* Research shows plenty of benefits come from IT process automation
In preparing some EMA research papers, I recently spoke with various enterprises about how they are automating their IT systems management, and the benefits they experienced.
Several enterprises focused on IT process automation (ITPA) – i.e. automating their data center operational processes, including complex ITIL disciplines like problem and incident management, change management, and service level reporting. Using modular and automated operational workflows, they are achieving benefits as diverse as cost reduction, operational efficiency, tighter security and improved compliance. You can read more about how ITPA solves critical problems in data center operations in two recent EMA reports, both available as free downloads from the EMA Web site: “Resolving Critical Problem Areas in Data Center Operations” and “How RealOps Delivers on Process Automation”.
For a more in-depth study, “IT Operations and Production Automation – Proving Ongoing Relevance”, I focused on a subset of IT process automation traditionally known as job scheduling. It is interesting to see how this technology continues to evolve.
Enterprises are using job scheduling as a foundation technology in composite application development, providing IT automation functions with out-of-the-box products, allowing custom development efforts to focus on business functionality that delivers competitive advantage. Others are plugging this technology into their service-oriented architectures, using it to automate offline Web services processing, to maximize online compute resources and make integration with legacy platforms easier.
I also interviewed businesses that were taking a different approach – using systems management appliances. Appliances generally deliver very specific functionality, but with low implementation and maintenance costs, so it was interesting to hear the real world results that they deliver. One business cut its application upgrade time from two to three days down to a day. Another reduced its desktop TCO from $56 to around $17, and estimated a $60,000 saving just from automating its Microsoft Office upgrade. Appliances are becoming a more common way to provide IT capabilities as diverse as patch management, software distribution, asset management, Web site compliance, and secure remote access.
You can read more about this appliance-based approach in two recent free EMA reports – “Don’t Wait to Automate: Achieve Immediate Cost, Productivity, and Security Benefits by Automating IT Management”, and “Secure Remote IT Operations with Xceedium GateKeeper”.
A particularly interesting area of IT automation, which crosses several of these areas, is management of virtual environments. Discussing virtualization with enterprises for an upcoming EMA research report, a major concern is the automated management of these environments. Disciplines like workload automation, provisioning, asset management, and patching, are of particular concern. Some vendors are starting to provide automated solutions specifically for virtual environments, but there is a lot of work yet to be done. I would love to hear your view on the automated management of virtual environments.
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