Data Center Transformation Program Planning and Design

04/12/2023 © Copyright 2010-2011 Sunnyside Associates, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

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Data Center Transformation Program Planning and Design

Service Offering Description


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Agenda

• Why data center transformation / cloud computing projects fail

• The Sunnyside solution• Conclusion


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The bottom line…Data-center transformation is about significantly reducing cost to an organization, helping them shift their spending away from management and maintenance and into business projects and priorities, and also helping them address the rising cost of energy, the rising consumption of energy and the mandate to be green or sustainable.These are, by no means, trivial projects. They often involve a tremendous amount of planning and affect IT, facilities, and energy planners, as well as the business leadership and line of business managers. The payoffs are potentially huge, as we'll see, from doing data center design properly, but the risks are also quite high, if things don't come out as planned.


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A wise old soothsayer once said: “The reasons for program failure are more numerous than grains of sand in the desert.”


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Top Reasons for FailureTransformation Initiatives / Change

•Misstarts •Making change an

option •Not involving those

expected to implement the change•Delegated to

“outsiders” •No change in reward

system• Leadership doesn't

walk the talk•No follow-through(Mark Sanborn, CSP, CPAE)


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Top Reasons for FailureIT Programs

• Poor Communication•Underestimating or

ignoring impact of change.• Lack of Leadership• Lack of strong executive

sponsorship• Poor project management• Poor Planning• Trying to do it cheap• Lack of technical

knowledge• Lack of sound business

case• Poor vendor management


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Top Reasons for FailureCloud Deployments

• Failing to define “success.”• Failing to update computing

concepts• Failing to hold yourself

accountable• Failing to scrutinize vendors• Failing to understand the

service supply chain• Failure to manage and

monitor applications• Failing to understand

financial realities• Failing to understand the

legal complexities of the cloud• Failing to get off the

sidelines


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The Gory Details

• Project Initiation & Planning Issues– Unclear or unconvincing business case– Insufficient or non-existent approval process– Poor definition of project scope and objectives– Insufficient time or money given to project– Lack of business ownership and accountability– Insufficient and/or over-optimistic planning– Poor estimating– Long or unrealistic timescales; forcing project end dates despite

best estimates– Lack of thoroughness and diligence in the project startup phases


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More Gory Details

• Technical & Requirements Issues– Lack of user involvement (resulting in expectation issues)– Product owner unclear or consistently not available– Scope creep; lack of adequate change control– Poor or no requirements definition; incomplete or changing

requirements– Wrong or inappropriate technology choices– Unfamiliar or changing technologies; lack of required technical skills– Integration problems during implementation– Poor or insufficient testing before go-live– Lack of QA for key deliverables– Long and unpredictable bug fixing phase at end of project


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More Gory Details • Stakeholder Management & Team Issues

– Insufficient attention to stakeholders and their needs; failure to manage expectations

– Lack of senior management/executive support; project sponsors not 100% committed to the objectives; lack understanding of the project and not actively involved

– Inadequate visibility of project status– Denial adopted in preference to hard truths– People not dedicated to project; trying to balance too many different

priorities– Project team members lack experience and do not have the required

skills– Team lacks authority or decision making ability– Poor collaboration, communication and teamwork


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More Gory Details

• Project Management Issues– No project management best practices– Weak ongoing management; inadequately trained

or inexperienced project managers– Inadequate tracking and reporting; not reviewing

progress regularly or diligently enough– Ineffective time and cost management– Lack of leadership and/or communication skills


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The bottom line…• Note that these points are all about management, rather than

technology.• Projects fail when expectations are not aligned with results; in a

sense, that’s the definition of failure. Given the complexity of IT projects, with many moving parts distributed among a diverse group of stakeholders, it’s not surprising that expectation mismatches occur all the time.• Differences in expectations, goals, and priorities are substantial

contributers to non-technical complexity, which is the underlying cause of most IT failures.


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Agenda

• Why data center transformation / cloud computing projects fail

• The Sunnyside solution• Conclusion


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Our approach foundation

• Program Design Principles– Tailored to Data Center and

ITSM transformation– Takes your organization’s

specific needs and requirements into account

– Establishes clear program vision, mission and scope

– Is milestone and metrics driven

• Best Practices– Develop a rock-solid

business case– Avoid knee jerk

response to tactical business requirements

– Ensure that we have the “bench strength” to succeed

– Invest in the right tools and technologies


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Our approach method

Conceive Initiate Execute Measure


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Opportunity

Identification

Performance Baselining /

Benchmarking

Due-diligence design

Identify Sponsor

ship and

GovernanceConceive


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Opportunity identification• Report answers these

questions in terms of strategic impact– Go further with consolidation?– Upgrade the network

architecture?– Upgrade the blade farm?– Go further with virtualization?– Go further with

standardization?– Go further with service

transformation?


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Performance baselining / benchmarking

• Report answers these questions:– What key metrics / KPIs

should we use to measure service and operations performance

– How do we measure up?• Against customer

expectations / SLAs• Against industry

benchmarks


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Due-diligence design• Report answers these

questions:– What is the high-level

program scope, target architecture and operating model?

– How would we phase delivery?

– What is the CAPEX and OPEX forecast for the life of the program?

– What do IRR / ROI and KPI factors look like at key delivery milestones?


Identify Sponsorship and Governance

• Report answers these questions:– Composition of the Program

Steering Committee?– Composition of the Program

Leadership Team?– Who is the Program Delivery

Manager?– Who are the Accountable

Owners?– Who is the Design Authority?– What are the main Pillars of

the Program (logical groupings of similar projects )


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Conclusion – Program Success Criteria

• Critical overarching principles must be adhered to for effective enterprise and program governance: Tiers of governance—enterprise, portfolio, and program—integrated with enterprise-wide processes for strategic planning, programming, budgeting, acquisition, and execution.

• Distinctly defined relationships between each governance tier with clear, non-redundant roles, responsibilities, and authorities.

• Integrated portfolio transition strategies overseen by executives responsible for that portfolio function who are in the best position to identify existing capability gaps, set priorities for investment, and adapt quickly to evolving strategic priorities and business challenges.

• A single, transparent reporting relationship for a program manager to an oversight (program-level) governance board with executives from key stakeholder organizations empowered to make decisions, binding their organizations, and creating a partnership between the business, IT, procurement, finance, etc., while establishing accountability.

• Timely decisions for a program in execution at the program governance level, especially as enterprises leverage modular and agile methodologies to drive smaller and more frequent incremental releases.

• Escalation rules and paths—from program to portfolio to enterprise—for programs experiencing issues or changes that could affect a portfolio or the enterprise.


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Next Steps• Contact Sunnyside Associates

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Data Center Transformation Program Planning and Design

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