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Just a quick note to pass on that APMG has formally announced that the Information Communications Technology Infrastructure Management (ICTIM) qualification has been granted “Complementary Qualification” status within the ITIL v3 qualification scheme. Clients who have already taken or will take the ICTIM qualification will gain 3.5 credits towards their ITIL Expert certification.

Read more at ITSM Watch here: http://www.itsmwatch.com/news/article.php/3831896

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Cloud Computing has become increasingly popular in the last few years.  From the use of email to online storage, cloud computing can be integrated into the everyday running of small and large businesses alike. The Art of Service provides a cloud computing accreditation program for those wanting certification in this exciting new area of the IT industry.

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A survey was released last month to consult the community on the market needs relating to current and earlier versions of ITIL® qualifications. When the full ITIL® Version 3 qualification scheme was complete there was always the expectation that the status of the Version 2 scheme would be reviewed.

The results of the survey, a joint initiative by OGC and itSMF, will assist in determining the timetable for the eventual phased retirement of the Version 2 scheme.

If you need a refresher on the difference between Versions 2 and 3, visit our website.

By answering the questions in the survey you will have the opportunity to shape the future of the industry. This is a great opportunity to have your say, and let OGC and itSMF know how this phase-out will affect you and your business.

The survey is only available until this Friday, 24^th July (UK time).

Take the survey!

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At some point, your company will have to look at their energy consumption. Maybe they already have and have already started some initiatives. If you’re in position to influence the direction, you may want to look at some different approaches to future energy management. One thing that will influence any corporate strategy is the global energy outlook. Recently, the Global Business Network (GBN) and the EPA worked with several companies to identify how this outlook may impact their business. Out of this venture came four plausible “roads.”

For IT companies, planning for all four roads may become necessary to understand current and future needs in energy management. Each has challenges, short term and long term benefits and costs. By understanding and planning for these four roads, a company can have a comprehensive outlook on the decisions they have to make in the context of becoming sustainable now and in the future.

“The Same Road” - Within this outlook, no significant change is made in the current direction of the world or the company with regards to energy or environmental concerns. Some changes may be made, but for the most part, the future will be plagues with higher energy bills and reduced natural resources with nothing in place to truly protect the company.

“The Long Road” - A significant change in the economic, geopolitical and energy landscape occurs. Some experts may state that companies our on this road with the current economic climate and the challenges of the this road are readily apparent. It speaks to the fact that changes to the global landscape may have an adverse impact on the efforts of companies real or imagined, making the path to becoming sustainable more difficult. Some concerns are government regulation, depletion of natural resources, Budget restrictions and the like. Strategically, this direction considers all the potential risks to initiate a green effort.

“The Broken Road” - The worst case scenario, this road proposes what may happen if a significant global event takes place. Maybe the event impact your company directly or one of your customers or a supplier. In any case, the company is in the midst of an immediate and significant change to normal operations in the form of a loss of energy or a need for increased energy. Consider this an event, attack, or threat that causes a service disruption as small as a brownout or as large as a complete disaster event to recover from.

“The Fast Road” - This approach focuses on making reasonable decisions with the necessary investment resources to implement improvements to energy consumption and environmentally conscious initiatives that are made early to make a difference today. Consider this the best scenario possible? How much would it take to implement all of these projects now with the intent to have a greater ROI than if implementation waited.

All outlooks above imply that a need for energy management is required because of declining resources and rising costs. The difference in the approaches apply to a company’s access to those resources. For strategic steps suggested by the GBN and EPA, read Part two of this article.

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When going green, how do you know that you are getting the greatest benefits? This is a good opportunity to evaluate your initiatives for a sustainable company. Earlier this year, InformationWeek suggested five areas to look at in their report by Michael Healey, The Eco-Enterprise and the Reality of Green IT.

Power Saving ROI – what is the real power savings delivered by an initiative. There are two classes of solutions for initiatives to take: reduce the total consumption or rely more on sustainable power sources. The first class can be better understood by checking the power ratings of IT equipment within the environment. Focus on purchasing equipment that uses less power. Most computer systems have power save features built into them. Create companies policies to take advantage of these features, shutting down or hibernating equipment that is not in use.

The second class have a variety of solutions present. The design of a building can provide can reduce power consumption for lighting and heat. Innovative ideas have been implemented in this area for years, from solar panels intermixed with windows to a power producing waterfall within a company’s atrium.

Productivity ROI – Though energy is the most visible “green” concern, it’s not the only one. Time savings is another concern. The less time required to perform a task, the less power used. The less human resources involved as well. Virtualization provides opportunities to save power and time. But not all initiatives increase productivity. Shutting down computers at night requires a few minutes of non-productive time the next morning waiting for the computer to start up.

Environment Impact – A hard concept to measure, but fairly easier to monitor, the best suggestion is to ensure that to reduce the negative impact to the environment. One possible option is to earmark the cost savings of the initiative over time to another worthwhile “green” initiative within the company or externally. The financial ROI may take longer to reach but will show the company’s commitment to the environment which may draw more customers to the company.

Upfront Cost – Always a concern. The best approach is to start with educating the workforce and make small changes with very little change in upfront costs. Keep in mind some some of these costs are slight, such as spending a few more dollars for a power efficient computer rather than just trying to meet the minimum technical specifications.

User Receptiveness – As mentioned, education is the best start. The workforce needs to embrace the need for any environmentally conscious initiative. Any one initiative isn’t going to provide the Holy Grail solution for saving the environment and bringing outstanding ROIs without the support of the workforce. Make sure they understand and implement.

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Let’s face it: solutions that are designed to be environmentally minded are typically more expensive and have longer ROIs than general solutions that are available. This alone has many businesses pass over most “Green IT” initiatives. The current economic downturn isn’t helping the situation.

If the “growing green” movement is going to persevere, the long term economics of the environmentally safe IT has to be taken into account. The EPA has reported that nearly half of the national greenhouse gas emissions come from commercial and industrial buildings in the United States. This has spurred even more call for government regulation on the environment and business. This could result in government requiring businesses to use environmentally safe products and utilized environmentally compatible processes with hefty fines if the requirement is not met.

The cost for energy is also rising – an average 11% a year since 2004. In six more years, the energy bill for a company will have doubled without any expansion or change. The primary reason for this rise in costs is the diminishing supply of resources.

Another factor is that more green minded consumers are looking for companies with a strong record of environmentally safe practices and products. Eventually, it won’t matter how good a product is, if its manufacturing process is unsafe.

Solutions for sustainable equipment, processes, and products are more likely to rise in cost because of the remand. Especially if government control is initiated. Which brings us to the reality of the situation: implementing green initiatives within the economic situation may prove to be more beneficial than waiting, especially to the wallet.

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Every IT organization has a Change Management process, but the scope of the process is typically very limited to a small set of controlled IT components in the environment. The reasons given for the limited scope may vary, but they have the same underlining message, “it’s too much for the staff to manage all changes.”

Maybe it’s time to reevaluate this position. The new age of IT is calling for more integration of systems, processes, people, and knowledge. It is becoming more apparent that a shift in one area of IT support can have ripple effects across the entire organization. As things get more complicated, the greater the need for communication. Change Management does just that.

A change is a simple matter to understand. Take any tangible item and modify it in some way so that it functions differently. If that tangible item is connected to a larger entity such as a server connected to the network, than the larger entity has a potential impact or risk to react to. Change Management allows control over the change so that the reaction turns into a planned, well thought out response that minimizes any harmful impact to the environment. At the core of Change Management is communication and affirmation that the communication has been received through a review and approval process.

Most IT departments focus mainly on changes to the technical aspects of the environment, hardware, software, and configurations. Here are other IT areas that should be under change control:

• Strategies
• IT Plans
• Services
• Service Level Agreements
• Service Level Requirements
• Processes

Consider the risk for not having these elements under change control.

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Most data centers are actually very inefficient. Just the shear number of technologies, services, programming languages, methodologies, applications, and hardware types require a diverse set of skills and experience that require specialized people working on distinct aspects of the IT infrastructure, none of whom have the time and may not have the desire to interact with other members of the whole team.

Add to the mix, the number of concerns that have to be addressed throughout the day. Security, heat, space, bandwidth, capacity, availability, redundancy, backups, migrations, replication, monitoring, and an endless schedule of activities to just maintain the environment for the business. And we have yet to bring in the customer complaints, requests, and expectations. By the end of the day, the data centers become a complex set of systems and applications that have been uniquely designed and implemented into the environment. And the result is a wasteland of confusion and specialized duties.

This isn’t anything new, it’s a old pattern from the mainframe days where entire systems were built for a single function, while another system was built for another function and so on. This was in the time when the interoffice memo was still typed, printed, and physically handed out at a departmental meeting where everyone gathered in single conference room.

The key to an effective data center is simplicity. The technologies today allow systems and applications to be consolidated, integrated, standardized, automated, and modularized in different configurations to make things easier. Here are some simplicity rules for the IT professional:

• Minimize variation – every variation in an environment is one more item that requires attention to ensure that everything works appropriately. Most IT departments have created minimal standards for hardware to limit hardware variation within a specific range.
• Share similar functions – some applications perform the same functions, such as emailing. Unfortunately, these applications typically have different programming required to perform the function. Modularization creates a single set of programming that is used by all applications.
• Focus on priority items, automate the rest – Easier said than done sometimes, automation is useful in those situations when very little to no variation is present and in most cases is reusable for multiple systems.

The first step in building efficient data centers is taking the next step in a sure and confident manner.

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Here are some notes on Voice Over IP (VoIP) that may impact any decision on using the technology within your business.

VoIP is not about voice communications anymore. The future of VoIP is the convergence of all communication methods into a unified package that is not bound to a location. Essentially, each person will have a single address for data transmissions and voice transmission. The person can access that address from anywhere using a VoIP device held in their hand.

Security concerns are always a big problem with transmissions of any kind and, with VoIP, a new set of challenges await. The good news is that VoIP is part of the data network and as such incorporate the data security controls already in place. To do this, a voice transmission must be submitted as a voice packet that is encrypted and goes through the firewall. Unfortunately, VoIP opens some new vulnerabilities to the network in the form of voicemail spam, impersonation, session eavedropping, voicemail bombs or hijackings. Pay attention to minimize these vulnerabilities.

Some early complaints about VoIP was the quality of voice communications. Early implementations on poorly engineered data networks was the source of that problem. VoIP requires error-free delivery. Networks designed for data can tolerate errors occasionally, that become pops or static in voice transmissions. Additionally, networks that connect to the Internet can tolerate a few seconds of delay before responding which cannot happen for VoIP, especially when interactivity is required. In a properly designed network, VoIP can provide as good or better quality as a traditional phone connection.

Voice requirements on bandwidth is much smaller than for data. That is the good news. The bad news is that too many voice transitions at the same time can bring down the entire network. Phishing attempts, telemarketing spam and the like can clog up the network in no time. But the problem isn’t just capacity, but also configuration and connectivity. If the network carries both data and voice transmission, the bandwidth dedicated for both should be predetermined and configured. If 70% of the bandwidth is required for expected data transmissions, than only 30% is available for voice. Instead of potentially dropping a call, a busy signal should be provided when a voice transmission attempts to exceed the dedicated bandwidth.

Not all networks support VoIP. So before implementing the technology, so it is important to perform an audit of  network applications and their priority to identify what can or cannot support VoIP. Ports and traffic that may be blocked to protect the LAN may be necessary for VoIP. Make sure the environment can support the technology before installing it.

VoIP is the direction for business communication. IT has its advantages. Just don’t jump with your eyes closed.

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The Information Age should be renamed the Communication Age. At no time in our history has our society ever been inundated with communication devices and methods and simple ways of staying in touch. Our neighbors are no longer across the hall, but may be a person halfway around the world.

With the opportunities, however, comes a curse. The devices and tools and software required to stay in touch can become overwhelming with cellphones, blackberrys, instant messaging, email, voice mail, web conferencing, Internet chats, and the like. Recently though, a new technology has been gaining wide attention – Voice Over IP or VoIP.

Initially adopted the business to cut rising telecommunication cost, VoIP has become a vital component for unified communication. That is, having email read through the voicemail system or having voicemail readable through an email. The purpose of unified communication is to merge collaboration tools such as calendaring, email, instant messaging with voice technology.

The greatest benefit of VoIP goes to the gains in mobile computing, where from a single device, a person can access their phone, the Internet, email, and almost anything that can be imagined from a simple handheld.

For enterprises, there is one potential pitfall. Traditionally, the IT departments for services unified VoIP were separated and still are. With VoIP, the collaboration between these different departments has become a high priority for the success of the implementation and during operations. This requires the integration to extend to business processes, not just applications. If everyone is not on board with VoIP, than the entire system can fail.

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