Dell_KACE_User_Profile

August 6, 2014
Nancy Shepard
Dell KACE User Experience Group
1
Dell KACE
Customer Profile: System
Administrator

• Typically generalists, although
some specialize in areas
• Solve complex problems using
diverse sources
• Are under time constraints
• Work in both reactive and
proactive modes
OVERVIEW
The typical Dell KACE system administrator is a technically competent, experienced male who
enjoys troubleshooting and responding to a variety of IT problems. System administrators usually
have to be generalists, performing a wide variety of tasks. In larger organizations with large teams
of system administrators, they may have individual areas of specialization, for example, network
monitoring. Their work is fast-paced and they are often on call 24/7.
In both reactive and proactive modes, system administrators are searching for needles in a
haystack. They are solving granular product problems and often may only know the symptoms.
Their everyday challenge is to identify and resolve problems by searching for error messages,
typos in scripts, patches and other extremely granular pieces of information that are buried in text-
heavy web pages, time-consuming online documentation, or poorly designed support forums.
When in reactive mode, time is of the essence. As they troubleshoot a problem, system
administrators need speedy and accurate guidance. They simply do not have time to wrangle with
the difficulties of navigating through the abundant information on the web. As a result, they will
abandon web-based self-service support such as knowledge bases if they make no fruitful, visible
progress in solving their problems within a short timeframe and will move on to other problem
solving resources such as calling for support or consulting an expert colleague.
2
 System administrators face
unique challenges in a
stressful environment
 “It’s a big job keeping things patched.
It’s a daunting task and we’re always
looking for things to make us more
efficient. -Tom
Bryon, IT System Administrator

• Dell KACE system administrators
have a history of staying at their
current employer, 5-15 years*
• This is in contrast to other IT
professionals’ average of
changing employers every 3-5
years
BASIC DEMOGRAPHICS
3
 Primarily male with at least
10 years experience and a
median age of 36 Education
Varied – some come from non-traditional backgrounds in non-computer fields, this is
particularly true for older system administrators. Others have degrees in Computer Science
or Electrical Engineering. More often today, companies look for system administrators with
some type of computer field degree.
Age ranges
• 22-65, with highest concentrations within 35-50**
Gender
• Primarily male although younger system administrators tend to have a small portion of
females**
Years experience
• For SMB system administrators, experience tends to be on the higher side, 10-30 years
experience and the tendency is to stay at a company*
 “I’ve been with my company for
almost 10 years now and working in
the industry for about 15.” -Bryon
Salary Averages***
Mountain View, CA $113,000
Houston, TX $88,000
New York, NY $109,000
* Dell KACE customer 2012 site visits and interviews
** Sun system administrator survey and interviews 2010
*** Indeed.com 2014
Median: $88,537

• Someone can have the name of
IT Manager or Director of IT and
yet primarily do the everyday
work of a general system
administrator
• This may be due to vanity
promotions and their equivalent
pay increases
JOB TITLES AND FUNCTIONS
4
 System administrators
sport a wide variety of job
titles that don’t necessarily
reflect their actual
responsibilities
Common Titles*
Computer Technician
Lead Systems Administrator
Network Administrator
Director of Information Technology
Information Technology Support Specialist
Information Systems Analyst
Manager, Technical Support Services
Desktop Support Technician
Help Desk Specialist
Systems Engineer
Support Coordinator
Help Desk Manager
Systems Administrator
Systems Support Analyst
IT Manager
Computer Support Technician
Technical Analyst
Configuration Manager
Computing Consultant
Director of IT
* Dell KACE customers (N=56)
**2012 Dell KACE customer survey (N=309)
67.0%
23.0%
9.4% 0.6%
I am a front-line IT
professional (i.e., system
administrator)
I manage a team of IT
professionals
I am an IT executive
"What is your role in managing IT systems?"**

• While most Dell KACE
customers are within the U.S
currently, sales initiatives have
increased global coverage and
these numbers are expected to
change
OTHER DEMOGRAPHICS
5
 Falling solidly in the SMB
market, 64% of Dell KACE
customers administer 150-
2,000 PCs or nodes
Steve, System Administrator
7%
11% 12%
17%
23%
16%
8%
2% 2% 1% 1%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
Node counts from 5,209 customers
April 2013
 “Inventory has been great for us.
Knowing what we have out there,
what version of Windows they’re
running. Before we were just
guessing how many machines had
Windows XP service pack 3.”
-Kyle

KNOWLEDGE
6
 System administrators may
need a wide knowledge of
IT technologies depending
on their IT environments
Knowledge*
• Networking, security, TCP/IP, SAN,
DHCP, WINS, and DNS
• Virtualized environments (VMware)
• Linux (Redhat)
• SAS, SASE, SOX or other compliance
audits
• Server capacity planning
• Firewalls/security
• NFS
• RAID
• Microsoft Exchange Server
• File replication service
• SharePoint
• Citrix, Microsoft RDS or other VDI
technologies
• Scripting (VBS, PowerShell, etc.)
• Windows clustering technologies
(Windows clustering, VERITAS Cluster
services)
• Database administration (Oracle, SQL
Server)
• Network administration (Cisco)
• Storage administration (NetApp, EMC,
SUN, HP, Hitachi, SGI)
• Lotus Notes
• SQL Server
• Sybase
• Active Directory
• Microsoft Office
Communicator/Microsoft Lync
• Domain controllers
• Remote administration
• Windows 2000/2003/2008 server
administration
• Server builds
• Patch management
• Backup/recovery experience
• This is only a partial list of
typical applications and
technology that system
administrators might need to
know
• Each company’s IT environment
determines what knowledge
their system administrators
should have
Bryon, IT System Administrator

• Value technical expertise, in
themselves and in others
• Always try to be more proficient
• Thrive and adapt to ever-
changing environments
GOALS AND ATTITUDES
7
 Almost all system
administrators said they
wanted to spend less time
working after-hours
Goals*
• Become more proficient and feel confident
• Be knowledgeable about products and technology
• Keep systems up
• Be proactive about preventing problems and downtime
• Fast and accurate problem solving
• Be a generalist (wide variety of tasks and problems)
• Increase responsibilities and move up in a company
• Work less by reducing time spent after-hours
Attitudes
• Likes to figure out things on his own
• Likes to have power and control over systems/environment
• Thrives in an environment that requires juggling multiple tasks at one time
• Adapts to interruptions
• Is adept at multi-tasking
• Value colleague interactions (phone, cube mates, IM)
• Wants all the gory technical details
• Values technical expertise
• Almost always under time pressure
 “My goal is to make things run faster
and knock off time from our tasks,
make us more efficient.” -Bryon

• Besides everyday
troubleshooting, they often will
work on future planning for
major projects like operating
system upgrades
RESPONSIBILITIES
8
 System administrators have
a wide range of
responsibilities System administrators typically have the following high-level responsibilities:*
• Administer and maintain systems
• Install, upgrade, patch, migrate, and support system software
• Troubleshoot hardware, operating systems, and application problems
• Analyze and tune systems for optimal performance
• Develop or obtain tools to monitor the performance of systems
• Design and implement backup, disaster recovery, and high availability practices
• Configure and monitor system security
• Develop and implement system standards
• Interact with and support a variety of teams and departments within a company
• Train employees or other IT staff
• Research solutions and make recommendations to management
Tim, System Administrator

• They balance short interactions
with clients while maintaining a
sociable manner
work in primarily Windows-
based IT environments
ENVIRONMENT & INTERACTIONS WITH
OTHERS
9
 System administrators have a
healthy sense of ego
IT environments
In small and medium businesses, IT environments tend to be more homogeneous than
large corporations. System administrators in SMBs may have to administer only
Windows systems or Windows and Mac systems.*
Equipment**
Dell KACE SMB IT environments are primarily Microsoft Windows-based and have
Windows PCs for their end-users. While this is the dominant operating system, some
have Apple Macintosh computers or Linux systems. Servers can vary widely with
equipment from IBM, Dell, Microsoft, and Oracle (Sun). Dell KACE SMB customers most
often use Windows-based servers.
Interaction with others
With a healthy sense of ego, system administrators are often out-going and direct,
balancing the need for short and efficient interactions with their clients with a sociable
and caring manner.
*Dell KACE users fall into the SMB category. In enterprise organizations,
system administrators may have to maintain Solaris, HP, IBM, Linux and
Windows platforms.
** Dell KACE customer 2012 site visits and interviews
Tim, System Administrator

TOOLS AND APPLICATIONS
10
 System administrators will
often have to use separate
applications to handle all
their responsibilities
Tools and applications*
• Virus protection software (Symantec,
McAfee)
• Symantec Ghost
• (MS) Remote Desktop
• Dell OpenManage Server Administrator
• TetraData
• What’s Up Gold (IpSwitch): network
monitoring that tells them whether
their servers and their services are up
• SolarWinds Orion (perimeter
monitoring of switches and IP
addresses)
• MobileIron (mobile devices such as
iPhone or iPad)
• Blackberry Enterprise Server
(Blackberry management)
• DameWare (remote control)
• MySQL
• Kayako (help desk application)
• EminentWare
• Paragon
• GFI
• Paessler
• Uptime
• Splunk
• Heat PowerDesk (FrontRange
Solutions)
• Clonezilla
• SpiceWorks (for non-computer
assets such as printers, scanners,
and routers)
• Citrix
• Xen Center (virtual machine
monitoring)
 “Orion is our network monitoring
tool. It’s our eyes and basically tells
us what’s going on, do we have any
nodes down, all our servers, our T1
lines. So with a certain view I can see
traffic on our main internet circuit,
see the throughput, how busy it is or
if I need a new circuit.” -Bryon
• Some use integrated tools such
as the Dell KACE K1000 which
includes a service desk
• Others prefer separate tools
based on their needs, for
example, using a separate
service desk tool

SAVING TIME AND MONEY WITH DELL KACE
11
 Inventory of hardware and
software was cited as saving
the most time and money Top K1 features that users said saved them time and money*:
*2012 Dell KACE customer survey
2.81
3.49
3.94
4.12
4.26
4.56
4.64
4.75
4.79
5.07
5.08
5.28
5.58
0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00 5.00 6.00
Secure Browser
Security (OVAL) Scanning and…
User Portal
Remote Site Replication
Integration with the K2000
IP Scanning Inventory / Asset Discovery
Help Desk/Service Desk
Policy and Configuration Management…
Asset Management/License Compliance
Patch Management
Reporting
Software Distribution
Hardware and Software Inventory• Their primary goals begin with
inventory management
• Software distribution and
license compliance was a top
need

• Viewing information or checking
on status were mentioned as
top tasks
• Tasks that require focus and
concentration, are typing
intensive or require a much
larger screen than a phone
were considered better for the
desktop
MOBILE DEVICE AND MOBILE APP USE
12
 Dell KACE system
administrators rely on their
smartphones as their primary
mobile device
Mobile devices used
Dell KACE system administrators rely on their smartphones as their main mobile device.
While some may have tablets, these are often viewed as “small laptops” and not their
mobile device of choice. Smartphones varied: iPhones, Androids, Blackberries.
Approximately half are company-issued.
Smartphone apps
Besides their email app, system administrators don’t appear to use many system-
administrator related apps. Some of those mentioned include: Cisco AnyConnect VPN, AD
Manager, Bomgar Rep Console, Shortcuts to websites, MobileIron App, PGI Premier Global
(conferencing), ShorTel (phone system), Nagios Map, subnetting tools, Dell diagnostic tool,
remote desktop client, LogMeIn, and Dell mobile client.
K1000 tasks they would be unlikely to do from their phones
Any tasks that require focus and concentration or are typing-intensive or those requiring a
much larger screen were considered better for the desktop, including:
• Writing scripts
• Writing reports (especially those requiring SQL)
• Patching and patch management
• Remote desktop
• Pushing out images
K1000 tasks they would like to do from their phones
• Machine lookup with drill down capability
• View patching status
• View software distribution status
• View active service desk tickets, add comments and close tickets
• View knowledge base
• Create and assign assets
 “I’d like to see what’s happening with a
managed install I have going so I can
get back to my desk and solve the
problem if there’s an issue.” -Ken

• xxx
PROBLEM SOLVING & NETWORKING
13
 System administrators are
typically self-sufficient
problem solvers and rarely
pick up the phone unless
they have exhausted all
other sources
Type of problem solver
Self-sufficient. Likes to solve his own problems. Gets satisfaction out of fixing things.
Enjoys being a resource for his coworkers.
Problem solving behaviors
Checks support websites regularly. Participates in communities/forums. When unsure
about something, he asks his system administrator buddies. If they can’t help, he looks
online. As a last resort, he contacts phone support or submits a service desk ticket.
Communities/networking
System administrators integrate informal support from their communities of experts
with more formal support resources from documentation, internet, and call centers.
These communities of experts are friends or colleagues who are either system
administrators themselves or have otherwise comparable technical expertise, and can
be located either within or outside their own organization. System administrators rely
heavily on this support network when researching new solutions and when supporting
and maintaining existing systems.
 Support has been excellent. For both
products, K1 and K2. I’ve never had
that good of support for any other
product I’ve ever used. In fact, they
probably do more than they’re
supposed to.” - Eric
Eric, Service Desk Technician

• Despite all their systems
management tasks, system
administrators must fit in time
for researching and
recommending new products
for their IT environments
KEY TASKS
14
 Monitoring systems is a top
priority as this is the way to
proactively address issues
before they become problems
Support, maintain and train*
• Manage, download, and install patches
• Write and edit scripts in support of other tasks
• Monitor systems
• Troubleshoot and repair systems
• Install software
• Maintain firewalls and security
• Manage networks
• Train users and other IT staff
• Maintain physical inventory (asset management)
• Perform security audits
• Performance optimization
• Perform backups
Product research, comparisons, and recommendations**
• Gather product information: specifications, compatibility, value/benefits, prices
• Gather vendor information
• Make comparisons
• Write recommendations for management
** Sun system administrator survey and interviews 2010
Bob, Senior System
Administrator

• In 2011, Windows 7 upgrade
was a top project for many
system administrators
• Some system administrators are
faced with retiring and
replacing most of their PCs
within a short period
KEY TASKS continued …
15
 Large project planning can
include operating system
upgrades or replacing
equipment
Keeping informed *
• Locate and read online knowledgebase articles, documentation, white papers,
technical bulletins, and step-by-step instructions
• Read postings and post problems on forums and other community sites
• Stay aware of new software updates and patches
• Monitor security threats
• Stay up-to-date on new products, services, solutions
• See and take training
Other*
• Manage contracts and/or vendors
Project planning for major IT environment changes*
• Rolling out full operating system upgrades
• Large scale equipment: retire and replace
• Major configuration changes
• Create a disaster recovery plan

use support forums such as IT
Ninja
• System administrators must be
relentless in solving problems,
stepping through a hierarchy of
resources
SOLUTION-SEEKING LIFECYCLE
16
 Becoming aware of a problem
is only the beginning
TROUBLESHOOT AND REPAIR
Problem awareness: becoming aware that there is a problem by:
• Equipment behavior
• Monitoring tool
• Paged, emailed, or called
Identifying the cause and finding fix
• Doing self-solve
Try what I know
Ask co-worker
Use sources such as support forums, etc.
• Asking vendor support sources for help
Call
Submit online service request ticket
Get call back from FE or SE
Performing the fix
• Install patch
• Order part
• Upgrade software or hardware
• Change configuration
MONITORING SYSTEM HEALTH
• Watch for alarms like chassis failures, reboots, memory and storage
• View latest patch releases, determine patches needed
• Run reports for system analysis or trending
• CPU or disk utilization
• Check availability and look at downtime
 “After the JumpStart and the KACE
field engineer helping us, we were up
and running in just a few days.”
-Brian

• Some of Dell KACE system
administrators’ pain points are
solved with the K1 and K2
products
• Yet finding the information
needed to solve problems still
remains difficult at times
FRUSTRATIONS AND PAIN POINTS
17
 A major pain point of system
administrators is having to go
to too many places to find
solutions
• Having to dig or go to too many places to find solutions
• Need to reduce number of versions of installed OS’s
• Lack of customization on many tools
• Poorly designed dashboards that lack customization
• Understanding and keeping track of product and system dependencies
• Lack of standard installations
• Poor tools to do configuration cloning
• Frequent rate of configuration changes
• Hates marketing fluff
• Prefers management tools that give granular level control
• Multiple monitoring tools with multiple logins
• Configuring alerts and notifications
• Identifying who to contact when a problem occurs because a vendor’s reps keep
changing
 “The first few months I used the
search in the admin guide when we
were setting up things, like what
does the feature mean, how do we
do this…” -Bill

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