ITSM “enABLES” the Cloud

The cloud. It’s on everyone’s mind and in everybody’s plans. But getting the right kind of cloud in place and then managing

it efficiently to derive some real value … well, that’s another story. That’s this story.

This is about how IT service management helps “enABLE” the cloud - how ITSM – and the discipline of ITIL -

enables organizations to create, deploy and manage cloud services that actually do what they’re supposed to do.

Hype is one thing. Action and sustainable results are better.

We’re here to tell you that while the rewards are great, so are the challenges. While the cloud can and does

provide agility, flexibility, cost savings and ultimately, a stronger bottom line, a failure in planning, deployment or

execution can lead to “cloud sprawl” and increased costs. This ebook won’t provide you with all the answers, but

it does list essential “ABLES” that you should be considering

Is your current ITSM system ABLE and up to the task?

Use the catalog, just like the old days – only betterHave you decided what your services will be? It sounds simple, but coming up with an accurate service description will inform every

decision that follows. This is where the Information Technology Infrastructure Library – yes, ITIL - starts to become critical. There’s a

reason ITIL is the world’s most widely adopted approach for IT service management. Its no-nonsense real-world framework is crucial

for identifying, planning, delivering and supporting your organization’s IT services to the business.

You no doubt already know this, but sticking with the ITIL playbook is so vital, it bears mentioning again. And maybe even again.

ITIL’s insistence that IT services be aligned to the needs of the business must be your mantra. Practice it and you will achieve that

higher consciousness that drives business change, transformation and growth. And, to bring this back to the present, the service

descriptions that fuel your catalog. Are they fully fleshed out? They will inform critical decisions about the type of cloud you chose,

core computing capabilities, storage, security and network infrastructure decisions.

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Have it your way, but know what you wantPublic, private, hybrid – what’s it going to be? Maybe even a combination. How can you decide? Well, there are people we

know (hint) who offer services that funnel your needs, business goals, budget and timeframe into a secret blender and then

out the back come accurate recommendations of what services should go to the cloud and whether it should be public,

private or hybrid. It’s all revealed, and it saves organizations a lot of time, trouble, experimentation, expense and trips down

wrong-way roads.

If you decide to do this yourself, be aware that even basic terms like “public” and “private” can be confused and misused.

The phrase “private cloud” generally means you are housing cloud-ish resources inside your organization. But what if the

private cloud was located somewhere else, but it included much greater security and quality of service than the often-

temporary public clouds? Is it possible to get a secure, private cloud without building it yourself?

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After making it easy, make it visibleOnce you’ve enabled your catalog of services, it’s important to focus on tracking what you have in inventory. This is important because the

cloud could get very popular. As the usefulness of cloud services rises, so will demand, which will generate the addition of more services.

It’s a happy, virtuous cycle, but it does need to be well managed. Following are some questions to consider:

• Do you have adequate resources for the service levels you are committing to provide?

• How do you track who has what, and the costs?

• Have you achieved transparency of resource consumption? That is, can you order up a dashboard view that gives you the

information you need to make the right decisions at the right time?

Without this accurate information, you may experience “cloud sprawl,” which means you’re in for an explosion, not savings, in costs and

trouble. It’s no joke. Once word of the cloud benefits spread through your organization – and it will - people will want to get their hands

on some of that good thing. Costs can rise, and yet at the same time a very non-cloud thing can occur: productivity can suffer. Also,

remember to have your IT Assets properly aligned in a service view, and make sure those CIs are properly loaded into your CMDB. This

will help you stay ahead of the game.

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Do-it-yourself can be better for everybody This is where having a services portal or a service request management capability comes into play. Self-service and

automation are key to making this a smooth process, and once again, ITIL helps show the way.

What types of services can be ordered with a completely automated process? Which may require a change request, and

how can they be pre-approved? By thinking through your services and the various use case scenarios, you can look to add

automation to the process which assists in speeding time to fulfillment as well as accuracy and tracking.

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Keep a tight rein on things and lasso those efficiencies partnerThe ability to monitor, control and report on resource usage is critical. Remember: The cloud and its double-edged pendulum offer great

flexibility, but if the services are not adequately tracked and are essentially allowed to run free and unmanaged, you’ll find the cloud

could net out as a loss. It might sound like we are talking about restrictions, but really it’s about empowerment. The idea is to empower

users while adhering to and enforcing SLAs and actually metering usage of on-demand services, storage and even security services.

This is also where we start to focus on the cost structure, understanding the “a” of your service. Can you track your usage? Do you

understand what it costs you to provide cloud service? Remember, once you can measure, you can bill and you can improve.

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Who’s going to pay for all this cool stuff?Are you planning on full chargebacks or just “showback?” When departments get services for free, they may take those services for

granted. Or maybe they demand increasing levels of service, unaware of the investment of money and time that goes into providing

them. Maybe they ask for things that don’t make sense, then whine about it when they don’t happen. Maybe this should stop.

Quite surprisingly to some, IT services chargebacks or showbacks can greatly benefit not just the IT department but consumers as well.

Benefits include:

• IT users will understand the value of the services they consume

• They will think more carefully before requesting new services

• IT personnel, on the other hand, will realize they have to be fully accountable for providing an IT service

• Everybody suddenly understands these services are no longer free, so everybody, from the top down, considers requests

more realistically

As you add costs to the offering, remember the natural reaction will be something like; “Fine, but there better be an SLA associated

with this service.” Though instituting and negotiating the SLA at first adds a layer of complexity, the net result is positive. IT will be

more on its game, and the end user now has the information to understand the value of the service delivered.

<<Key item call out>> By establishing a cost of goods to your services, you can now communicate both directly to the business

and up to management the returns on all IT investments.

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The business agility that has become such a cliché? It starts here

There’s really not a lot to say here that has not already been said. Who doesn’t need rapid deployment and agility? The idea is to be able to

make adjustments on the fly, but without taking on development. If you have to start worrying about development, what’s the point of using

the cloud?

So, can you adjust your cloud needs without a major development and capital expense project?

Are agility and nimbleness core attributes and assets or is the cloud still a six or eight week sourcing exercise?

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Once it’s successfully deployed, then what?You also need to be able to support and maintain your cloud(s) and your services. The failure of a single component has the potential to

severely affect many customers. While each IT component in a cloud infrastructure or a service has to be registered in the CMDB, and there

must also be a well-defined relationship, it’s also critical to know how those services are really performing.

With that insight, you can more quickly manage degradation in critical services and potential failures by staying ahead of them entirely. There’s

no need to wait until the trouble tickets start flying like confetti.

Put another way, can you deal with sudden surges in demand? Have you managed your resources to ensure the availability of sufficient

capacity, balancing utilization and excess capacity?

Capacity management and forecasting are complex but critical. If the real-time addition of capacity might be required, you must ensure tight

integration between capacity management and supplier management processes. The elasticity provided by the ability to rapidly provision new

resources may turn out to be an essential element.

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Make it easy to check the pulse of your systemsOk, so this one is an “ible” vs an “able” but by now you get the picture.

As we first mentioned, you need to be able to order cloud services, so having visibility from the end user as well as from an IT

operations standpoint will make everyone feel better about their clouds.

Visibility is knowing what you have, what it costs, what its health status is, and how everything is performing against your SLAs. Are

you able to track and monitor the performance of your cloud(s) and the application and services that are running there?

End users want to know what they have, what they are being charged for, and that everything is performing in the background so

they can get their jobs done. You want to know that your clouds are working for your people and performing as you expect them to.

Q: If a cloud crashes and no one is around, does it make a sound?

A: No. But the users will – and you’ve probably heard it before. It’s the screaming of an angry mob.

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Razor wire, noSmart precautions, yesThe trick with security is to design it in from the beginning. Key questions follow. Remember, your convenient cheat sheet is as close

as your copy of ITIL v3.

• How do I balance cost, speed and flexibility with security?

• How can we handle data privacy?

• Is there really a way to integrate systems, processes and our cloud operations securely?

• Can I offer various levels of security to meet and match the requirements of various types of data, thus saving resources, time

and money?

Keep in mind that because organizations and their information systems constantly change, your security management process must

be continuously vetted. Remember William Edward Deming’s famous “Plan-Do-Check-Act” cycle? The “act” part refers to continuous

improvement, taking corrective actions to improve results that are significantly below plan. In addition, security plans must contain

operational level agreements as well as the security policies.

Security today should be a given, but to many it is an afterthought until the unthinkable actually happens (and the screaming starts).

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How is your elasticity factor?So many questions. So few answers. That is why we are here to help.

Do you need to be able to quickly scale out or scale in, adding or subtracting users, images, instances, storage, services and assets?

Should you do it in-house with a private cloud or externally? If you go public, will it be secure and can you track and manage it?

Two huge upsides of the cloud are that it scales very quickly and provisioning can indeed be automated. The downside is that without proper

IT asset management in place, you could again be infected by cloud sprawl. With ITSM in place, you will have the ability to offer, automate,

track, manage, enhance security and calculate cost. The cloud can scale easily, if you have the right foundation in place.

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Now to make this eBook SummarizABLEForgive us, but we have to do this: The sky’s the limit when it comes to the cloud. But remember, while you can have your head

in the clouds, you need your operational feet firmly planted on the ground.

With apologies firmly in place, let’s just say we understand that you are fully aware of the benefits of moving to the cloud. You

now also know it’s not as simple as many vendors want you to think. But with a plan, and while remembering your core ITIL and

ITSM disciplines, you will find … your silver lining.

© 2013 Unisys Corporation. All rights reserved.

Unisys, the Unisys logo and ClearPath are registered trademarks of Unisys Corporation. All other brands and products

referenced herein are acknowledged to be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.

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