The make sense approach to IT infrastructure

IT infrastructure is the base on which today's businesses are being built. Whichever industry your business belongs to, Information Technology Infrastructure has become critical. Managing IT infrastructure has become an indispensable area of activity for every business. Large organizations have all the affordability to invest in and manage IT infrastructure. It is the small and medium sized businesses that need to focus upon leveraging on effective management of IT infrastructure. Managing IT infrastructure does not mean just cutting costs on IT infrastructure, it involves decision making on the right mix of outsourcing and in-house management, right mix of open source and commercial software environment, continuous Research and Development for effective management of the business through Information Technology. More and more companies have now turned to IT infrastructure as a medium of effective business management.

Outsourcing your IT infrastructure - A complete solution?

Outsourcing IT infrastructure has now become the 'in' thing for most businesses for managing their IT infrastructure.
Outsourcing is a strategic business decision as it can help you to boost your firm's performance making it possible for you to enhance your competitive advantage by focusing on core activities, at the same time having a reliable outsourcing partner who will have single point of accountability to deliver required service levels in the most cost-effective manner. You can considerably reduce on fixed costs on IT infrastructure, turning them into variable costs and making available cash reserves. For SMBs, outsourcing also offers the advantage of benefiting from expertise on areas that they normally may not be able to afford.
Given the current trend of most companies going the outsourcing way, it does seem to be an attractive solution for managing your IT infrastructure, but the question is, is it the complete solution? Could there be alternatives to outsourcing? Would your business benefit from in-house management of your IT infrastructure?
What to outsource? - An important decision
While acknowledging the fact that outsourcing gives you cost advantages over in-house management of IT infrastructure, you need to understand that there are some aspects of your IT infrastructure, which would be in your business interests, to be managed in-house. This is where it is important to make a decision on what to outsource.

IT Infrastructure primarily has the following categories:

• Local area networks (LANs) and wide area networks (WANs)
• Internet access
• Internet services (e-mail, Web sites, etc.)
• Hardware and software: servers, workstations, productivity software, specialized software
• User services: help desk, support, training

Within each of these categories, making a decision about what to outsource should depend primarily on the capabilities and needs of the organization and the knowledge and expertise of the staff.

For small and medium sized organizations it does help to have one or more IT staff to serve as the contact for all IT infrastructure needs. There may be several first level troubleshooting requirements which in-house technical staff can easily attend to rather than depending on expensive support calls. Only for those areas on which your own staff does not have enough expertise or where it is an expensive deal for you to get people with the expertise, it would be a good option to outsource the activity. This holds good for both your hardware and software needs. Maintaining your computer hardware, replacing obsolete systems, and keeping the software updated are other ways to reduce support needs. Standardizing on operating systems, and applications, and hardware will also simplify support tasks. All this can easily be accomplished by your own IT staff.

Having said that there could be some infrastructure requirements, especially high end technologies, where the expertise across the industry is limited or it is way too beyond your core area of competence, outsourcing the activity to someone with the expertise would save you a lot of time and effort. Looking for the in-house alternative in such cases would not be a good option.

Thinking of outsourcing? Check these points first!
The first thing you need to consider before outsourcing is that for SMBs, it is important to keep the outsourcing flexible, affordable and aligned to business needs. Success in outsourcing depends on how well you define and communicate your technology needs to potential contractors, and the quality of the relationship you develop with the outsourcer.

It is common for companies looking to outsource to be confronted by an array of options, replete with both advantages and risks alike. Companies need to bring in their project management skills to overlook their outsourcing ventures in a well-disciplined manner, thereby honing in on the advantages and avoiding the risks.

Companies interested in outsourcing their IT infrastructure needs should also keep in mind the attendant risks of outsourcing. One underlying risk is that by relying too heavily on any one vendor, the company puts themselves in the position of having to depend on the outsourcer.

Similarly, by appointing the outsourcer with the task of designing a "mission critical" application, the company is opening the door to the slim chance that delicate information regarding the application could be leaked to competitors. Also, as is sometimes the case, the vendor may not perform reliably. In these situations the company needs to have a viable back-up plan should they find it necessary to drop the vendor's services. It should also be noted that as outsourcing vendors take over certain aspects of a company's operation with their more technically knowledgeable staff, the company itself tends to hire less technical talent. This is a tendency that should be avoided as it can ultimately lead to a weakness in the company structure in the long run.

One way of ensuring that you have made a right decision about your outsourcing partner is to assemble a multi-disciplinary team to select the proper outsourcers. This team should establish a formal process for requesting information and proposals as well as employing a practical means of evaluating the vendors.

Once an outsourcer has been decided upon, the company should manage its progress as closely as they would supervise an in-house project. An agreed upon agenda needs to be established between the outsourcer and the hiring company as well as a time frame to report progress.

As mentioned above, companies should be sure to retain enough IT personnel to avoid an over-dependency on any single vendor. Additionally, any contracts with outsourcers should specify the matter of technology transfer. For instance, if an outsourcer uses any new technology, they must provide for the exchange of knowledge between the vendor and the company staff. Along this line of thinking, companies must always maintain a readiness to resume work on any work that is abandoned by the outsourcing vendor. Allowing for contingency plans reduces the chances the company will become tied to a particular vendor.

The outsourcing of IT infrastructure is a growing trend in the current business climate. In order for a company to make the best of this option, a strong management infrastructure should be in place to devise and support effective outsourcing arrangements. The project management industry is in an excellent position to offer its guidance on best practices and lessons learned to help bring complex outsourcing projects to their fruition. Failure to do so would be to ignore a golden opportunity.

Tips to choose the right outsourcing partner.
Choosing the right partner is a critical step in building a successful outsourcing relationship. First of all, not every outsourcing partner is capable of providing a wide range of services. The company needs to have an established infrastructure, a competent and highly skilled workforce, and strong leadership by a management team that understands the goals of the client.

Here are some points to be checked before outsourcing your IT infrastructure:

• The outsourcing partner should be able to demonstrate quality processes, methodologies and metrics, a financial enterprise risks failure in this venture. The partner must be able to create or add value at every step of the transaction process.
• The partner should have expertise and communication skills to help the enterprise transition to the new model and have the geographical presence to provide an understanding of local issues, requirements and standards.
• The company should have handled similar business processes for clients and know what it takes to adapt and improve upon existing business procedures.
• The partner should have sound data security policies.
• The partner should be able to scale rapidly and effectively to meet new client demands
• The outsourcing partner should be a company on sound financial footing.
• A company with a solid management team and change management expertise.

The right blend of software, open source software and custom applications.
Next on the radar for effective management of IT infrastructure is managing your software resources.

Here companies are primarily faced with the choice between commercial software and open source software. More and more companies are now turning towards open source software but the again the question is, can open source software completely replace commercial software?

The Open Source option

Open source model is a very pragmatic way of evolving software in a rapidly changing environment. It harnesses the collective wisdom, experiences, expertise and requirements of its most demanding users to ensure that their needs are rapidly met.

Any software company with expertise, the resources and the will can elect to provide whatever level of support they feel the market will bear. With complete access to the source code nobody has the edge that previously was only available to the owners of the proprietary software. Support is now open to competition. The quality of support is now open to market forces. Open source software also gives you the flexibility to choose or customize the software as per your IT needs. At the same time you get the advantage of not having to purchase licenses associated with commercial software. Although open source software is also subject to licences, the licenses are more to do with the usage and distribution of the software rather than commercial terms. Open source software also comes with the value proposition of supporting the standards very closely.

Commercial software as an alternative

The growing usage of open source software has however not displaced the use of commercial software. If you are looking for a software for your core area of business, it is advisable to rely on commercial software, which always offers you the advantage of a more stable software and also support and maintenance. For such core business, it may not be an economic and prudent business practice to choose open source software where a lot depends on customizing the software through further development at your end. Open source software proves advantageous for support areas of your business.

If you are a manufacturing company, rely on commercial software for activities that are directly related to your product manufacturing, design and sales. Open source software may be a good option for your other activities like Human resources and finance. If you are an IT company, commercial software is critical for your core technology not only for maintaining quality of your end product, your customer may also want to be sure that the software that you are using is reliable and stable.

Open source software proves to be a good option for IT companies which already have the resources to customize the software or further work on its development. For non-IT companies, using open source software could turnout to be a little expensive as they need to get the customization out sourced before the software can be used.

Best of both worlds - Having a right blend of open source and commercial software.
For enterprises the major advantage of adopting open source is that they can pick the best solutions for the job at hand. The downside, however, is how they protect IT investments built on open source when they don't come with the guarantees that come with commercial applications? The answer lies somewhere in the middle.

The blended approach

An increasing number of enterprises are now turning to mixing commercial applications with well-supported open source frameworks. The goal is to use a hybrid or blended approach that comes with little risk and lots of reward.

That said, even though it can mean significant up-front cost savings on license fees (though not necessarily long-term support costs), however, companies are faced with insecurities about relying too much on open source, especially for mission-critical applications. Though there are instances of open source projects being widely used even after their parent companies have gone out of business, there is a risk that support and longevity of an open source application or service is not guaranteed. Customers of companies would also be interested in knowing how the risk of using open source software is being managed.

Open source adoption is usually driven by core infrastructure, in other words, a low-risk, well-defined technology. Enterprises need to approach selecting open source the same way they would commercial applications: identify requirements, then assess and validate the technology. The main point to be considered is where the project in question is something that the company can afford to invest time, attention and internal resources to develop an open source software or is it an important one where using commercial software would be a profitable alternative.

In the process of blending open source and commercial software, companies have to ensure that it is backed up by efficient legal and management systems because this process could attract several legal and licensing provisions which need to be managed effectively so that there are no infringements of any license requirement. For example, some commercial vendors limit how their code can be modified or integrated with open source code and though more commercial vendors are opening up their code, they still have licensing requirements, too. There are so many enhancements to open source licenses that it is important for enterprises to address the issues presented by so many different types of licenses.

Supporting your hybrid approach

While blending the two kinds of software, companies have to focus on two point - complying with licensing agreements for both commercial and open source applications and getting the long-term support for enterprise needs. One of the options for this is to use only open source frameworks that are certified or supported by a third party.

There are also commercial vendors that offer open source support also help companies make development more efficient and giving them the investment protection they need and want in a blended environment.

Custom application development - Effective solution for your specific requirements.
Most enterprises look for one centralized packaged software system that will cater to all the business requirements in the organization. Though this offers the advantage of having one system covering the entire needs, it is a rather expensive deal. For small and medium sized companies this may not prove to be a feasible option.
Building custom applications could be a cost effective solution for this. Rather than looking for one central system, companies can break down the business processes into individual activities and build custom applications that best suit the specific needs of that particular activity. This way you can cut down on the expenses involved in buying packaged software.
However, customized software, as in every decision for IT infrastructure may not be the complete solution in all cases. If the business activity relates to your core expertise or is an activity where time is a critical factor, then it makes sense to choose a complete packaged software which gives you quick solutions along with guarantee, support and maintenance. If a particular activity is unique for your business, then building a customized solution in-house is a sensible approach.

Customizing software - Check these points.

The first point is to take stock of what's on hand, including both software and personnel. Can existing resources be used?

Developing customized solutions requires a great deal of time, as well as both skilled and dedicated resources. Enterprises should take an inventory of their resources, including applications, development tools, and personnel skills, and make the best use of those resources.
Building an in-house team that can work on projects as needed has its advantages - it can improve projects' time-to-market, it can protect corporate assets, and it can engender loyalty among employees.
Another issue to consider is the maintenance and upgradation of the customized software. With a home-grown application, that is not the case. Maintenance and upgrade costs must be factored in when determining the cost of building vs. buying an application. This is especially in the case of non-IT companies which may not have resources with exclusive expertise to develop and maintain customized software applications.

Manage your IT infrastructure - reap rich rewards

To conclude, IT infrastructure management is indeed a critical aspect of business irrespective of the industry that you are in. As has been discussed throughout in this article, managing IT infrastructure does not mean just reducing IT related costs. It is all about managing IT in your organization in such a way that you get the best deal in terms of costs, time and resources thereby giving the best solutions to your business requirements. There is no single complete solution as such which will cater to all your needs, one approach may be most suitable in a particular case and the same may not work in another case, successful enterprises are those which use the right approach for the right kind of business requirement at the right time. Managing your IT infrastructure effectively, gives your business a cutting edge. Invest your attention on IT infrastructure and you will realize the rich rewards that your business will gain.