a realistic approach to transforming it operations: analytics + automation + common sense

IT & DATA MANAGEMENT RESEARCH,

INDUSTRY ANALYSIS & CONSULTING

A Realistic Approach to

Transforming IT Operations:

Analytics + Automation +

Common Sense

Dennis Nils Drogseth

Vice President

EMA



Agenda

• A radically changing landscape

• Core roadblocks to going forward

• Issues of communication

– Knowledge capture is key

– Historical insights are key

– Why common sense needs to be applied

• Analytics and automation can help clear the way

– Why analytics and automation go hand in hand

• Proven benefits of going forward with a pragmatic

approach

© 2016, Enterprise Management Associates2



A Radically Changing Landscape





INDUSTRY ANALYSIS & CONSULTING© 2016, Enterprise Management Associates

What’s New in the IT Landscape?

• Digital transformation

– IT transformation

• Cloud in all its forms

• Agile/DevOps and the need for speed

– And hopefully the need for wisdom as well

• The growing role of IT analytics

• The rise of mobile computing and the ‘empowered’

user/consumer

4



What Are Digital and IT Transformation?

“Digital transformation”

targets optimizing business

or organizational

effectiveness via digital

investments and IT services.

“IT transformation” is

directed at optimizing IT

performance to more

effectively address business

or organizational needs and

outcomes.




[qual1] Which optimizing approach applies most to you and your transformation initiative?

BASE: (All: N=306)

0%

8%

15%

35%

43%

We are focused on neither one

We use the terms interchangeably

We are primarily focused on digitaltransformation

We are focused on both about 50/50

We are primarily focused on operationaltransformation

IT Transformation was More Pervasive than Digital,

but 35% were 50/50; 8% Used the Terms Interchangeably




Transformational Trends – Metric Drivers

• Most transformational initiatives (52%) had been

underway for more than a year

• IT operations and the IT executive suite were far and

away the most likely to oversee transformational

initiatives

• Service availability and performance was the #1

operational metric

• Improved end-user efficiencies led for business metrics

7



85% Viewed Cloud as a Part of Their

Transformational Initiative

[Cloud6] How, specifically, has cloud impacted your digital/IT transformation initiatives?

BASE: (All: N=306)

2%

15%

22%

23%

25%

26%

27%

29%

32%

Other (please specify)

Cloud has been more disruptive than helpful

Cloud has isolated IT further from the business

Cloud has forced us to measure our transformational progressin a way that the business understands

Cloud has forced us to redefine our transformation priorities

Cloud has challenged us forced us to measuretransformational progress outside of our own data centers…

Cloud has forced us to reorganize the way IT is structured

Cloud has promoted more dialog with the business

Cloud has been a resource for accelerating our transformationinitiative(s)




Core Roadblocks to Going Forward






Top 10 Challenges for Optimizing IT

for Cost and Value Were…

1. Operational inefficiencies

2. Incomplete data

3. Fragmented technologies in general

4. Lack of analytics in optimizing data from IT assets

5. Poor data quality

10





Top 10 Challenges for Optimizing IT

for Cost and Value Were…

1. Operational inefficiencies

2. Incomplete data

3. Fragmented technologies in general

4. Lack of analytics in optimizing data from IT assets

5. Poor data quality

6. Sharing data effectively across IT silos

7. Low or inadequate levels of automation

8. Fragmented technologies due to IT silos

9. Unable to measure op efficiencies

10. Communication/process issues

11



Some Other Roadblocks

• Digital Transformation—3 at the top– Lack of effectively defined processes

– Poor communication across IT

– Warring or siloed toolsets

• Looking just at discovery and inventory:– On average, respondents indicated

using 11 different discovery or inventory tools

– And on average, respondents spent 15 hours a week reconciling different data sets

• Monitoring is often worse– 1 mid-tier with 300 tools

12



Siloed Data, Free Association, and Lack of Processes

• Large U.S. Manufacturer:

– We had many silos of data and many different repositories. All

over the world everyone was doing their own silo of work in

sometimes redundant or even conflicting ways.

• Mid-tier Healthcare:

– We can get past ‘task by free-association,’ where everyone’s

on a phone call and begins to speculate about where the

problem might lie.

• Mid-Tier Financial Planning:

– Our operations organization was fairly siloed and hadn’t yet

invested in best practices. We often had no clear idea what

would happen if, for instance, we unplugged a server. Most of

our change records there resided inside someone’s head.

13



Voices from the Abyss Documented

via EMA Consulting

• “Our focus is on closing tickets. We do very little root

cause analysis.”

• “If it takes more than 20 minutes to fix a problem, then

we simply re-image the machine. We don’t fix the

components.”

• “Tribal knowledge is used in emergencies to restore

services.”

• “Each silo has its own process. To provision a server,

you fill out a form in Oracle Financials, and then you fill

out a storage form. For other requests, you pick up the

phone. There is no end-to-end process. It’s frustrating.”

14



Issues of Communication




Issues of Communication Are…

• Pervasive

• The second top obstacle for digital

transformation (after lack of effectively

defined processes)

• Impact IT efficiency, morale, and service

delivery

• Require communication across operations

silos, as well as between operations and IT

service mangement teams, application

owners and others

• The solution depends on:

– Knowledge capture

– Sharing historical insights

– Applying common sense to team collaboration

16



Voices Lost in the Cascade from EMA Consulting

17

Communication is done as an informal

exchange and is very ad hoc. Often,

you call those who you know will agree

with you.

“Communication between

silos is good. If there is a

performance issue, we

quickly get a group call

going.”

“Communication

between groups is

brutally bad.” (Same

IT organization)

Information is lost in the cascade.

It is especially lost from the director

level to managers.





More Quotes from EMA Consulting

• “Communication depends on interpersonal skills…

It is all about the relationships between departments.

Problem resolution is via tribal knowledge.”

• “IT doesn’t communicate well either internally or

externally. We vacillate between too big and nothing.

We over-promise and don’t follow through.”

18



Analytics and Automation

Can Help Clear the Way




Transformational Trends: Technology Is a Key Driver

[Functional2] You indicated that some technologies were in some way associated with your digital/IT transformation initiative.

How were they associated?

BASE: (All: N=304)

Driver73%

Supportive27%



INDUSTRY ANALYSIS & CONSULTING© 2015 Enterprise Management Associates, Inc.

Top Technology Priorities for Digital Transformation

• Top analytics and automation priorities

– Enhanced workflow automation

– Analytics for incident and problem resolution

– Analytics for IT governance

– Analytics for application/infrastructure optimization

– Configuration automation

• Top functional priorities

– Improved customer/user experience

– Improved applciation performance management

– Enhanced project management

– Enhanced automation for self service

Slid

e 21



Technical Performance Issues for IT Analytics

Investments– Average of 4 per Respondent

50%

50%

44%

44%

43%

36%

35%

31%

27%

23%

16%

8%

Network availability and performance

Systems availability and performance

Storage availability and performance

Data quality management efficiencies

Security-related issues

Cross-domain service performance and availability

Response time for multiple transactions to support a complete businessservice

Service transaction response time

Middleware issues

Issues across the Extended Enterprise (partners, suppliers, serviceproviders) for performance

Issues across the Extended Enterprise (partners, suppliers, serviceproviders) in managing change

Containerizations/microservices availability and performance

What technical performance issues does your organization plan to target for its advanced analytics for operations or other IT organizations?

22 © 2016, Enterprise Management Associates



Other Analytics and Automation Perspectives

• Optimizing IT process efficiencies is the number one

priority (and challenge) in optimizing IT for financial

performance.

• The top three strategic priorities for ITSM teams are:

– Improving end user experience

– Superior integrations workflows with operations for incident/

problem/availability management

– Superior integrations workflows with operations for change

and configuration management

• Top ITSM analytics priority: analytics for incident,

problem and availablity management

23



Mean-Time-To Resolve Incidents and Reduced War

Room Time Led in Op Ex Efficiency Priorities

24 © 2016, Enterprise Management Associates

41%

39%

36%

34%

32%

29%

26%

23%

16%

6%

0%

Mean-time-to-Resolve incidents

Mean-time-to-Repair service issues (reduced war room time)

Problem owner efficiencies in addressing unique problems

OpEx efficiencies in managing change/change impact

First call resolution

OpEx efficiencies in managing/delivering SW audits

OpEx efficiencies associated with security/GRC/compliance…

OpEx efficiencies in delivering new application services

OpEx efficiencies in managing vendors and service providers

OpEx efficiencies specifically related to optimizing cloud…

Other

What IT process or OpEx efficiencies are you currently measuring?





Why Analytics and Automation Go Hand-in-Hand

• Analytics enables faster, better, more

collective insight

• Automation helps to accelerate the benefits

from those insights

• Pragmatic knowledge sharing can help to

inform both incrementally

• Changes impact HOW IT works, and this has

to be done gradually

25



Proven Benefits of Going Forward

with a Pragmatic Approach




Core Benefits of a Pragmatic Approach for

Unifying Analytics and Automation

• Reduced MTTR with progressive levels of automation

to improve effectiveness

• Improved IT operational efficiencies with significant

potential for cost savings

• Improved service availability and performance

• Improved customer exeprience

• Step-by-step, gradual evolution of how IT works and

evolves

• Best practice optimization across IT, via

documentation, commentary and automation

• Associated team building

27



Improved IT Productivity and Improved Service Quality Led in

Transformational Benefits Achieved through Best Practices

[Process5] You have stated that you have seen benefits in best-practice adoption.In your opinion, which of the following are two most

reflective of the value that your organization has achieved through best practices?

BASE: (All: N=228)

21%

22%

22%

23%

24%

25%

30%

33%

Better collaboration within IT groups

Improved business outcomes

More effective dialog between IT and its business counterparts

Improved agility and flexibility in provisioning services moreresponsively

Improved IT services in terms of business relevance through theuse of proven best-practice processes

Reduced IT costs

Improved IT services in terms of quality through the use ofproven best-practice processes

Improved IT productivity



Comments From IT Initiatives Where Automation

and Analytics are Being Introduced Pragmatically

29

We are definitely reducing mean-time-to-

repair (MTTR) because there’s a context for

where our IT professionals can look to drill

down and solve problems.

Our initiative allows us to

break through our silos

and create a kind of data

democracy so that there’s

a real context for every

relevant stakeholder to

access the data and see it

in the big picture.

Our initiative is helping us to blaze a

trail to deliver trust and confidence

across our teams in managing

complex infrastructures and services

more effectively.



Success – A Large High Tech Manufacturer


We’re seeing IT evolving into new ways

of working, as some groups that weren’t

working together before are starting to

share data and insights.

© 2016 IBM Corporation 31

31Page© 2016 IBM Corporation

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ANALYSIS & CONSULTING© 2017 Enterprise Management Associates, Inc.

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