Management Essential for Virtualization Adoption

For most organizations, virtualization holds great promise for significant and immediate savings in the datacenter. However, most organizations reach a certain level of virtualization and then have their efforts stall. Research from IDC shows this is the case, with organizations having many VMs rating management as very important to further adoption.


Although virtualization reduces the number of assets under management, it does increase management complexity of the environment, and centralizes risk / amplifies sensitivity to errors, making management more critical than ever.


Unfortunately, many who have implemented virtualization have not advanced their management of the environment to follow suite. Management solutions and practices need to change and advance to meet the demands of moving from physical to virtual.


It is recommended that organizations begin by assessing their current capability and maturity of virtualization management to understand where they are today, and what specific elements need to be implemented to help drive improvements.


Working with EMC Ionix, Alinean created the Virtualization Management Capability and Maturity Assessment.



The Virtualization Management capability and maturity levels are defined as follows:

Survival

LITTLE TO NO:
• Automation for processes or tasks
• Centralization and standardization of tools
• Integrated tools across technology domains
• Integrated tools across virtual and physical infrastructures
• IT Service awareness across tools


Awareness

PLANS AND/OR INITIAL ADOPTION OF:
• Automation for processes or tasks
• Centralization and standardization of tools
• Integrated tools across technology domains
• Integrated tools across virtual and physical infrastructures
• IT Service awareness across tools



Committed

SOME, BUT UNCOORDINATED:
• Automation for processes or tasks
• Centralization and standardization of tools
• Integrated tools across technology domains
• Integrated tools across virtual and physical infrastructures
• IT Service awareness across tools

Proactive

SIGNIFICANT ADOPTION AND COORDINATION OF:
• Automation for processes or tasks
• Centralization and standardization of tools
• Integrated tools across technology domains
• Integrated tools across virtual and physical infrastructures
• IT Service awareness across tools


Optimized

COMPREHENSIVE AND CONTINUALLY IMPROVED:
• Automation for processes or tasks
• Centralization and standardization of tools
• Integrated tools across technology domains
• Integrated tools across virtual and physical infrastructures
• IT Service awareness across tools




To obtain a Virtualization Assessment overview, and compare your current level to peers / leaders, visit the EMC Ionix Virtualized IT Management Cost Savings Assessment at: https://roianalyst.alinean.com/ent_01/AutoLogin.do?d=96663974887422036

Prove business value, or lose the sale

In this challenging economy, 44% of organizations plan to reduce projects selectively based on potential / expected contribution to business value.
As a solutions provider, you have to prove superior contribution to business value, or your project will be on the chopping block.

Even though the economy is challenged, decision makers are not just interested in cutting costs. How do customers measure the value of their investments:
31% - Improved Customer Service
24% - Reduced Costs
18% - New or improved products and services
15% - Improved business intelligence / knowledge
8% - Increased security / risk reduction

http://www.cioinsight.com/c/a/IT-Management/Finding-Value-in-IT-investments-288941/
ISACA (isaca.org) Value of IT 2009 study

How to Keep Your Interactive Marketing on Track

Many are looking for ways to make thier Interactive Marketing programs more successful and provide higher ROI.

According to Gary Stein, VP of strategy for Ammo Marketing, in a ClickZ article: "If you want to be successful online, you must take advantage of the fact that you are marketing on a medium that people see as a tool, and they anticipate getting value out of……you must provide something worthwhile, because, simply, people want to use the Internet, not simply view it."

On-line ROI/TCO calculators and assessment tools are a great way to meet these goals - making on-line white papers and savings / value research come to life.

See the full Stein article here: http://www.clickz.com/3634599
Review some great interactive campaigns using these interactive sales tools at: http://www.alinean.com/BVS.asp

Tying ROI proposals to Unique Strategic Value

Rick Page, founder of The Complex Sale Inc., and author of Make Winning a Habit (McGraw-Hill, 2006) points out in this article how ROI is an absolute requirement, however since it is becoming common, a key is to not only quantify the savings and benefits, but convert the abstract dollar savings into something the company can dig into, strategically. This means understanding the organization's strategic goals and being sure to map the savings directly back to helping the company achieve these goals.

Page's example speaks about Hershey and tying the savings back to increases in charitable donations. For a company with a Green strategy, the savings could be translated into cars off the road, homes powered, or trees saved. For a restaurant, this might be tying the savings to profit from N restaurants, for a REIT, this might be tying the savings back to the profit from N commercial buildings.

Any way you look at it, as ROI proposals become required, its important to not only quantify unique value, but to begin to differentiate your proposals with a core connection to the organization.

http://www.sellingpower.com/html_newsletter/article.asp?usr=SP1734968844&NLid=1&Layout_ID=921&ARTid=4088&nDate=August+3%2C+2009