The Top Ten Things That Tell You It s Time for a Change

The Top Ten Things That Tell You It's Time for a Change

Here is the challenge for you. See if any of these "Top Ten Things That Tell You It's Time for a Change" apply to your organization.

Number 10: You don't have a solid partner

Traveling down the e-business adoption path is not always an easy thing to do by yourself—especially if your resources are constrained due to tough economic times. So you need to have a place to turn for help when you need it. Maybe it's some simple technical support matter, or maybe you need help developing and executing a comprehensive e-business plan. In either case, if your current computer vendor is unable or unwilling to help you succeed, you need a new partner. Life is too short and dollars too scarce to follow someone down the e-business path—when they don't even know where they are going. If you see yourself in this situation, it's time for a change.

IBM will make the case that they have more experience than any other vendor in helping businesses plan and execute e-business projects. Their Global Services division (more on them later) has worked on over 30,000 real-world e-business projects with customers (not counting their own internal projects). They have an Advanced Business Council in which IBM Distinguished Engineers work directly with leading companies to develop e-business solutions based on real situations.

Another alternative is to tap the resources of the IBM Business Partner network consisting of over 60,000 firms. This is often a cost-effective alternative when you need ongoing support.

Sometimes it makes sense to have more than one partner for a particular project. For example, when broadcast company Swedish Television in Stockholm needed a new digital media management system, they had IBM Global Services team with Swedish business partner Ardendo, which specializes in digital media management networking. Additional support for this project was also provided by IBM Silicon Valley Labs as well as IBM Digital Media Labs in Bethesda, Maryland. The resulting benefits included a 25% gain in workflow productivity, significant savings in total cost of ownership, and increased viewer satisfaction.

Whether you turn to IBM or someone else, if you don't have a solid partner, you need to make a change.

Number 9: There are walls between users and the information they need

This point refers to the integration element of a sound e-business computing infrastructure. Depending on where you are along the e-business adoption path, you may have some work to do here. Perhaps you have multiple UNIX servers running multiple UNIX application programs, but they are unable to share information with one another. Or, more likely, you have a mixture of UNIX and non-UNIX systems running application programs that can't share information with each other. If this is the case, you have the classic "islands of automation" blues. People can't efficiently get the information they need, when they need it, and how they need it. Your organization has (or will) hit a wall, hindering your progress down the e-business adoption path. What's the answer? It's called enterprise application integration. This is a process enabled by tools that allows you to enable the free flow of information between disparate application programs, thus tearing down the "wall" between that information and the people who need it.

The pSeries' ability to run AIX or Linux means there is a very good chance that you are using versions of the application programs that can be consolidated onto a single pSeries server. You can also use the WebSphere middleware tools (covered earlier) to enable the free flow of information between the application programs, thus enabling you to integrate the core business processes they support. Only then you will have found your way out of the "islands of automation" blues and take a step down the e-business adoption path.

Number 8: You feel trapped in a proprietary world

Many computing infrastructures in use today have evolved from a time when it was commonplace to buy proprietary hardware and software architectures (i.e., those not adhering to the open standards of today). As a business tries to move down the e-business adoption path on these infrastructures, it will quickly find that the choices in servers, storage devices, operating systems, middleware, application programs, enterprise integration solutions, etc., may be limited. Fewer choices typically translate into less-than-ideal solutions at a higher cost. Compare this to an open standards environment where there are more options at a lower cost, and you can see how one company (the one in the open standards world) has a competitive advantage.

If you are feeling locked in to a proprietary environment, the answer may well be to accept it and make the change to an open standards server. The pSeries and its AIX operating system is a definitive open standards environment. As the IBM version of UNIX, AIX was born and bred in an open standards environment, so by default, you have in AIX a very open platform from which to launch down the e-business adoption curve.

And then there is Linux, the other open standards operating system that can run on pSeries. Linux is experiencing phenomenal growth right now due to its low cost, excellent performance, and natural affinity for the online world, to name just a few of the many good reasons.

If you put off making the change and invest more in your proprietary infrastructure, then you will be wasting that much more money when you eventually make the change. And make no mistake: If you pursue the e-business adoption path, you will eventually wind up making the change to an open standards computing infrastructure; as the saying goes, "You can pay a little now or pay more later." If your business is not pursuing an e-business agenda, then update your resume.

Number 7: Much of your computing power is wasted

As mentioned earlier, much of the computing resources deployed today are underutilized, leading to higher costs. IBM is focused on enabling the eServer lines to more efficiently utilize their performance and capacity with things like Capacity Upgrade on Demand and Dynamic LPAR—both covered in an earlier chapter. These two functions work together to help ensure two things:

1. You have enough computing power available to the users who need it, when they need it.

2. You aren't paying for more processing power than you actually need.

Dynamic LPAR allows you to allocate and reallocate computing power to match the needs of users without causing disruption. Capacity Upgrade on Demand allows you to have spare processing power on hand but not pay for it unless you actually need it.

If you are missing either piece of this puzzle, it may be time for a change.

Number 6: Your systems go down too often

Back in the days of the Ford model "T," auto owners had to be amateur mechanics to keep their "horseless carriage" running smoothly. Of course, today's automobiles are way more complicated than these early ones. At the same time, the reliability of our automobiles is also way more vital for most of us now because we have woven cars into the very fabric of our everyday lives. That is, we have moved down the "auto-mobile adoption path." As complexity increased, auto designers had to turn to computers to manage the complexities of gas mixtures, real-time performance monitoring and optimization, critical event timing, adaptation to changing environmental conditions, security—you name it. The same is true for almost any system. As you increase function and performance, the systems necessarily become more complex.

Of course, the same is true with an e-business computing infrastructure. As you progress down the e-business adoption path, you are weaving that infrastructure into the very fabric of your business. To achieve the greater level of value held out by the e-business opportunity, you have to contend with greater complexity. Just like the designers of the automobile, computer designers have added additional computer technology to... computer... systems to help the systems manage themselves better. This is the heart of the IBM autonomic computing initiative—that is, to build systems that leverage things like specialized service processors and advanced software to allow a computer system to be self-optimizing, self healing, self-configuring, and self-protecting.

Looking back, the RS/6000 line (and other UNIX systems) had some level of autonomic computing (e.g., memory error detection and correction). If you looked hard enough, you could probably find some autonomic elements in the Model "T." However, in all of these cases, what worked for the past will not be adequate for the future. As a business moves down the e-business adoption path and gains the enormous benefits to be had, the complexity of its computing infrastructure will grow—and so will the need for autonomic computing. That is why autonomic computing is such a big push for all of the IBM eServer lines.

As mentioned earlier, a core IBM strategy for all eServer systems is to mitigate the risk posed by system outages. The pSeries line has implemented things like dynamic memory and processor deallocation (discussed in Chapter 2) to help keep the systems running in the event of hardware failures.

Number 5: You're out of computing power

Maybe your business is growing quickly. Maybe your company just made an acquisition or has started hiring new employees, thus adding users to your world. Maybe you need to add a new application program to solve a new business need.

Whatever the reason, businesses often find their computer system becoming slow and sluggish or unable to hold all of the information being generated. When you find yourself in this spot, what you need is more computing power and capacity. Okay, so what's the most economical way to get it?

That depends. Maybe a simple model upgrade will do... for awhile. Maybe not. Here again, a business needs to take the long view. Investing more money in a dead-end product line, even if it solves your problem for a period of time, may not be the smartest move in the long run. The money spent for the model upgrade might well be better spent on updating your e-business infrastructure with the latest technology. Granted the "new technology" approach might cost more at the time of purchase. But it may be the better investment over, say, a five-year period when you look at the total cost of ownership. See "Number 2" below for more on this way of looking at cost.

The high levels of performance offered by pSeries systems is well documented in recent performance testing efforts (i.e., benchmarks). For example, the pSeries Model 650 was determined to be the best 8-way performer of all the systems tested (SPECweb99 and SPECjbb200 tests). The technological magic behind these pSeries performance numbers is things like the first dual-processor microprocessor chip (POWER4+), which houses 184 million transistors running at 1.45 GHz. Still need more power? Try the pSeries Model 690 or, better yet, link a group of pSeries systems together in a Cluster 1600 configuration and see what happens.

Later, when you are on the pSeries and you grow some more, you can "turn on" additional processors through Capacity Upgrade on Demand, upgrade to a larger pSeries model (vertical growth), or add additional pSeries systems to your cluster (horizontal growth) and combine the strength of many systems to achieve supercomputer performance yet manage the cluster as if they were one system.

To help you keep a handle on performance needs over time, you can choose to activate the "IBM eServer pSeries performance management for AIX" service (PM/AIX) covered earlier.

If your storage infrastructure isn't meeting your needs, then the IBM answer is the IBM TotalStorage family of devices (covered earlier). This family of disk and tape storage products can be used with any eServer and with many non-IBM servers. Some storage devices are attached directly to a server, but more often they are stand-alone devices on a network. As we saw earlier in the Whirlpool case study, an inadequate storage performance and capacity can hold back your entire e-business infrastructure.

Number 4: You can't find the right application program

Things change and you are faced with a new set of requirements you must meet. If the best pre-packaged application program for the task won't run on your computing infrastructure, it may be time for a change.

One of the key strategies IBM has behind the pSeries line is application flexibility. Since pSeries can run AIX or Linux, there is a sea of pre-packaged applications already out there from which to choose. As mentioned earlier, IBM has many alliances with top application program developers in order to ensure a steady stream of solutions is available for pSeries.

As for finding the right solution, the IBM eServer Solution Connection is one source that can help you locate pre-packaged application programs based on your requirements. Here you can use search functions to find specific types of application programs, consultants, solution value reports, etc. You can also request a no-fee business assessment and find things like performance benchmarks, technology papers, customer references, events, promotions, education, implementation guides, technical manuals, etc. Once an application program has been successfully implemented on eServer systems in real-world businesses, it is given the IBM ServerProven designation.

MORE ON THE WEB

• IBM eServer Solution Connection—online catalog of application programs

However you do it, finding and selecting the right application programs is critical as you move down the e-business adoption path.

Number 3: Too many systems to manage

Another tool you can use to help achieve enterprise application integration while saving money is termed "server consolidation." Here, you take a group of disparate (or even similar) servers and operating systems (each requiring its own systems management effort, maintenance contracts, periodic software/hardware upgrades, etc.) and move the application programs and data they offer (e.g., collaboration, Web serving, transaction processing, etc.) onto one larger server. By doing so, you wind up with one system to manage, one maintenance contract, one set of periodic software/hardware updates... and probably extra floor space to boot.

But wait, you have different types of servers running different application programs requiring different types of operating systems—how can you move all that incompatible stuff to one server? To get to the answer, each application program has to be considered, one at a time. The first question to ask is, "Do we really need this particular application?" Most of the time the answer will probably be "yes," but once in a while it will be "no" and so you simply take that one out of the picture and don't spend any time moving it forward into your new e-business computing infrastructure.

When the answer is "Yes, we must have that application program," then you have to consider your options. First, contact the software vendor and see if a version is available that will run on a pSeries under AIX or Linux (both of which can be running on a single pSeries system). If not, you can look for competitive application programs that might do the job as well or better. Often, competitive application programs can import the data from competing products to help ease the migration.

If there is no AIX/Linux version of a key application program and no desirable alternative solution, you may not be able to consolidate that particular application program onto the new server. So leave it where it is for now. Dropping from five servers to two (rather than to one) would still yield many of the same benefits and would still be a step in the right e-business direction.

Earlier, we covered the fact that pSeries systems can use their Dynamic LPAR function to logically subdivide a single server into several, each running a different instance of AIX or Linux. By doing so, you have multiple "virtual" servers housed within one pSeries server. So you effectively get the function and inter-user protection of having separate servers with the advantage of having only one server to manage and maintain. Later, if one "virtual server" needs more processors, disk storage, etc., you can make the change on the fly without disrupting operations.

MORE ON THE WEB

• Case study of an IBM internal server consolidation project

To help ease system management tasks, pSeries servers feature a front-accessible serial interface for personal digital assistants (PDAs). Using IBM System Network Analysis and Performance Pilot software, network administrators can quickly and easily conduct system setups, perform network configurations, and monitor performance anytime anywhere.

Want a real-world example? Colgate, one of the largest SAP deployments in the world, consolidated seventy Sun servers down to thirteen pSeries 680 servers. In Chapter 4, we will see a more detailed example of server consolidation at Toyota Australia, where they consolidated eight servers onto two pSeries systems.

The point is, when it comes to servers, "less is more."

Number 2: You need to reduce costs

A recent Gartner survey of businesses revealed that 2002 computer technology budgets grew only about 1.5% over 2001, while from 1999 to 2000 budgets grew at near double-digit rates year to year. Going forward, those responsible for managing the computing infrastructure for businesses are not likely to see a cloudburst of new funding for e-business projects falling onto their desks. Yet the e-business world will steadily march on at its typical light-speed pace, and companies will have to find a way to do more with less.

One way to attack this problem is to reduce the costs of your existing computer infrastructure to make those funds available for new e-business initiatives. This brings us back to a discussion about reducing the total cost of ownership—one of the key strategies for all eServer lines. As was described earlier, recent studies have demonstrated that eServer systems have the lead in total cost of ownership (considering acquisition cost, software cost, operating cost, maintenance, etc.). The total cost of ownership of pSeries systems was shown to be about one-half that of similar SUN servers and about one-third that of HP systems.

The pSeries servers have several characteristics that lend themselves to cost-reduction projects, as we have seen. The Dynamic LPAR function enables and simplifies server consolidation projects, which saves money. The price/performance ratios of pSeries servers make them a cost-effective choice for meeting new needs as they arise This is augmented by the capacity on demand function, which allows a business to safely operate closer to the maximum capacity of a pSeries server, which means you are not paying for computing power you don't need.

Projects that aim at reducing the total cost of ownership can often demonstrate the kind of solid return on investment potential needed to get funding in even the most trying economic times... because they save money.

Number 1: Things are running just fine the way they are...

It is both difficult and risky to advance down the e-business adoption path if your information technology team is busy day and night responding to urgent problems. Who can methodically plan and execute the integration of core business functions when your servers keep going down, you are over budget, and your users increasingly complain about slow response time? If you and your team are needing to react to urgent problems all day, every day, you will probably see yourself in one of the other "Top Ten Reasons to Make a Change." You have some work to do to gain control of your situation before you can move forward.

On the other hand, if you have things under control, then you are in an excellent position to pull your team together and start planning your next strategic step down the e-business adoption path and toward a new competitive advantage. Chances are you will come up with several key projects that can move your business forward.

Keep in mind that the biggest risk in today's e-business world is doing nothing at all while your competitors (known and unknown) are working to gain the upper hand through their own e-business push.