Where was the Project Manager (PM) for healthcare.gov while it was crashing on takeoff? It’s too bad we will probably never know what really happened since spin is all you get in DC. “There’s never time to do it right the first time, but there is always time (& money) to do it again” is the Beltway mantra. Out here in the real world we don’t have that luxury; our projects are expected to succeed the first time. You always hate throwing anyone under the bus, but barring any further information being released, this failure falls squarely on the shoulders of the PM.
Change is a scary thing for almost everyone. Whether it is in your personal or professional life, change is often not welcomed with open arms. There is skepticism, hesitation, resentment, fear, or just the urge to stick to old habits.
Still using pagers and two-way radios? Still lugging around wireless phones? It’s amazing how often we see someone with all of these devices, and a cell phone.
They are better equipped than Batman!
Not only is it a lot to carry around, the organization has to support the aging technology (with people and dollars). This is 1990’s technology that served the hospital well in its day, but it is time to look at updating the communication infrastructure. There are some real world, measurable benefits to modernizing this infrastructure:
We have all seen the TV commercials from Comcast and Verizon for their business Internet and phone services. These sound very attractive because of the low cost but buyer beware. Don’t get me wrong, these types of services are appropriate for some very small businesses, especially ones who maintain home offices. These are businesses that do not rely on stable Internet or phone service.
It was 4 or 5 years ago on Christmas day when Ed Hemschoot, Director of Information Services for Montgomery Hospital Medical Center, called WAKE TSI regarding a network issue plaguing Montgomery Hospital Medical Center. Chris Witt, CEO of WAKE TSI, was sitting down with his family for holiday dinner when he received the call. He finished his apple pie and immediately came in on Christmas day to help Montgomery Hospital Medical Center. Here is the testimonial in Ed’s own words:
We all hope that we never have to experience the devastation that is being felt in Japan. They are trying to cope with numerous challenges relating to basic human needs like food, water, and shelter let alone basic infrastructure like power and communications. Would you be prepared if your data center was in the path of
such destruction?
If you still own your own data center and this question has not already crossed your mind, then you might be spending more money than you need, subjecting your organization to unnecessary risk, or both. Your data center is the foundation for all your core computing resources. Any flaws in the data center puts everything installed in the data center, no matter how well implemented, at risk as well.
So what do you do? You need to securely house your servers and storage somewhere, and not go broke doing it correctly. Today, you have far more choices than you did just ten years ago. The added choices include numerous viable offsite solutions. While there are many permutations, the two basic choices boil down to keeping your data center in house or have someone else host it for you.
Making the Most of Data Center Upgrades
As usual in IT, some the greatest obstacles are not technical but social or political. The drive to service-oriented architectures and cloud computing involves a lot of disruptive technologies, and CIOs cannot afford to lose sight of the fact that what’s being disrupted are human attitudes and relationships.
Businesses can be interrupted by events as simple as a network outage, or as devastating as a tornado, fire, or even an act of terrorism. The most appropriate step you can take to reduce the impact of a disaster is to first realize that it could happen to your business.
Let’s make sure we’re all on the same page, definition-wise.
Some skills are learned from formal education and great training. Some of the more subtle skills necessary for success in business and IT are learned only through decades of hands-on experience.
The professionals at WAKE Technology Services have both. It was the application of these combined skills that enabled WAKE to successfully perform a number of key roles during a recent IT engagement involving the deployment and implementation of a new storage architecture.
