Is IT doomed?

Cloud computing is without doubt a disruptive business model. It is in the process of disrupting almost every element of the computing industry – including technologists themselves, especially those who are members of corporate IT teams.

Early on in the story of cloud, predictions of a massive reduction in corporate IT jobs were rife, leading many in IT teams to feel they should slow cloud’s adoption for fear of their own jobs. Since then, the dust has settled somewhat and those lay-offs have not occurred.

Instead, a few trends have emerged. Many of those who preferred to work directly with the technology but whose functions have diminished within the enterprise have gone to work with the cloud service providers, and others along the cloud service supply chain.

Production applications hit the cloud

For the rest, the need for technologists within the corporation remains and will remain, as the migration of production applications in large enterprises into the cloud is blooming. Even in smaller businesses this holds true as the cloud makes the kinds of services that previously only large organisations could afford – such as supply chain management, analytics and customer relationship management – available to them. This means that there will be a need for technologists – those who can manage multiple clouds, integrate infrastructures and administer databases – in those organisations too.

Wherever IT team members end up, business skills will be needed. Technical complexity remains to be managed and resolved, so awareness of business needs and the requirement to contribute to revenue are likely to command a premium. This will mean helping the business make technology choices from a business not a technology perspective: helping to drive the best and most successful technology integration will be key. So organisations have moved IT staff into roles such as business analyst, business architect, application developer, technical analyst or user support.

Age of the technology strategist

In other words, those individuals will become technology strategists. Data management will become their field, enabling the business to understand its business environment, via technologies such as big data analytics and the Internet of things. At the same time, they will need to ensure that company data that’s collected is organised, processed and backed up in a structured way that reflects business needs.

So none of these cloud-wards moves and technologies implies that the need for a deep understanding of the technology will fade away: far from it, as technology continues to march on at a ferocious pace. You need only to look at the developments over the last five years or so around software defined storage, networks and datacentres, new database technologies, object-oriented storage, and new virtualisation technologies such as containerisation to recognise the truth of this.

Instead, each and every team member needs a business model overlay: when making a decision, thinking first and foremost about how the business will benefit is likely to become the key to job security.

Manek Dubash

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Tags: Future Ready Workforce, Mobility, Technology

Why does Windows 10 win when it comes to enterprise mobility? Let’s step back and look at the bigger picture first.

We know that today, mobility is not just a trend but is rapidly becoming the de facto manner in which employees, managers, and consumers alike prefer to access their data. Yes, the desktop will remain important for the performance of complex tasks or those needing lots of screen real estate, but for day-to-day web browsing, email and access to corporate data, the phone, tablet or laptop can pretty much do it all.

Mobile data security

Today, users prefer to buy and use their own devices for both work and personal use – the BYOD phenomenon. This means that personal and company data co-exist on the same device, with all the potential for security breaches and leakage of corporate data that this implies.

However, Windows 10, which don’t forget runs on phones, tablets and PCs alike, offers the best set of security features around mobile enterprise data than any OS that Microsoft has released.

First and perhaps foremost, Windows 10 allows corporate and personal data to be separated. This means that all data tagged as belonging to the company can be automatically encrypted, so if the device is lost or stolen, the data can’t be accessed by unauthorised individuals. Data can be prevented from being accessed and/or copied without the right corporate profile, so reducing the risk of unauthorised devices accessing that information, and reducing the risk of malware copying that data to a miscreant’s server halfway across the world. VPN access can also be restricted by the IT security team to a given set of applications, which will then ensure that only authorised applications access the network that connecting the device to corporate data storage.

Security is not the only fruit

It’s not just about security however, as Windows 10 offers features such as native support for touchscreens, which are both becoming ubiquitous and make data access more intuitive. Windows 10 also allows IT to manage the update process for every Windows device.

Built-in battery saving technology allows users to go further and longer without access to external power, a boon for those out in the field, while file history acts as an effective instant restore, so that users are less likely to lose data and then ask the helpdesk to find it again.

Even the ability of Microsoft Edge to cast to DLNA and Miracast devices will mean that a presentation can be simply thrown wirelessly to a projector without the time-consuming – and frankly amateurish-looking – attempts to get a presentation going that can otherwise result.

Windows 10 triumphant in the enterprise

Windows 10 runs across multiple platforms, is much more secure than ever before, and provides a host of features to make working while mobile easier, simpler and more productive. The combination of better security added to its other, must-have features make Windows 10 a shoo-in for the enterprise.

Manek Dubash

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Tags: Mobility, Technology

What steps does the enterprise CIO need to consider in order to prepare the business for tomorrow’s world where cloud mobility is the new normal?

Should we be dropping the term mobile computing in favour of comfortable computing? There’s an argument for that, given the near-ubiquity of handheld computing devices – which includes tablets and laptops as well as phones and phablets.

Comfortable computing

So what is comfortable computing? It’s a recognition of the fact that nearly everyone has a device of some sort that allows them to compute and communicate from anywhere they can receive and send a signal. Cloud mobility encompasses this but goes a step further, acknowledging that the back-office effect of comfortable computing is a need to access data held on corporate storage, whether in a private or public cloud.

The business driver for this phenomenon, you will not be surprised to learn, is the desire to access that data at any time from anywhere, allowing employees, as well as customers and partners, to be productive no matter when or where they happen to find themselves. No manager is going to object to that, but how to make it happen, both securely and with maximum performance?

Data organisation

As with any kind of data management involving cloud computing, the key is to organise the data and access to it in a systematic and secure manner before making it publicly available. It involves planning exactly what access will be needed to which elements of the data, and locking it down to provide the minimum access privileges that allow people to get the job done.

As with any kind of data management involving cloud computing, the key is to organise the data and access to it in a systematic and secure manner before making it publicly available. It involves planning exactly what access will be needed to which elements of the data, and locking it down to provide the minimum access privileges that allow people to get the job done.

Data access is not the end of the story however. Comfortable computing doesn’t just mean that everyone is comfortable using data while mobile, but also that they expect and want all the information that used to be accessible only at the desktop to be provided on their device. In many cases, this also means ensuring that applications are integrated not just with the data store but also with each other.

A classic example of this might be diaries and other scheduling or collaborative software. Given that users choose the device they want, they will also want to choose the applications. Many of them may come bundled with the phone.

What this means is that the number and types of applications that individuals use is expanding, while the need for them to be able to share their diaries and other scheduling information is undergoing a similar explosion. This creates a considerable challenge, but one that needs to be resolved if the true benefits of mobility can be reaped.

First steps

Where you start from in order to get to the point where the right individuals can access the right data, and sharing can happen when it’s supposed to, depends on the business itself and its level of progress towards the mobile nirvana.

Smaller companies with little legacy equipment and few processes will find it easier to adapt to a cloud-mobile world than those with many legacy systems and perhaps regulatory requirements that also need to be satisfied. Under such circumstances, pilot schemes and selective steps towards cloud mobility, starting with the low-hanging fruit, are likely to be the best choices.

Whatever the level of progress the business has made along this road, if formal planning has yet to be started, now is the time to do so.

Manek Dubash

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Tags: Mobility, Technology

As a business decision maker, you might feel concerned that your organisation feels uncertain about how to cope with the fast pace of change. The honest – perhaps, unspoken – trust is that many executives feel the same.

Gartner research suggests 42 per cent of CIOs believe their current IT organisation lacks the skills necessary to respond to a complex digital business landscape. Worse still, Gartner asserts that a lack of digital business competence will cause 25 per cent of businesses to lose competitiveness by 2017.

A services-led approach can help your business to plan for the future with more certainty. So what are the key pain points and how can services help? Here we explain more.

Pain point 1 – There is too much choice and complexity

Modern executives are confronted by a huge choice of systems and services, and of platforms and providers. Industry experts talk of the need for an effective ecosystem. This integrated network allows businesses to support change across bespoke applications, legacy platforms and innovative technologies. Moving to that point, however, is no easy task.

Rather than a simple ecosystem, business leaders often face a complex IT infrastructure that can restrict the opportunities for development and growth. In these situations, executives need guidance. A services-led approach can help you to evaluate current infrastructure use and future requirements to plan for change. The result is the right technology in the right place at the right time.

Pain point 2 – Time and cost are key challenges

Evidence suggests many organisations spend four times as much on maintenance as they do on innovation. Senior executives also get pulled away from business change. Too many CIOs, for example, still split their time between 80 per cent operations and 20 per cent innovation, when they should be spending much more time on external-facing concerns.

Effective optimisation will prove crucial, so your business can spend the right time on the right processes. Finding a partner who has expert knowledge and independent insight across your business IT is critical. From data centre transformation to unified communications modernisation, your services partner should help you assess your IT infrastructure and create a platform to take advantage of digital disruption.

Pain point 3 – We haven’t done this before

IT-enabled change can seem frightening, even for the most seasoned of business executives. Disruptive innovation means your stable IT infrastructure might not be fit for the agile business demands of the future. Your business might have used the same production systems for many years. Embracing change through a new end-to-end lifecycle management process will seem a big step.

Your trusted external services provider can be a key support. You might be under the mistaken belief that your services partner is just there to help keep your operations up-and-running. A great services provider is a partner in the truest sense of the word. More than just ensuring top-level maintenance, your services partner should provide a business brain to help your organisation grow.

Pain point 4 – We don’t have the staffing

Almost two thirds (65 per cent) of CIOs report that IT and digital skills shortages are holding their businesses back, according to Harvey Nash and KPMG. Transformation involves change in so many areas – from cloud, to big data and onto mobility – that juggling all the key areas with limited human resources can be a tough call. Business leaders often need additional help to manage change and identify the greatest need or priority.

Experienced consultants at an external services firm can allow your businesss to transform. From the migration of applications to the roll out of critical IT infrastructure, your business needs a partner that can boost staffing when the demand arises. Consultation with trusted experts can help your firm from losing its competitive edge.

So how can Dell keep your enterprise ahead of the digital business curve? Take a look at some of the services that we offer.

References

Gartner reference: http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2745517

Harvey Nash research: http://www.hnkpmgciosurvey.com

Mark Samuels

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Tags: Future Ready Enterprise