel so that customers can access the solutions they need through the delivery methods that are right for their businesses both today and in the future.

VitAL: Ian Mcewan, thank you very much. VitAL: what is your view of the current state of IT Service Management and IT www.vital-mag.net

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What open source offers the public sector Can open source software offer significant savings and tangible benefits to the public sector? Bertrand Diard Diard, CeO and co-founder of Talend reports.

he OnSeT of the global financial crisis that began in 2007, the effects of which are still being experienced today, has given rise to a fundamental shift in thinking on how governments invest their annual budgets. Since the coalition between the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties took the reigns of power in the UK in 2010 the reduction of the nationsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; unsustainable budget deficit has been the core policy. This has cultivated an environment for intelligent dialogue on viable techniques that can be implemented to achieve this aim. 42 VitAL : May / June 2011

In 2010 IT spending by the UK Government was ÂŁ7.6 billon. with one department, the Ministry of Defence, spending in total the same amount as local authorities combined. Given that there is no homogenous plan that can be installed across Government as each department will demand its own idiosyncratic ICT systems, it reduces the options for where real savings can be made. with the need for fast, secure networks and powerful hardware, software becomes the obvious choice to search for spending cuts. www.vital-mag.net

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Last year’s publication detailing the spending by each individual Government department provides a clear indication of the volume of budget that is spent each year on IT services. The sheer range in spending was absolutely phenomenal. By far the biggest departmental spend on IT was by the Department of Revenue and Customs (HMRC), who spent an enormous £54.72 million on IT software, with a further £3.29 million on software coding and another £1.1 million on software suites. This £59 million outlay accounted for ten percent of the total department spend for the year. By comparison, The Cabinet Office incurred IT costs including software licensing of £724,550. This amounted to a paltry 0.36 percent of the departments’ yearly expenditure. As previously mentioned, it is naive to assume that there is a one size fits all model for IT between departments. However in the case of HMRC there is quite clearly scope for huge savings to be made in the procurement and implementation of software. This is the very platform from which the benefits of open source can be elevated.

The benefits of open source When the Cabinet Office published its Government ICT Strategy in March 2011 (see page six of this issue), open source software was discussed and put forth for public sector use as a realistic option to be considered in place of proprietary software. The mandating of open standards was a declaration of trust and belief, and represents a major milestone in the evolution of open source use. The ICT strategy report details ‘creating a level playing field for open source software’, which they believe will present significant opportunities for the design and delivery of interoperable services when used in conjunction with the soon to be compulsory open standards. By setting out these specifications the ICT strategy has moved the debate around open source from whether it can be used in government to how to apply it to achieve the best benefits. It is extremely refreshing to witness a development that for so long has www.vital-mag.net

been a point of discussion by the open source industry as a whole, as well as myself. A victim of its own title, open source has long had to battle against an attitude of fear and rumour amongst businesses that it is less secure and more exposed to penetration from hacking. It will take some time to dispel the myth of open source being higher risk than proprietary software but there is considerable evidence to the contrary. Open source products are put through greater testing before general availability release than proprietary based products. The key element to this is the input of community members who are involved with testing milestone releases (milestone releases are roughly equivalent to beta releases). This passionate community of followers means that software becomes incredibly dynamic, as it is continually being developed and improved.

Try-before-you-buy; pay-as-you-go By presenting the opportunity to try-beforeyou-buy, to validate the value proposition before purchasing anything, and to leverage the openness and community built around the offerings there is a real opportunity to use open source to cut IT costs. Proprietary software does not offer this freedom, nor is it compatible with all legacy systems. Given the pressure to reduce costs what open source software can really provide to public sector organisations is a shift from the historic burden of using a capital expenditure payment system to operational expenditure system, which by providing a pay-as-you-use payment model is crucial for saving money. The economic benefit, while being the most evident, is by no means the sole basis for an argument proclaiming for a shift away from proprietary software. Open source software offers greater flexibility than traditional software models. This can be of huge benefit for public sector organisations that rely heavily on the seamless integration of data across their numerous IT systems. Furthermore, open source provides functions equivalent – if

Given that there is no homogenous plan that can be installed across Government as each department will demand its own idiosyncratic ICT systems, it reduces the options for where real savings can be made. With the need for fast, secure networks and powerful hardware, software becomes the obvious choice to search for spending cuts.

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Following on from public sector institutions around the world such as the French Gendarmerie, the US Coast Guard and the United Nations, the UK Government is providing itself with an opportunity to save swathes of budget on expensive and dated proprietary software packages.

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not better – than proprietary software. This allows for less complex development and maintenance and removes the need for a complete overhaul of a system by employing a ‘rip-and-replace’ method. While I could eulogise about what I consider the self-evident benefits of the adoption of open source alternatives, the arguments do not really need to be vociferously put forth. With the publication of the ICT strategy what the British Government has done, by taking the initiative and identifying the issues that stand out in the current ICT model is commendable. The identification of the key issues to address, complexity, wasteful duplication, interoperability and poor integration means that the correct s olution can be sought to solve these problems. Be it deliberate or not, the strategy has identified the key issues as being the very strengths of open source software.

Reducing complexity It is in the very nature of open source to reduce complexity, both in installation and for end users. The fact that open source is compatible with all legacy systems emphasises just how complexity can be combated. With the burgeoning demand for master data management services amongst businesses, there is now an increased need for data integration software that will ensure that data duplication and data integration is resolved automatically. This reduces pressure on IT managers who traditionally would have manually checked for errors. When discussing economic benefits of alternative methods, it is common practice to focus on the monetary value of two options. However I have always placed an equal value on the qualitative measures such as human resource waste and also employee satisfaction as key measures of value. If an IT manager does not have to labour over the integration of a new system and does not have to endure the laborious task of data entry, their time can be spent on other tasks and they are less likely to suffer from the tedium of such processes.

What this shift in ideology for software procurement also does is open up the tender process for SME’s to vie for what are clearly lucrative public sector contracts. For too long there has been an iron grip on these contracts by a select few organisations, who once chosen by a ruling government are often successful in their bid for new contracts as and when they are up for grabs, regardless of the political party that is in charge. This issue can be best highlighted by the selection of Damovo UK Ltd who in 2010 successfully tendered for 50 Government contracts, of which six were for software licensing. The total value of these contracts is a phenomenal £684,335,923.86, with one software license contract signed with the Department for Local Communities and Government worth £684,325,000. As this incredible statistic shows there is a huge spend on licensing by Government and the acknowledgement of open source software, as alternatives will rightly increase the competition for these contracts. This in turn presents the Government with the opportunity to secure better value for itself in the future.

Benefits and change Overall the mandating of open source will bring real benefits and change to the public sector, which fully adhere to the desire to reduce the bloated public sector spending programme that the UK has for too long allowed to grow uncontrollably. Following on from public sector institutions around the world such as the French Gendarmerie, the US Coast Guard and the United Nations, the UK Government is providing itself with an opportunity to save swathes of budget on expensive and dated proprietary software packages. Furthermore, the opportunity for users to be involved in the development of software will bring greater efficiencies across departments and systems. In an era where austerity has become a necessity and budgets are very limited, open source software provides the vital flexibility for the continuously adapting project requirements of the public sector. VitAL www.talend.com www.vital-mag.net

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Proactive ITSM - the evolution of the human touch The ‘human touch’ is an ethos whereby ITSM is delivered from a customer centric perspective. Users aren’t treated as a homogenous group but instead as individuals, with varying degrees of knowledge and indeed expectations around the role of IT. Patrick Bolger, chief evangelist at hornbill, reports.

here WAS once a time when service desk support involved a user walking across the office ﬂoor and relaying issues to an IT guy all too happy and able to help resolve them. The reputation of IT was similar to the praise heaped on a soothsayer – nothing but awe and admiration for making the intangible tangible. This may well be a rose-tinted view of a long gone era. However, we’ve now reached a time where a user’s expectation of the service desk is not just about how quickly a ticket is raised and resolved. IT service Management must set a new standard that makes users again feel the immeasurable value IT brings to the business. The ‘human touch’ is an ethos whereby ITsM is delivered from a customer-centric perspective. Users aren’t treated as a homogenous group but instead as individuals, with varying degrees of knowledge and indeed expectations around the role of IT. similarly, the service desk is not a faceless organisation. Instead it is viewed as an interactive, personalised resource that adapts to users’ needs and the business as a whole. nonetheless, until now - even with the ‘human touch’ - the model of ITsM has been sustained by a reactive mindset ie, service desk professionals only learn about a problem when it has reached a point where a user’s productivity is probably at zero. The big question today: Is the reactive ITsM model really geared to meet the expectations of an increasingly demanding community of 46 VitAL : May / June 2011

IT users? In my view, it is not and the following four observations will illustrate the opportunities for a new, proactive model for ITsM:

1. ItIl not be alright on the night when it comes to best practice, the role of ITIL is unquestionable. Organisations that have adopted even the most basic ITIL processes have realised significant benefit. However, ITIL simply cannot account for the pace of change across the wider ITsM environment. For example, as virtualisation continues its rapid spread across the IT estate, a spread otherwise referred to as virtual sprawl, it adds an entirely new layer of complexity that has yet to be covered in ITIL v3. similarly, the increasing use of social media is exposing IT departments to a number of issues, and there remains no formalised best practice approach for managing these tools. nonetheless, as with virtualisation, the business benefits are clearly outweighing any ITsM concerns. The past few years have seen IT departments engage in vain attempts to control social media usage. However, much like the period when barriers were raised to employees having public internet access, it is a losing battle. Over time, users will expect service desks to address support issues with social media and undoubtedly through social media. Failure to embrace these tools within the broader ITsM framework today will only increase pressure on service desk staff to put out fires instead of preventing them.

2. electronic mail is dead – long live electronic mail As I mentioned, the early days of the service desk were all about face-to-face support. In fact, as some will remember, when email was first introduced as a channel for raising service issues, there was huge scepticism amongst users and the service desk. However, today it is the primary channel of interaction. The question now is how much longer can email remain as the most effective channel? speculation calling for the ‘death of email’ has been around for some time. Atos Origin CeO Thierry Breton certainly added fuel to the fire by publicly stating his company’s ambition to eradicate email within the next three years. now it may well be a little too presumptuous to suggest that this is a signal that the walls are coming down on the inbox as we know it. what’s interesting to hear however is that Atos alongside other organisations, particularly higher education institutions, sees social media as a more relevant and productive tool for interaction: ie, people are actively choosing these tools over email. with regards to the service desk, this evolution in the way users communicate exposes both an immense challenge coupled with an exciting opportunity. On one hand, when users see social media as the primary communication channel there is a strong chance that they will turn to this medium as the first port of call to air any grievances with IT. At the same time, monitoring social media www.vital-mag.net

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offers IT the opportunity to discover, react to and resolve service issues long before an email is even sent to the service desk. Moreover, this new communication channel can actually enhance ITSM.

3. The devolution of IT: This is not a statement about regression or a ‘dark age’ of IT but more a point about the changing service desk environment. That said, failure to acknowledge and understand this change may well lead to a dark age of the service desk. When you look across the diversity of IT infrastructure that underpins a typical enterprise today, IT leaders should in many ways feel proud about what they have achieved. Even more so when you see line-of-business owners asking their teams to adopt Software-as-a-Service applications such as Salesforce.com, or indeed CEOs asking questions about ‘cloud computing’. Many employees are now also bringing their own devices including smartphones and iPads into the enterprise and using them as both personal and professional tools. This ‘consumerisation’ of IT is an ongoing topic of conversation and one that is still probably in its infancy. IT infrastructure in the main remains a business asset and probably will do for the next few years at least. Nonetheless, the trend towards consumerisation does beg the question of the role of ITSM and the service desk if organisations no longer physically own IT resources. In today’s ‘reactive’ model of ITSM, a user will select one of multiple channels or devices to access the service desk and log an incident – such as phone, web self service or chat functionality. This serves the internal community fine. However, as you move beyond the corporate firewall, the effectiveness and availability of those channels can be become limited and service issues lie dormant, simply because IT does not have a defined process for dealing with problems relating to IT infrastructure and applications they do not own or manage. Social media is further amplifying these issues, where a complaint or poor service experience can be communicated to thousands or even millions within a 140 character tweet.

4. IT Warrior to Brand Guardian The fact that customers commonly complain www.vital-mag.net

about a product or service without making the supplier aware they are unhappy is not a surprise. However, social media is giving the ‘dissatisfied’ a voice that transcends a living room or office floor and reaches a mass audience. Marketers are deploying a variety of social media monitoring tools to help defend the brand and there are daily examples of customers who have been approached by a supplier because of a negative tweet. There are also many cases where the ‘complaint’ fails to reach the right department, which further exacerbates the issue. In my experience, when it comes to implementing technology and creating strong process and policy around how it is used and managed, there is no better model than ITSM. For example; recording and tracking customer complaints, from notification through to resolution, involves processes that are second nature to most service desks. As the use of social media increases across business, the service desk is in a prime position to extend and apply its expertise to demonstrate how social media tools can be used more effectively. From identifying complaints that emerge on Twitter to helping implement processes that ensure the right teams are dealing with the issue, IT can be seen as an innovator, proactively involved in helping to strengthen the corporate reputation and enhance customer satisfaction. These four observations are intended as starting point for discussion around the need and opportunity for proactive ITSM. Change is inevitable: for instance, there will most certainly be an ITIL process for social media. Nevertheless, I trust you’ll see that the impact of social media on the service desk is driving an entirely new set of service delivery expectations. In my opinion, these expectations are not just about the ‘look and feel’ of how the service desk interacts with users. Neither are they entirely focused on the introduction of chat or simply extending internal collaboration capabilities through the introduction of Facebook-like forums. The significant jump in the quality of service delivery will only be achieved by fully embracing social media to enable the proactive service desk – an environment where businesses and users can again feel ‘wowed’ by IT. VitAL www.hornbill.com

In my experience, when it comes to implementing technology and creating strong process and policy around how it is used and managed, there is no better model than ITSM. For example; recording and tracking customer complaints, from notification through to resolution, involves processes that are second nature to most service desks.

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Bringing cloud computing to the investment banking world Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fair to say that there is a degree of wariness about cloud computing, but nowhere is this more pronounced than in the banking sector. Lance Sinclair MD of radius shows how finance industry IT operatives can overcome their concerns with security and compliance.

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uch has been said and written about the benefits of the cloud computing model, but the financial services industry has largely shunned it – at least in its public version. Parts of the industry have dismissed the model as just another example of IT industry hype. Those that have considered cloud computing are reluctant to fully embrace it due to concerns, mainly focusing on security and compliance. These concerns about security and compliance are legitimate. Following a torrid time in the investment banking industry which saw the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the global mortgage backed securities (MBS) market, many banks had to write off billions of pounds and reassess their risk parameters. The focus on a more prudent and transparent investment strategy has never been greater. Meanwhile, banks’ compliance teams are battling with increasingly stringent regulations and cannot take the risk of a data breach involving commercially sensitive information. However, for the industry to dismiss cloud computing altogether due to security and compliance concerns would be shortsighted. Indeed, there is a growing number of examples of investment banks using the cloud, particularly the ‘private’ cloud. This is largely down to the fact that the benefits of cloud technology to the financial services industry are potentially enormous. Cloud can not only slide out companies from the straitjacket of legacy systems, it can also reduce costs, improve operational efficiency and offer greater corporate flexibility. Where once vendors had not been able to offer cloud solutions which addressed the anxieties of compliance teams in the financial sector, now the technology has matured to the point where such solutions are available and should make the adoption of cloud computing within the investment banking community a more widespread phenomenon. www.vital-mag.net

The barriers to adoption Over the years, financial institutions have invested heavily in enterprise systems that enable their operations. These so-called ‘legacy systems’ often utilise outdated hardware and software yet persist due to the expense, difficulty and risk of transferring everyday operations and huge quantities of data to more advanced infrastructures. Compliance teams at financial institutions are typically hesitant to embrace new technologies or ways of working that may put this sensitive information at risk. They justifiably want absolute control over the exclusive customer and financial data that has been built up over the years. While the business generally sees the value in cloud adoption, alarm bells start ringing for compliance teams who are nervous about holding their data ‘outside’ of the bank, which they perceive to be outside of their control. While investment banks may have already transferred some business processes and data to private clouds (clouds within company boundaries and firewalls), they typically remain averse to exploiting public clouds (where resources are provisioned via the internet by a third party outside of the company boundaries and firewalls). This means that investment banks cannot use software hosted centrally in public clouds which can provide valuable functions such as business process management (BPM), customer relationship management (CRM), human resource management (HRM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP). In addition to security concerns, compliance teams are working hard to ensure banks adhere to the regulations imposed in the jurisdictions in which they operate. In the wake of the financial crisis, regulators across the world have increasingly been baring their teeth and introducing reform to the financial services industry. In the UK, banks are accountable to

The benefits of cloud technology to the financial services industry are potentially enormous. Cloud can not only slide out companies from the strait-jacket of legacy systems, it can also reduce costs, improve operational efficiency and offer greater corporate flexibility.

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If the City is to maintain its leading position in financial markets on the worldwide stage, harnessing businesschanging technologies, such as cloud, will be crucial. Despite the regulations facing capital markets today in relation to data residency and privacy,

the Bank of England, as well as European bodies, such as the Committee for European Securities Regulation (CESR) and the Committee of European Banking Supervisors (CEBS). In such a climate, it is understandable that compliance teams are wary of falling foul of regulations and may wish to avoid moving business processes and data to public clouds which could lead to infringements. The issues outlined above are proving to be barriers to fully utilising cloud technology that can help stimulate better business in banking. This dilemma is compounded by the fact that many technology vendors are simply not addressing the issue of compliance within their cloud offerings. So, how can the capital markets industry ensure it is reaping the benefits of cloud computing while also remaining compliant with market legislation and internal controls?

The hybrid model solution A hybrid cloud model overcomes many of the concerns outlined above, enabling the capital markets to reap the benefits of cloud computing while also maintaining the security and confidentiality of their data. A hybrid cloud combines aspects of private clouds and public clouds. Regardless of whether the cloud resides inside or outside a bank’s firewall, governance and security are crucial.

the wheel and build an entire cloud-based replacement system. By having both cloud and internal data visible on the same page, the value of both systems is enhanced. For example, seeing contact details from the cloud complete with the trading history for that contact from the corporate data warehouse.

Benefitting from cloud The business case for cloud computing is a strong one. Investment banks can realise significant cost reduction in upfront capital expenditure as cloud-based solutions are paid for by the operational expenditure budget, which is based on monthly usage. Just as peaks in demand can be met, there is no outlay for unused capacity, creating a flexible and affordable solution. In addition, the speed of deployment is significantly increased as the design, development, test and roll-out is achieved within a single platform. Finally, and arguably most importantly, is the empowerment the cloud delivers to business users including total control of change management with little or no IT support, as the delivery team mix for cloud solutions is reliant on analysis rather than development. In an industry, such as banking, where business processes are very specific to the industry, it is critical that the business is in control and completely empowered and liberated from IT

cloud computing has now evolved to the point where a highly secure and compliant model is available.

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Hybrid clouds work by ‘mashing up’ private and public data so investment banks can keep certain information highly confidential while also exploiting the benefits of public cloud computing. By way of example, an organisation might find it convenient to have all their clients and contacts stored on the cloud, but not be willing to have the associated accounts’ cash values exposed. A hybrid approach allows some object fields to reside within an organisation’s firewall and only be visible to users within it. For those users, it is a seamless mash-up of cloud and internal data. Outside the firewall, only the non-sensitive fields are accessible. Another example of a hybrid approach is where an organisation already has internal systems containing hugely useful data. There is often no commercial reason to reinvent

in a way which will enable cloud computing to deliver the real value that has been promised for so long.

Time for change If the City is to maintain its leading position in financial markets on the worldwide stage, harnessing business-changing technologies, such as cloud, will be crucial. Despite the regulations facing capital markets today in relation to data residency and privacy, cloud computing has now evolved to the point where a highly secure and compliant model is available. The next few years will shine the light on the technology leaders and laggards in banking and there’s no doubt as to which type of financial institution will come out on top. VitAL www.radius-technology.com www.vital-mag.net

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Why IT staff shouldn’t tackle online security – without a little help from Marketing Oliver Wilkinson, director of SSL247 says it shouldn’t always be left to the IT guys to sort out online security, perhaps some more emotional input from Marketing would be valuable.

n MAnY – or indeed most – companies that buy website security to protect their visitors’ privacy online, it is a technical person who does the buying. This seems logical – it is a technical remit, needs some technical knowledge to get it working, and because it is seen as a technical necessity, is just palmed off to the IT guys in the corner. so why do we see this as a problem? Like many buying decisions, it is easy to boil everything down to numbers, and buy purely based on a calculation like miles per gallon, or monthly repayment amount whilst ignoring total cost of ownership over time, or interest rates for example. Humans are complex, so just seeking out the cheapest, or buying purely based on one logical assessment at the 52 VitAL : May / June 2011

expense of fluffier emotional reasoning rarely works – which is why it might not be wise to rent or buy the cheapest house if that means being in a less safe area. Real economies can start out small short-term, and end up as very costly false economies long-term. For the sake of illustration, we’ll make an assumption that one key factor (to name just one) that makes technically minded people experts at writing software, being an IT genius or doing anything else technical, is their ability to process logic rapidly and effectively whilst filtering out fluffy irrelevance. To be able to be a good programmer for instance, you need to hold in your head relationships between complex sets of data and different data types, know how it all can, and can’t interact, plus www.vital-mag.net

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consider multiple concurrent processes and dependencies all at once – almost being the human version of the computer before sitting down to tell the machine how to think. When it comes to ordering SSL, which is the technology responsible for the padlock icon in your web browser when you access a secure site like your online banking – we find that time and time again, our clients put the decision in the hands of their technical staff. To us, this is a big false economy, and is to the detriment of trust and privacy online for all of us. It is rather like buying a car purely on the advice of a mechanic with his logical hat on.

An emotional response A logical mechanic probably wouldn’t use much more than hard facts to recommend you a car, based on his expert understanding of all the bits that you don’t see or understand, like engine components he knows comes from the same factory as in more expensive models, and ease of servicing and reliability for instance. He is likely to avoid the more emotional needs of a purchase though – how you feel driving one model over another, what they do for your self-image, how safe you feel driving one compared to the next, or just which feels more ‘you’. Because the padlock in our web browser denotes cold, hard encryption – mathematical and logical factors that determine to what extent your credit card details, or other personal details are kept private – IT guys tend to act like our reasoned car mechanic. In our metaphor though, the marketing manager, or the marketing director is a car enthusiast. She understands all the feelings and joy associated with driving a responsive, agile, classic British sports car, and the fact that other vehicles tick many more (practical) boxes and are cheaper just doesn’t matter – nothing logical can replace those joyous feelings, so if saving money means doing away with driving pleasure and overall experience, it is a false economy and just won’t be a viable purchase option. Good marketing managers and directors realise that the unseen logic and maths and www.vital-mag.net

plain geekery of SSL encryption is completely irrelevant to how safe their online customers actually feel. They understand it needs to work first and foremost, but that the feelings of security, and level of trust inspired in the end user is all that matters. As a result, marketing buyers go for the ‘padlock’ that inspires the most trust and confidence possible in their website. They know that the more their visitors feel that they recognise, trust and are confident in the site, the less risk they perceive (another feeling, or set of feelings) the more likely they are to register for the newsletter, complete a purchase, and generally interact with the business online. When marketing buyers do the specifying and purchasing, in a larger sense they foster greater trust and transparency of identity online by picking the best products that make us feel safe on the ‘big web’. Conversely, technical buyers often do the opposite, by buying lesser products that are merely ‘probably statistically good enough’ but devoid of the signs of trust (who owns the site, prominence of padlock and other visual cues), this just seeks to commoditise encryption at the expense of the other critical aspects that give us the feeling of genuinely trusting a site. This is a vicious circle which is to the detriment of everyone. The more sites that do their job properly, and refuse to compromise and save a few pounds, the more every other site out there has to do the same.

Anything other than the biggest signs that your site is secure, is trusted, trustable and genuinely run by your company (and not someone malicious) is a huge false economy, so this critical decision shouldn’t ever be solely up the IT guys.

Raising the bar By raising the bar, and only going for the best, all legitimate sites get elevated above the rest, and overall consumer confidence in being safe online grows too. Nobody here loses out except online scammers, fraudsters and phishers. In short, anything other than the biggest signs that your site is secure, is trusted, trustable and genuinely run by your company (and not someone malicious) is a huge false economy, so this critical decision shouldn’t ever be solely up the IT guys. VitAL www.SSL247.co.uk May / June 2011 : VitAL 53

vitAL PROFILe

Enterprise Cloud? ITSM 2 the rescue With the rise of virtualisation and cloud computing has traditional Service Management become outdated? vitAL spoke to Matt Bateson, principal Consultant, about the launch of ITSM 2.0, a next Generation Service Management framework developed using vMware technology, and designed for the cloud era.

OX IT has been at the forefront of the practical implementation of Service Management techniques since 1981. It is a global independent specialist that has undertaken transformation engagements in over 50 countries. As a premier supplier of consultancy, education and technology, fox IT is recognised as one of the most extensive ITIL based ITSM and governance consultancies in the world. significant changes in the technology market are revolutionising the way IT services are sourced and delivered. while this is good news for business, the increased speed and fluidity of change in modern environments present challenges.

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VitAL: what is ITSM 2.0? Matt Bateson: ITsM 2.0 is an integrated IT service Management framework for both traditional and cloud infrastructures. It has been developed to bridge the gap between new technologies and current management best practices enabling organisations to successfully transform and integrate IT service delivery into the cloud. The framework has been designed to leverage existing best practice with focus on three key principles; simplicity, consumer focus and technology enablement. ITsM 2.0 incorporates a value Model that enables greater business focus for all service Management activities. www.vital-mag.net

vitAL PROFILe

The utilisation of cloud services is increasing; Gartner has estimated that “within five years, one out of five companies will have 100 percent cloudbased infrastructures.”

Groups of processes have been mapped to five organisational functions; Consumer Management, Portfolio Management, Zone Management, Private Operations Management and Public Operations Management. This enables greater organisational integration of best practice. VitAL: how is ITSM 2.0 different from a standard Service Management framework eg, ITIL? MB: There is an improved focus on business alignment, speed and agility, cost efficiency, control and governance which puts the consumer at the heart of the service architecture. Over recent years, the technology marketplace has seen significant changes. Developments such as cloud computing, social media, web 2.0 and mobile technology are transforming business and consumer expectations. It is now common practice for business management staff such as sales Managers to procure services direct from cloud CRM providers (saas – software as a service) without IT involvement. Application developers can go direct to cloud infrastructure providers (Iaas – Infrastructure as a service) for development platforms which are made available in minutes. Increased usage of social networking may drive IT providers to adopt new ways of communicating with consumers, leading to integration challenges with existing processes and tools. This consumer driven activity leads to reduced control over IT services resulting in increased risk in areas such as compliance, security, availability and cost. However, with appropriate service Management the operational flexibility can provide significant business value and competitive advantage. ITsM 2.0 reinforces the importance of existing best practice and standards and is enabled by frameworks such as ITIL and Cobit. VitAL: why has fox IT partnered with VMware on ITSM 2.0? MB: The utilisation of cloud services is increasing; Gartner has estimated that “within 5 years, one out of five companies will have 100% Cloud-based infrastructures.” This strengthens the need for next Generation management technology and process that enable automation, pay per use, service elasticity and dynamic sourcing, for example. Moving forward, automation will be the

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foundation for service architectures as companies look to further leverage their resources in people and technology. vMware’s unrivalled virtualisation capabilities have positioned it as the key cloud management provider. By combining our areas of expertise we are able to offer clients thought leadership and practical guidance. In a recent press release Mark newton, Regional Director, vMware UK and Ireland commented: “The innovation that Fox IT is bringing to market with ITsM 2.0 is welcome in order to move the people and process agenda forward with the technology. As the global leader in virtualisation and cloud infrastructure, vMware has unrivalled expertise in reducing customers’ IT complexity and enabling them to achieve more flexible, agile service delivery. we support Fox IT’s initiative and are delighted they have selected vMware’s technology to deliver the ITsM 2.0 framework.” VitAL: what is the first step in adopting an ITSM 2.0 model? MB: The first step is to identify the drivers. some organisations will need to focus more on consumer management and their relationship with the business whilst others may need to establish a dynamic sourcing model to reduce infrastructure costs and improve service availability. Fox IT has developed an assessment service to provide a 360o view of the IT environment. The assessment uses the ITsM 2.0 value model to identify business drivers and priorities which are then mapped to your organisation’s capability. The output is a management report and roadmap for the adoption of next Generation service Management. VitAL: when and how was ITSM 2.0 made available? MB: ITsM 2.0 was announced at the IT service Desk & support show in earls Court on the 19th April. The complete framework has been made available free of charge at www.itsm2.com. VitAL: Matt Bateson, thank you very much. VitAL

www.itsm2.com www.foxit.net May / June 2011 : VitAL 55

vitAL PROCesses

Remote control It seems like we are in the middle of a ‘perfect strom’ of IT advances and developments. Cloud, virtualisation and mobility have all added layers of complexity to the IT estate. While this widespread evolution is widely acknowledged its impact on IT management is perhaps less understood. Christian Nagele, managing director at CentraStage, says this is where remote management can come into its own.

IrTUALISATIOn – at server and desktop level, xx wireless and 3G networks, cloud computing, tablets and smartphones... as with much of the IT industry device management, the management and monitoring of IT assets, is currently undergoing rapid and significant transformation. While this evolution is widely acknowledged its impact on IT management is perhaps less well understood. As mainstream business applications become more sophisticated and easier to install, update and manage, and devices themselves become more robust and reliable, there is a steadily decreasing requirement for overly complex and featurerich IT management solutions. IT service providers and corporate IT departments are increasingly looking at their core requirements and finding that many tools are, in essence, excess to requirements.

the must-haves In a financially constrained environment the buyer is looking to address their ‘must-haves’ and looking at cost not only in terms of money, but also in terms of the human resource, and costs of set-up, deployment and on-going management. 56 VitAL : May / June 2011

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Capacity and Performance Management Training Capacitas's training service offers the customer a number of ways to learn new skills and techniques. Training courses and workshops can be run at the customer's premises or at Capacitas's training centre in Central London. Student-centred, tutor-led learning We are aware that different people learn in different ways so our tutoring methods cater for all types of student learning styles. We not only teach using the traditional lecturing style but facilitate learning by way of Group Discussion; Team Exercises; Simulations; and Practical Case Studies. Our tutors are all experienced in the field of capacity and performance management and bring this practical experience to the classroom. Check our website for information on our training courses and workshops. Design your own course We realise that capacity and performance management is a broad discipline and everybody's knowledge and experience is different, therefore we allow our customers to design their own personal training course by choosing relevant modules from our existing courses. Submit an online enquiry for a custom training course. We can come to you If you'd rather not come to our central London training centre then we can come to you. You can save money by booking an on-site course. Use our online service and obtain an instant quotation for an on-site course. Save costs Once you've found the right training courses make sure that you can make the most of it and save money at the same time. Capacitas offer discounts for booking more than one attendee on the same course as well as if a selection of courses are booked at the same time. Submit a training enquiry via our website for block bookings. Personal Development Programme Capacitas offers an extensive range of courses to suit everyone from novices to practitioners to managers. You can plan to undertake an integrated set of courses over a particular time period to get the training that you need. By ordering multiple courses for the same trainee you can save money. Submit an enquiry via our website for a Personal Development Programme. Accreditation Programme Cement your learning by taking part in the Capacitas accreditation programme. Students can sit a multiple choice examination based on their training course, supported by an optional tutorial, to lead them to Capacitas accreditation. Students can be accredited to Foundation, Practitioner, Advanced Practitioner or Manager level. Find out more about the Capacitas Accreditation Programme on our website.

+ Prince Consort House 109-111 Farringdon Road London EC1R 3BW 8 www.capacitas.co.uk enquire@capacitas.co.uk ) 020 7841 9950

vitAL PROCesses

This is where the web-based remote monitoring and management technologies come in. The core concept plays on both the advantages offered by the cloud and the focus on streamlining customer requirements when it comes to IT management. The benefits of the cloud in this sense mean: Speed of set up: the back-end management engine is hosted in the cloud, so there is no installation or set-up of management software. Ease of deployment: being domain and network agnostic, the technology is built to deploy and run over the Internet. Ease of management: modern, intuitive UIs mean that ‘time to value’ (ie, the time in which a company starts to see value from a new technology) is very short, and the training overhead for users is minimal. Cost: cost of customer fulfilment is dramatically reduced with the back-end system, and the benefits of this scalable, multi-tenant infrastructure hosted in the cloud can be passed on to customers in a lower end user cost.

the middle market In the remote monitoring and management space, perhaps unusually, we see the sMe market driving the adoption of these new technologies. enterprise organisations, often seen as the early adopters of new technology in order to gain competitive advantage, are still largely wedded to the established high-end IT management tools that are tortuous to deploy, hugely complex to manage and very expensive, in fact the very antithesis of the web 2.0 IT management technologies. The proliferation of mobile working, greatly accelerated by the explosion in smartphones and tablets as business tools, however, is forcing the enterprise to look beyond the traditional IT management products, to the new breed of web-based technologies that will give them centralised visibility and control of their IT assets, regardless of location, network, Os type or user. 58 VitAL : May / June 2011

The sMe IT sector meanwhile is perfectly positioned to take advantage of cloudbased IT management technologies due to the widespread adoption of outsourced IT contracts – small businesses outsourcing their IT to other small businesses. There are estimated to be over 15,000 IT service providers in the UK , the large proportion of which fall into this category. For these small, often owner-managed businesses, adoption of IT management technology has previously been prohibitive from both a cost and time perspective; however new breed remote monitoring and management tools removes both the technical and commercial barriers to entry. They can simply sign-up, deploy and they are up-and-running, with the benefits to their business almost immediate. with no minimum contracts, no minimum commitments, and a pay-as-you-go pricing model so favoured by saas providers, the cost of the technology is commensurate with customer revenues. The challenges for the majority of remote monitoring and management providers are not insignificant, but many are running on pre-cloud architecture and therefore need to re-engineer their technology for the cloud. Often packed full of ‘nice to have’ features and underpinned by expensive licensing models, most are battling to keep pace with the need to integrate into a multitude of other technologies.

simplicity, choice and integration I feel the future lies in three key principles – simplicity, choice and integration: Simplicity: the provision of a core IT management platform that contains the key requirements: • Audit – so you know what’s out there; • Monitoring – so you know what’s gone wrong, or is about to go wrong; • Deployment and conﬁguration – so you can automate your routine IT tasks; • Remote support – so you can provide

one-to-one device management when the need arises; • Reporting – giving you complete visibility of your environment. Choice: this lies in the ability of IT service providers to overlay core IT management frameworks with the functions that they need. For example, Centrastage’s Comstore allows IT admins to browse through a range of additional functionalities, which are then imported into their systems. This means they only have and only pay for the functionality they need. Think of it as the Apstore for IT management. Integration: the holy grail of IT management is a single technology that ‘does everything’. we’ve yet to see it, and so have built our technology around a framework that will integrate easily with other IT management and monitoring tools. It’s a model that has served salesforce well.

remote possibilities Fundamentally, adoption of IT management technology amongst sMes will be driven by wider economic market conditions – growing businesses looking to take on more clients, or grow their IT estate, without throwing additional headcount at their IT support function, or struggling businesses looking for efficiency savings. That said, by removing the two key inhibitors to adoption – cost and complexity – tools like Centrastage can dramatically accelerate market penetration of remote monitoring and management tools. On the enterprise side, it will be the adoption of tablets and smartphones that drives IT departments to look outside of the established technologies, and to consider some of the new pretenders and we believe they will be pleasantly surprised by what they see – well-featured, robust, cost-effective and flexible IT management technology that delivers an eye-watering ROI and a ground-breaking simplicity. VitAL www.centrastage.com www.vital-mag.net

vital eyes on

Tweet to who?

The holy grail of IT

Jonathan Westlake contemplates the importance of Twitter as the social network has its fifth birthda

management is a single technology that ‘does everything’. we’ve yet to see it, and so have built our technology around a framework that will integrate easily with other IT management and monitoring tools. It’s a model that has served salesforce well.

ArCh 2011 saw the fifth anniversary of Twitter and begs the question ‘is Twitter now part of everyday life?’ The statistics would seem to indicate that yes in the answer. 140 million tweets a day and year on year increases in use since its launch. Increasingly businesses are using free online social tools, for example at Staffordshire University (http://twitter.com/StaffsUni) we have nearly 3,000 followers and use Twitter to deliver useful short messages and advice. why is Twitter so popular? My view is that ease of use and synergy with mobile phones are important factors as well as the speed of twitter. Twitpic also allows the upload of photos which one can argue describe more than the 140 characters limit for a tweet. so we are witnessing a wide, electronic grapevine in the public domain targeted to followers of individuals or organisations. Business and news use has given Twitter more authority and tweets now range from gossip/trivia to important world-wide events which unfold as they happen via a set of tweets almost like a set of jigsaw pieces. The pros are that it is communication and what people really think in an uncensored environment and perhaps Twitter can help to differentiate an organisation and promote collaboration. Twitter can help to improve

the visibility of an organisation because it’s such an open social tool and virtually all messages are searchable and indexed by Google. whatever you talk about can be found – the dialogue can be seen and help individuals to get to know the organisation. You can see the appeal for UK Universities! The cons of Twitter include whether anyone cares about what an individual or organisation might think or be doing at a particular time, but the usage evidence of Twitter indicates that they do! Also there is a cost to online social tools – they are not free. Your Twitter account will need staff time for the creation and maintenance of meaningful tweets to your customers. The tweets need to offer added value to generate interest in your tweet feeds. so why not try a Twitter feed for your organisation? Get some experience and then augment with the use of hashtag registration to create a TwUBs for your organisation which is a Twitter group built around content aggregated from #hashtags, for example, http://twubs.com/nationaltrust. VitAL

Useful references: http://business.twitter.com/ http://twubs.com/ May / June 2011 : VitAL 59

vitAL PROCesses

Conflicting paradigms Will cloud computing and agile development conﬂict with IT service management or are they a cure for all our problems? Capacitas chief executive Andy Bolton looks for the answers.

LOUD COMpUTInG is the new paradigm that everyone is talking about. It involves the migration of IT services to commoditised data-centres, usually external to the existing IT service provider. The perceived benefits for this approach include the rapid scaling of services to meet customer demands, the reduction in costs due to the cloud service provider’s higher asset utilisation and reduced provisioning time due to automated processes. Like Agile development, another recent computing paradigm, cloud is designed to speed the delivery of IT services and hence the business benefits of those services. One of the great leaps forward in the IT industry’s maturity in the last two decades has been the adoption of service Management as a formal discipline to control and regulate the delivery of consistent IT services. service management brings control over the way IT services are delivered and supported, by defining high-level processes for key areas such as financial management, service level management, availability management, capacity management and change management.

Flexibility Cloud computing has been mooted as the saviour for many shortcomings of traditional in-house IT service provision, including the bureaucratic inertia that service management organisations are often accused of. One frequently mentioned advantage of cloud is the ability to ‘flex’ capacity up and 60 VitAL : May / June 2011

down to meet demand as needed. This can be useful to meet transient or unexpected demand in operational circumstances and has been often cited as the ‘end of capacity management’. In reality cloud does remove some of the constraints that an IT delivery organisation faces, such as long lead-times for provisioning. Long lead times are a natural barrier to meeting the customer’s requirements as they restrict the ability to react quickly and accurately to changes in end-user demands. similarly cloud enables the business customer to request and rapidly receive a server to install and run a service from; in fact with a credit card they can do this in a matter of minutes. This is also why Agile development has become so successful with the business customer, and is being widely adopted; it offers the ability to deliver new business functionality quickly thereby speeding timeto-market. It too reduces the bureaucracy that business customers have to endure to receive the functionality that they desire and, ultimately, pay for. However this flexibility in meeting business requirements can cause problems: it circumvents all the existing service management processes that are there to sensibly control the IT environment and prevent service-affecting outages. An example is change management: when the business can use a credit card to provision a new windows server, exchange server or sharePoint server, completely outside of the usual IT service management processes, it becomes impossible for the IT department to support or manage these services.

costs in the cloud The three most common characteristics that are ascribed as benefits to cloud computing are the ability to increase capacity to meet demand at short notice, that the cloud customer only pays for what they use (this may be on a pay-per-use or subscription model) and that higher asset utilisation leads to lower usage fees. It is true that a higher asset utilisation should, in theory, provide a reduced costper-transaction. This higher asset utilisation drives the economies of scale possible from cloud service providers in a similar way to other managed service providers. However there are other costs in addition to processing: cloud providers charge for data in/out of the cloud and also for storage. These costs are not forecasted or budgeted and are uncapped. while it’s a great advantage to be able to flex capacity up and down as needed this flexibility does create uncertainty as to the amount of installed capacity at any point in time. Also, when the bill comes in at the end of the month the financial director will not be happy that someone has incurred a cost without prior authorisation or a forecasted budget. Cloud-based contracts are generally uncapped so that it’s entirely possible for a staff member to procure cloud capacity without any authorisation that ends up costing the company dearly. These issues are normally controlled within service Management using the Financial Management and Capacity Management processes; cloud computing www.vital-mag.net

vital processes

requires considerable changes to these and other Service Management processes to accommodate short lead times

The death of capacity management? It has often been said that cloud computing will end the need for Capacity Management; this contentious statement has some basis in its truth, though it is not completely accurate due to the misuse of terminology. Capacity management, specifically the day-to-day management of capacity as it is needed, could be seen to be in danger of extinction due to cloud computing. However, this should really be called capacity provisioning, not capacity management. Capacity Management, as defined by ITIL and others, comprises of more than just provisioning capacity when required; capacity provisioning is just one aspect of this larger process. To understand the difference we should take a step back from capacity management to the more general term ‘management’. In his 1916 book Administration Industrielle et Générale French mining engineer Henri Fayol described his theory of management and its six components functions: forecasting; planning; organising; commanding; coordinating; and monitoring. Capacity Management, as any management discipline, is an over-arching discipline comprising of all of these activities. Creating new capacity, which cloud does so quickly and easily, equates only to the ‘organising’ and ‘commanding’ functions within Fayol’s model. Importantly this doesn’t reduce the need for the other functions: forecasting, planning, coordinating and monitoring. Forecasting is needed to calculate customer demand for the IT services across a specific planning window such as the financial year; planning is needed to calculate the required capacity to meet that forecasted demand. This capacity plan that is generated is needed to plan when new resources need to be procured or installed to support IT services; additionally the plan is used to create a budget so that the demand for financial resources can be prioritised across a business. Coordinating capacity across an enterprise prevents the duplication of capacity requirements. There are already reports of some companies having dozens of VMs running in the cloud without any workload “just in case we need them”. Not only does this negate the raison d’être of cloud services, but it increases idle capacity further. Coordinating www.vital-mag.net

capacity requests and allocations, as part of Capacity Management, can prevent this if undertaken properly. Monitoring capacity is important for a number of reasons including to ascertain the installed base and growth across the enterprise. At an event on private clouds, Gartner Analyst Milind Govekar recently said, that “Capacity Management and Capacity Planning become even more key in a cloudbased IT organisation” and that a “shift to holistic capacity planning” was needed. This confirms the renewed importance of Capacity Management for cloud-based architectures.

Will cloud be the ubiquitous computing platform? A significant amount of IT capacity can now be migrated to cloud-based services, but not all. Many IT services are not currently suitable for the cloud such as mission critical or low-latency applications. This is due to resource contention between unconstrained Virtual Machines (VMs). Also the performance overhead of each VM can create higher overall server utilisations and hence false measures of improved asset utilisation. The overhead of ten Windows Server VMs on a single box is not really a true measure of customer workload, but rather an artefact of the timesharing implementation. In a perfect world most customer workloads would be consolidated onto a single server image; although this wouldn’t remove the resource contention issue it does save the resources that are needed to run multiple operating systems. However, consolidation doesn’t isolate customer workloads into separate ‘sandboxed’ environments, meaning there can be security and configuration issues.

Here to stay Cloud as a paradigm is here to stay. It has many advantages, but does also have a few disadvantages that need to be recognised and understood before implementing cloud in an organisation. Service Management processes, such as described in ITIL, need to be adapted to the new world of cloud Computing as they need to be robust and more flexible. Importantly careful planning of capacity needs to take place, and suitable governance needs to exist, more than ever, due to the flexibility and ease of procuring cloud-based capacity. Suitable Capacity Planning is also needed to deliver accurate financial forecasting and budgeting of any enterprise, particularly one using cloud services. VitAL www.capacitas.co.uk

At an event on private clouds, Gartner Analyst Milind Govekar recently said, that “Capacity Management and Capacity Planning become even more key in a cloud-based IT organisation” and that a “shift to holistic capacity planning” was needed. This confirms the renewed importance of Capacity Management for cloudbased architectures.

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vitAL PROCesses

IT training – a sound investment in an uncertain economy As the first faltering steps are taken towards recovery, is training now back on the agenda? And if so, how can companies calculate the return on their investment (rOI)? Sue Bird, director of operations at SkillSet discusses.

This strongly suggests that training, along with learning and development, is increasingly recognised as an effective, contributing part of a business – a value-adding function rather than a cost that can be cut when budgets are tight.

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he fInAnCIAL crisis saw many organisations preoccupied with reducing budgets, putting time and energy into identifying potential cutbacks and spending freezes. now that UK plc has taken its first – some would say faltering – steps to recovery, there is a distinct sense of ‘getting back to basics’ amongst business leaders. Is training now ‘back at the table’? And if so, how can companies calculate the return on their investment (rOI)? The global marketplace moves at an ever-increasing pace and training is absolutely fundamental to the successful implementation of any new initiative, IT or otherwise. Growth comes with its own set of challenges but a well-planned strategy to help organisations develop their richest resource – people – can help overcome difficulties, improve service and enhance the success of a business. Training is therefore perhaps one of the soundest investments an organisation can make in a challenging economic climate, playing a critical role in providing a competitive advantage. But the aftermath of the economic crisis has seen budgets come under close scrutiny, which means training must be justifiable and measureable. earlier this month, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), released its 2011 Learning and Talent Development survey. The findings showed that this year, companies have increased training offering

to a median of five days per employee, compared to four days per employee in 2010. The research showed that they have also ‘increased their use of less costly development practices such as e-learning (54 percent), coaching by line managers (47 percent), in-house development programmes (45 percent) and internal knowledge-sharing events (37 percent)’. This strongly suggests that training, along with learning and development, is increasingly recognised as an effective, contributing part of a business – a value-adding function rather than a cost that can be cut when budgets are tight.

the challenge of measuring roI Return on investment (ROI) provides a snapshot at only a single point in time, which is less than beneficial when trying to determine return on training over time. The benefits of learning and development within a business setting can, therefore, be difficult to quantify, leading to difficulty in measuring ROI. while some elements can be easily recognised in financial terms, others are tricky to calculate; what value would you place on improved staff morale or more qualified staff who stay with the company for longer? Although harder to define in terms of value, these elements are no less important to the strength of an organisation. Overall, measuring ROI is more of an art than a science but applying a value to these www.vital-mag.net

vitAL PROCesses

Undoubtedly the economic downturn has caused the business world to revaluate and take stock of internal strategies. However, research suggests that organisations that implement or maintain their training commitments are likely to reap positive returns.

RoI or VfM? Return on investment shouldn’t be confused with value for money, which look solely at how much a desired object or condition is worth relative to other objects or conditions. ROI does not equate to cost; it is simply the ratio of money gained or lost (whether realised or unrealised) on an investment relative to that same amount.

Easterby-Smith’s purposes of training evaluation include: • proving: that the training worked or had measurable impact in itself. • Controlling: for example, the time needed for the training courses, consistency or compliance requirements. • Improving: for example, the training, trainers, course content and arrangements. • Reinforcing: using evaluation efforts as a deliberate contribution to the learning process itself.

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indicators of successful training undoubtedly helps a company pin down the effects of their investment.

What does success look like? Businesses need to think about what success looks like for them in order to be able to adequately measure the success of training. If learning and development professionals fail to plan for success from the start, they are unlikely to be able to measure it later, and no measurement means no calculation. An analysis of training needs will assist in outlining the objectives of the training; this should include how it will fit into the organisation’s learning culture and how you will get internal buy-in for the initiative. Once training needs and objectives have been set, the calculation of ROI must begin with knowledge of the costs and benefits associated with the training. Direct costs such as materials, training venue, suppliers , refreshments and the administration associated with training are the easiest to quantify. Additional costs such as travel and accommodation must also be taken into account, along with indirect costs such as employee cover.

tangible benefits of training The financial benefits of training are notoriously difficult to measure in terms of employee reactions and need not simply be based on the revenue generated by training. Tangible, long-term benefits come from improved performance, whether individual, corporate or financial. successful training can improve staff satisfaction, which links to enhanced productivity, greater retention rates (which, in turn, relate to lower recruitment costs and less training time) and reduced absenteeism. Operational savings such as faster access to information, reduced duplication of work and fewer mistakes also have a direct impact upon the revenue generated by a company. with the implementation of new IT systems, measurement can be relatively straightforward.

examining proficiency levels amongst staff via the number of helpdesk calls, errors, speed of work or the number of attempts to go back to the old system are all sound indicators of aptitude. similarly, regulatory training ROI can be measured by determining the effect on the number of accidents or incidents a company faces. soft skills, however, are more difficult to calculate; focused on people rather than processes, calculation is far from an exact science. employee retention is a useful long-term indication, while satisfaction surveys can also be useful – the ‘happy sheet’ is not quite dead. Customer feedback or complaints and 360 analysis from reportees give other measurement options, all of which can be applied to the formula to calculate ROI. Once this formula has been created, measurement against the costs outlined above is a simple calculation that offers a sound financial measure. Undoubtedly the economic downturn has caused the business world to revaluate and take stock of internal strategies. However, research suggests that organisations that implement or maintain their training commitments are likely to reap positive returns. while there will certainly continue to be lively debate on the topic, the role of ROI calculation is a fundamental one, helping us to identify costs and potential returns in order to sharpen a company’s competitive edge. Although training can increase the competitiveness of a company, the costs incurred must be tracked closely to ensure that an organisation’s learning and development programmes are truly an effective service to the business. Ultimately, though, closer scrutiny should not result in fewer initiatives; investing in effective training strategies is crucial, and is an activity that the most stable and innovative organisations rarely sacrifice. VitAL www.skillset.co.uk www.vital-mag.net

vitAL PROCesses

Testing virtual applications Application virtualisation can be a tremendous aid to the production, testing and implementation of modern IT systems. Marek Kucharski, president of parasoft explains.

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vital processes

odern IT systems have long since ceased to be one big monolithic application. They are a complex conglomerate of traditional applications such as CRM or ERP; smaller and dedicated to the specific needs of the industry and external services increasingly appearing in the cloud. Everything has to communicate with each other, often in real time. With this high degree of interdependence appropriate testing of a new application becomes a huge challenge – consuming high costs, human resources and time. As a remedy to this issue, the concept of application virtualization has been created. Thanks to the virtualization, companies can save considerable sums spent on the development, testing and implementation of new components in their systems.

1. Portal 2. CRM 3. Mainframe 4. World Span Pricing Engine 5. Common Payment Gateway

Airline ticket economics It always fascinated me how airlines set fares. It is so different from that of public transport tickets to which I’m accustomed. In the latter case, for a train connection in a given period of time, the rigid, predetermined price is offered. Meanwhile, an airline ticket purchase is a gambling game. Recently I had the opportunity to learn about some of this mystery. In one of the airline companies, a ticket purchase over the Internet is roughly as follows: • First, the customer logs in to the portal. By identifying the customer, the CRM system, based on the customer identity, provides information on the customer’s purchase history, loyalty points, etc. • Then the client specifies from where to where and when he wants to go. • Next, the portal contacts the main system, perhaps based on a mainframe, which checks what options are possible. In the next step the portal contacts the external system for information on the competitors’ prices of similar flights. Only after gathering all the pieces of information the price for this specific flight is offered to the customer. When the customer chooses the offer, a credit card authorisation is required to complete the transaction. Again, the authorisation is executed by another external system. So we have five systems involved in the transaction: www.vital-mag.net

However the above-mentioned airline experiences a big problem with the high cost of changing the functionality of the portal. The portal itself is that part which the customer sees and works with, and which substantially affects the derived revenues. Well, each new version of the portal must be thoroughly tested. Unfortunately, this cannot be done in any other way than when the portal is connected to the supporting systems. And this could be a problem since the supporting systems and external services are also subject to upgrade. The airline has calculated that the slowdown in the portal testing process is close to 50 percent when one of the supporting systems/services is unavailable or overloaded with a high number of transactions. And it happens often enough that it becomes a great obstacle for the company. Building a completely separate test environment is not an option for financial reasons. Moreover, there are other problems with infrastructure, but those are beyond the scope of this article. The problem described above is a real case, an example of the challenges faced by companies developing their IT systems, systems which are a key factor of their competitiveness. Each system element must be properly tested, and what is

Thanks to the virtualization, companies can save considerable sums spent on the development, testing and implementation of new components in their systems.

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The virtualised application is not the same as the original

most essential, tested in the target environment, or a well-simulated one. Achieving this is becoming increasingly difficult, and therefore more expensive, labour and resource consuming, especially when the individual components of the system are more expensive and harder to configure.

Virtual testing

one. It’s just a ‘mockup’, good enough to let you test the components, but not so good as to fully replace the original application. So this is not the same as hardware virtualization, eg, VMWare, where the simulation is complete.

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To help companies solve this problem the new concept of application virtualisation was invented. It is based on the finding that, for testing purposes, we don’t need the external services and supporting systems available on site. We need them only so far as it is required for simulation of the transaction. So we can look at the communication between the elements of our system and learn how it should work, and then replace the real application with a ‘mock-up’ that can collect messages and respond in the same way as the original application does. Let’s once again refer to the ticket ordering system mentioned above. A test case may cover a process of searching for a GlasgowTaiwan connection, accepting money and then making a purchase. To carry out this case, the application working on the mainframe gets information on dates for the beginning and end of the journey. Then it returns the list of connections. You can safely assume that in a short term the responses of this application for the same input data will not differ considerably. In the case of the application temporary being unavailable we could use the stored results. Later, when the application is again available, it may be re-used for the test case. This simple concept allows the continuity of testing in the absence of access to the original application. You can even completely reproduce elements of the production environment for testing purposes. This is to avoid downtime in the tests, and considerably ease the implementation. Virtualization can also be used in development. Developers can use a virtualised application in the development of its software. This is important especially for companies that outsource the development process. In such case companies may provide their suppliers with a virtualised system to let them test the

components under conditions as close as possible to destination ones.

The human factor Of course, the issue is not trivial when it comes to the implementation of relevant systems. We have to remember about human interactions, productivity, the need to emulate more complex transactions, etc. Building a customised virtual environment requires a lot of effort. Fortunately, there are a few solutions on the market available. We should also note that application virtualisation is not a ready-to-use solution; rather it’s a bespoke process. With an ‘out-of-box’ solution we may virtualise only some basic test cases. However, in order to virtualise the entire application behaviour we need ‘to teach’ our tool how the application works itself. So we have three phases of virtualisation: 1. Observing and learning how the original application behaves (Capture); 2. Tuning of the virtualized components (Provision); 3. Using the virtualized components for testing (Test). You should be aware that the virtualised application is not the same as the original one. It’s just a ‘mock-up’, good enough to let you test the components, but not so good as to fully replace the original application. So this is not the same as hardware virtualization, eg, VMWare, where the simulation is complete. With this in mind, it should be stressed that the concept of virtualisation perfectly fits the needs of modern enterprises. As mentioned above, today’s IT systems are often a key factor to gain an advantage over the competition. Therefore, companies are constantly developing their IT systems. Application virtualisation accelerates the development of software both ’in-house’ and ‘out-sourced’. This allows organisations to better and more quickly test the components of their systems. Moreover, it reduces costs by eliminating unnecessary purchases of equipment and licenses, and avoiding unnecessary extra charges for external services. Finally, it facilitates the implementation allowing the gradual connection of components to the application. VitAL www.parasoft.com / VIRTUALIZE www.vital-mag.net

vital DrIve: IT HITs THe FAIRwAY

Diary dates Today’s IT systems are often a key factor Geraint Lewis is checking his diary to see when it’s time to switch to a new OS.

to gain an advantage over the competition. Therefore, companies are constantly developing their IT systems. Application virtualisation accelerates the development of software both ’in-house’ and ‘out-sourced’. This allows organisations to better and more quickly test the components of their systems.

h e M AS T er S Tour n a me n t traditionally marks the start of the golf season as spring arrives in Augusta with an explosion of colour as the blossom on the course bursts into life. with the Ryder Cup safely returned to its spiritual home just down the corridor from the IT HQ in the PGA at the Belfry and three out of the four ‘Major’ trophies being held by non Americans, hopes were high that we could see a first european winner since 1999 or a first UK winner since sir nick Faldo, overcame a six shot deficit going into the last round to defeat Greg norman by five shots, in what many people consider was the worst / greatest golfing collapse by a player, leading a Major with the ‘finishing line’ in site. westwood, McDowell, Poulter & McIlroy were all being mentioned before the event as the players to watch, with McIlroy ultimately snatching defeat from the jaws of victory and giving Greg norman a run for his money, but it was south African Charl schwartzel that took the title. Lots of the talk in Augusta related to Golf looking forward to becoming an Olympic sport at the 2016 Games in Rio, with the prospect of the greats of the game playing for their countries, expect a similar amount of interest and hype to when the greats of the nBA, put aside team differences and came together as the UsA Dream Team,

sweeping all before them to win gold medal after gold medal. we in the UK are looking forward to hosting the Olympics in 2012, which look as if they will be ready on time though not on budget. It will be the first Olympics in many years where the stadium will not smell of paint and echo to the sound of last minute building as the spectators take their seats for the first events. And speaking of ‘key dates,’ the one that I have in my diary is in summer 2014, when Microsoft finally ends support for windows XP. Our IT hardware replacement programme here at the PGA has been adjusted so that we commence replacement of our PCs in Q1 2014, at which time we will look to move to windows 7 or possibly windows 8 or even windows 9 or 10. Many remember the problems with vista, which meant that lots of companies refreshed their equipment with XP rather than upgrading to vista. will IT professionals hold off from windows 8 to ensure that it is bug free, roll over with windows 7 and then move onto windows 9 or 10? with the cost of an operating system making up a significant part of the price of the computer and the rise of open source operating systems bringing new players into the market, this decision for the IT manager becomes harder and harder. VitAL May / June 2011 : VitAL 69

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A greener approach to IT even in this era of economic crisis the adoption of a greener approach to IT is still very much a dominant issue. According to Sumir Karayi, CeO of 1e an organisation’s brand image and green credentials can be vastly increased if a push to ‘go green’ is widely acknowledged.

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nfOrMATIOn TeChnOLOGY is in a constant state of forward propulsion – perpetually innovating, evolving and expanding. It is understandable, therefore, that IT professionals can feel daunted by the task of keeping pace with IT’s transformation, constantly learning about and deploying the latest and greatest innovation. However, it has become apparent to organisations that the implementation of a ‘greener’ approach to IT is becoming a dominant issue. Consumers are becoming more aware of environmental issues and the need to reduce their individual carbon footprint. similarly, an organisation’s brand image and green credentials can be vastly increased if a push to ‘go green’ is widely acknowledged.

Investing in the future Due to the dramatic evolution of information technology equipment over the past few decades, handheld devices can now do the same things once only achieved by core mainframes. Other elements such as server cores, memory and capacity have also undergone much needed improvements. Unfortunately, the perceived need for the newest technology has created an epidemic of waste in today’s IT environment. Globally, organisations will spend more than $8 trillion on IT (both new products and ongoing maintenance) in the next five years, according to IDC’s 2011 predictions. That is almost double China’s reported annual GDP. To make matters worse, traditional systems’ management tools mirror IT’s top priority of innovation and looking forward. This means that IT professionals rarely, if ever, have the luxury of fully understanding their IT environment (past and present) before making purchasing decisions for the future. Many organisations invest in new technologies (the newest operating system, the latest version of Office, countless virtual servers) without fully www.vital-mag.net

tapping their existing infrastructure. The result is an abundant mêlée of waste – ranging from an array of ‘shelfware’, the term attributed to unused software, to an excess of unused servers in data centres across the country.

looking back to move forward Before investing in new technologies, however, organisations need to evaluate their existing infrastructure and determine what is actually providing business value or even simply what is being used. For an organisation to achieve a greater level of efficiency, five primary questions must be addressed: 1. What is being used? This question strikes fear into the heart of many IT professionals. whether this question is asked about software, PCs or servers, many IT professionals don’t know how to accurately find the answer. This leads to IT waste – which is costly and can be avoided. 2. When is it being used? Technology is not always a 24/7/365 need. For example, organisations often find that the majority of their PCs enterprise-wide are left on for absolutely no reason overnight and on weekends – wasting massive amounts of energy and money. 3. Is it generating business value? The servers commissioned to run enterprisewide risk management software are certainly being used to meet important security and compliance demands, but the servers commissioned to pilot or deploy legacy shelfware are useless. Finding the servers that are actually supporting current business needs can be a challenge if organisations are relying simply on utilisation measures as useless servers can often look ‘busy.’ 4. can it be centralised? The push to create a more centralised IT infrastructure can create major money-saving efficiencies, reducing the number of servers and better May / June 2011 : VitAL 71

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using network bandwidth and availability. For instance, large organisations are increasingly realising that branch-office servers used for software patching and updates can often be completely eliminated and managed securely from a central location. 5. Can it be automated? Reallocating the mundane, repetitive, and often downright boring IT tasks to computers lets IT people focus on more strategic initiatives. It also avoids procedure deviations and dramatically speeds up processes. A prime example is Windows 7 migration. Windows 7 deployments will be the largest project that many businesses will embark upon over the next few years and will test IT efficiency. If done manually, moving to the new operating system will require an army of on-site IT personnel spending anywhere rom half a day to a full day migrating one computer. When you consider the personnel investment and travel costs and multiply it by 50,000 to 100,000 PCs in a large organisation, the potential cost is tremendous. Taking the above process into consideration, companies can make their Windows 7 deployments a model for sustainability, by tapping technologies that can automate the migration process and manage such deployments remotely.

Going green: a case study ARUP, a leading structural engineering firm, has always encouraged staff to switch off their computers each evening before leaving the office, but this was hard to manage as it was not an automated process. Following further investigation it was found that one in four computers was being left on each weekday evening and one in five was being left on each weekend. The global increase in energy costs and the growing need for greater awareness of its carbon footprint in the UK, Middle East and Europe, led ARUP to opt for a power management solution for its fleet of desktop computers. It was agreed that PCs would be scheduled for shutdown at 19:00 each night. With 99 72 VitAL : May / June 2011

percent of ARUP’s desktop fleet in the UK, Middle East and Europe being powered down, the region is saving £50,000 and approximately 442 metric tonnes of CO2 per year, the equivalent of annual greenhouse emissions of 81 modern passenger vehicles or the energy use of 40 homes for one year.

Create real efficiencies Making your current systems as efficient as possible will always be more profitable than investing in new ‘green’ innovations. Rethink your IT priorities and processes – determine if your hardware is actually doing something useful, what software is being used, what energy is being spent on IT, which tasks can be automated or centralised – and you can save large amounts of money, dramatically reduce your energy consumption and become a greener, more sustainable company. Only once you have gained all possible efficiencies from your previous investments, should you evaluate and implement new energy-efficient technologies. There is a tremendous opportunity for companies to make ‘going green’ more profitable. Today, there are technologies that can provide organisations with a new view of their IT landscape and eliminate guesswork, providing accurate measurement and conclusive data to empower companies to create effective, enterprise-wide policies that form synergies between business use and energy conservation. My company provides IT efficiency solutions which help reduce costs in hardware, software, energy and time. We’ve helped our customers save over $1 billion and prevented 4.5 million tons of CO2 emissions from entering the atmosphere to date. Rather than rampantly spending on new technologies – PCs that use less energy, more efficient servers, etc. – focus on the efficiencies that can be gained from current IT assets. Doing so will help conserve energy, reduce your carbon footprint and eliminate excesses, as well as avoid the significant added cost of properly disposing of retired hardware. VitAL www.1e.com

Rather than rampantly spending on new technologies – PCs that use less energy, more efficient servers, etc. – focus on the efficiencies that can be gained from current IT assets. Doing so will help conserve energy, reduce your carbon footprint and eliminate excesses, as well as avoid the significant added cost of properly disposing of retired hardware.

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UKCMG 26th Annual Conference 2011 Education, Innovation & Excellence

16th & 17th May

at the Oxford Belfry Hotel, Thame, Oxfordshire

Capacity, Performance, Z/OS & Service Management Tracks

Four-track agenda each day â&#x20AC;&#x201C; technical presentations, end-user stories, tutorials and workshops. Network and learn through the table-top exhibition running alongside the conference. With a record number of end-user presentations this promises to be our best year yet!

K ! O ! ! O ! B W NO

More event details are available at www.ukcmg.org.uk