One topic that keeps coming up at Gartner’s Infrastructure, Operations and Management Summit in Orlando when analysts are discussing the challenges companies will face when implementing virtualization on a large scale is the skill set required to design, manage and optimize virtual server and other technologies across large distributed environments.
David Coyle, research vice president at Gartner, mentioned obsolete skills among a handful of issues IT operations managers will face when rolling out the technology more broadly and across various IT disciplines, such as servers, storage and desktops.
Thomas Bittman, Gartner vice president and distinguished analyst, polled attendees during a session to learn about what they perceive as impediments to virtualization (about 115 responded, according to Gartner’s live tally on the presentation screen). Among several responses three stood out: 33% said management and operational process issues held them back, 22% said organizational skills were an impediment and 10% noted staff skills as something they must consider before rolling out virtualization.
And Gartner Research Vice President Cameron Haight also alluded to an impending skills crunch during his presentations at the show as well. He advised attendees to organize their virtualization support staff and predicted the skills area to be among the hottest and most in demand going forward.
“Virtual administration skills will be the SAP Basis administration of this decade,” he said.
IT professionals with virtualization technology savvy will be able to “name their own salary. Good luck finding them, and better luck keeping them,” Haight said.
