3. Introduction
The information technology trends reports are out with many already
updated. We’ve seen the statistics. We’ve read about what’s top of mind
for CIOs. But how does this translate into where budget dollars are actually
being allocated — and will IT organizations get what they really need out of
these expenditures?
In 2016, Peak 10 conducted a survey in which we asked IT decision makers
what projects would take priority in the next several years. In this eBook,
we look at some of the top initiatives they cited — project priorities that are
shared by companies across a wide range of verticals.
Most organizations want to harness the benefits of new technologies to
enable the next phase of growth for new capabilities such as the Internet
of Things and big data analysis. The challenge, however, is balancing the
investment in next-generation technologies with the day-to-day realities of
serving their end-users and customers; dealing with legacy systems; and
making the most of their budgets and existing IT assets.
How can IT professionals determine where best to allocate their budgets?
Each company is different, so a lot has to do with each organization’s
specific vision and short- and long-term goals. But to remain competitive
and make forward progress, it ultimately is a matter of identifying and then
focusing on the most critical drivers of business value.
4. 4
The onslaught of cyberattacks and security vulnerabilities shows no signs of abating in 2016, so it’s not
surprising that IT security continues to be a top priority for IT decision makers. Many plan to focus on
establishing a more proactive security posture, and increasing investments in virus and malware protection,
identify management, access control and intrusion prevention.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: EMPLOY ADAPTIVE SECURITY
Perimeter defense and rule-based security by themselves don’t cut it, especially if your organization is
increasing its reliance on cloud-based services and open APIs. What you need is a multi-layered, adaptable
security approach to combat cybercriminals at numerous points inside and outside the network. That’s the
impetus behind adaptive security.
It’s a network security model that monitors a network for malicious traffic and behavioral anomalies,
uncovering end point vulnerabilities and identifying real-time changes to systems. It automatically enforces
end point protections and access rules while blocking malicious traffic, and even provides audit data.
If you don’t have the internal expertise or resources to do this, seek out managed security services
from experts who stay on top of emerging threats, security technologies and evolving security-related
compliance requirements.
Educating employees throughout your company is also essential. Implement cybersecurity training and
drills that incorporate communication, threat assessment and risk mitigation.
“[We plan to focus on] …security
focusing on intrusion defense
systems (IDS) and intrusion
prevention systems (IPS), log
and event management, identity-
based firewalling…”
1. Security
$$$
IaaS
5. 5
2. Disaster Recovery
Disaster Recovery (DR) took the lead among 2016 initiatives for respondents to the Peak 10 survey. For many
years, DR was something companies knew they needed to plan for but often felt the costs outweighed the risks.
Things are changing as businesses increasingly understand the true costs of downtime — costs that include lost
sales and revenue; dissatisfied customers, end users, vendors and partners; non-compliance penalties and more.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: TEST AND TEST AGAIN
The most comprehensive Disaster Recovery plan may be worthless if you haven’t tested it. So why don’t
companies test their DR plans? Well, it’s not quite as simple as flipping the magical DR switch to “ON” and
kicking back to see what happens.
There are a myriad of questions to answer before your first full-blown DR test, and there are more you’ll
discover after your test begins as DR testing carries its own complexities and risks above and beyond
planning for a true disaster.
Have you planned for user access, both during the test and during a true disaster, as those two use cases
are often quite different? Do you how to test your key application without affecting production? How do
you test your communication streams without actually spamming your customers? How does your business
define a successful DR test?
That’s why we urge customers to not only test their DR plans, but to test them again. Failing the first test, in
fact, may help identify gaps or deficiencies that can then be corrected before an actual disaster occurs.
“[We plan on] establishing a
suitable DR site to mesh with
our DR procedures.”
IaaS
6. 6
3. Cloud Computing
Following nationwide trends, many of the IT decision makers surveyed reported they are moving to the
cloud or expanding their use of cloud services — and discovering cloud migration doesn’t necessarily
require new IT dollars.
Instead of buying their own servers, storage and systems, companies are increasingly contracting for
infrastructure as a service (IaaS), which shifts capital expenses to operational expenses. Even if an
investment is required, benefits such as lower overall cost, greater agility, reduced complexity and better
security often offsets much of it.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: GO HYBRID
As great as its benefits are, cloud computing may not be right for everything. A hybrid IT strategy enables
you to pull together a variety of on- and off-premise IT environments to meet your company’s unique needs,
while maximizing cost-effectiveness.
Work with service providers that offer a consultative approach. Rather than selling you an off-the-shelf
solution, they should ask about your short- and long-term business requirements and goals to help you
determine the best mix of IT environments. They should also be willing and able to walk you through the
application/workload evaluation process, and offer insights on performance optimization, compliance,
security and the best migration processes to employ.
Once you start adding or expanding cloud services, it’s a good idea to have an internal cloud services broker
(CSB) role in your organization to analyze the various cloud options, negotiate contracts and take on the
governance, management and delivery aspects. Or, go with a third-party CSB, who can also help identify
shadow IT use of cloud services in addition to taking on the aforementioned responsibilities.
“We’re focusing on getting out
of ‘rack and stack’ and working
towards IaaS.”
IaaS
7. 7
4. Consolidation
One of the most effective ways to squeeze more out of an IT budget is through consolidation, and that’s
where many IT decision makers are focusing their attention this year. For some it’s a matter of optimizing
resources by hosting more workloads on fewer servers or using virtualization to consolidate servers. Others
are employing consolidation to reduce the number of data center facilities they operate. No matter the size
of the initiative, the end goal is to reduce capital spending and increase efficiencies.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: COMMUNICATE AND COLLABORATE
The word “consolidation” often strikes fear in the hearts of IT professionals. However, there are a number of
opportunities to reduce overall IT spend through various consolidation and shared services initiatives, often
without reducing head count or launching a disruptive reorganization. It’s a matter of communicating needs,
goals and upcoming changes, and collaborating across departments and disciplines.
Some of the simpler projects include better utilizing server capacity. Start by identifying and eliminating so-
called “ghost servers.” These are servers that aren’t running any useful applications but are draining power and
reducing capacity utilization by consuming rack space and other resources. Fewer servers also means less
manpower required for maintaining them, freeing up IT staff to focus on initiatives to grow your company.
Other suggestions include pooling IT staff; sharing best practices; consolidating IT procurement and
support functions into centralized shared services; and managing demand through central governance.
“[We are going to be] …
consolidating computing
environment to smaller, more
robust platforms…”
8. 8
5. Cost Control
For all the changes inherent in information technology, the one constant faced by IT decision makers is the
imperative to control costs. There are always new technologies to be implemented; software and hardware
to be replaced, upgraded or expanded upon; additional capabilities to be supported; new users and IT staff
to be trained…the list goes on. At the same time, IT is under pressure to increase efficiencies, provide the
required support to reduce time to market and meet any number of other critical business requirements.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: OUTSOURCE
IT cost control isn’t just about reducing costs. It’s about optimizing assets and maximizing the value they
deliver. A good option is to outsource — particularly those tasks that eat up internal resources without
contributing greatly to revenue generation. That includes many of the day-to-day activities such as software
upgrades or monitoring. Activities that require special expertise that many organizations don’t have or can’t
afford — advanced IT security, for example — also are good choices.
Outsourcing enables companies to tap into industry best practices and gain access to talent with the
most current skill sets. It frees up internal resources that can be allocated to more strategic initiatives. If a
company currently maintains its own data center, it can also benefit from opting for colocation or a move to
the cloud because of the ability to switch capital expenses to operating expenses.
Conduct a preliminary search to create a list of vendors. Check references. Ask the hard questions. Do they
have experience specific to your industry? How do they handle issues that may arise? What kind of service
level agreements do they offer?
“[We want to focus on] …
maintaining effectiveness while
capping costs.”
$$$
IaaS
9. 9
6. Backups
Backups are priorities for many companies this year, whether they involve backing up to a colocation
facility or the cloud. That’s not surprising given that it is one of the most critical IT functions. However, ever-
increasing data volumes are making it difficult to complete backups within an available window. “Always-on”
IT environments also make it difficult to take systems down to perform backups.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: KNOW YOUR OPTIONS
Don’t settle for the easiest, quickest or cheapest backup method. Determine your needs and then look at the
backup options that can best meet them.
• Assess the types and amounts of data you create and where it is being stored.
• Prioritize your backup needs. Mission-critical data should have top priority. Determine if dormant or
infrequently used data should be archived instead of backed up.
• Define your recovery time objectives (RTOs) and your recovery point objective (RPOs), and make sure
your expectations for them are in line with your business processes and objectives.
• Keep asking questions to fully understand the scope of your needs. Are continuous backups
needed? How will testing be handled? Will your data be encrypted? Are there regulatory compliance
requirements? Can object storage or other cloud-enabled storage methods be used for backup?
There are benefits and tradeoffs to every backup option. Make sure you select the one — or perhaps a
combination — that can deliver what you need.
IaaS
“[I]…would love to have a backup
environment in the cloud. If my
production servers, which are at
the data center ever go down, I can
switch to the cloud.”
10. 10
7. Business Growth
It’s a competitive world out there. Technology has the ability to give companies a much needed edge by
helping them achieve greater scale, improve productivity, pursue market diversification and integrate
into global value chains. It also is essential for enabling business growth, which is why a majority of the
respondents to the Peak 10 survey cited it as one of their top priorities for 2016 and beyond.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: ENHANCE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
Business growth doesn’t hinge solely on driving product and service innovation. Delivering an exceptional
customer experience maybe as important – if not more so. Use technology to make it happen.
Start by thinking and acting like a product manager. What do your company’s customers and/or end users
want? How can technology help you deliver it? How can technology help you capture information that will
continue to enhance customers’ experience?
Whether you employ internal IT teams or outsource to a vendor, the team must be comfortable with agile
software development over waterfall approaches, so that the technology you employ or deploy can be
responsive to changes in customer perspectives and to different phases of the customer’s journey with your
company’s brand. You’ll also need to focus on business outcomes, rather than just service-level agreements,
as key indicators of technology ROI.
Other areas of focus for enhancing customer engagement include mobile technology with rich integrations
into data in the back-end systems for those in sales and customer-facing roles, and more robust, user-
friendly ecommerce systems.
“[IT provides] …support for
growth in transaction volume and
new clients.”
IaaS
11. 11
8. Application Management
Business applications are critical to the success of many organizations, enabling them to perform the
functions essential to their operations. They also consume countless hours and dollars in the chase to fix
problems, identify best practices and maintain stability. Many companies are making outsourced application
management a priority as a means to reduce some of the burden.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: START THE RELATIONSHIP RIGHT
Outsourcing application management seems like it should be easy enough but it’s a change nonetheless. For
many companies, change of any kind isn’t easy. The following is a list of things to do at the beginning of an
engagement with a third-party vendor to help ensure a successful transition.
• Review all available documentation and contractual information. Make sure you understand the division
and scope of responsibilities.
• If you’re working with a third-party provider that offers application management services through a
partner, make sure you are clear on who your main contact is, as well as how billing and support will be
handled.
• Validate the assumptions made during the proposal and statement of work (SOW) and perform a gap
analysis. If there are any gaps, work with the vendor to close them. If the vendor is resistant, it may not be
the right vendor to hire.
• Ask outsourcing provider to offer suggestions or propose proven and repeated processes that will
improve your operation and add value to the engagement. The provider should function as much as a
partner as a vendor.
“This year’s priorities are mostly
application-driven.”
12. 12
9. Automation
With pressure on IT decision makers to control costs, maximize IT assets and meet changing customer
demands, there’s no room for wasting time and resources by duplicating efforts or following redundant
processes. That’s why many organizations are investing in automation, in areas ranging from security to
service desk operations. Automation can free up immense internal resources that can instead focus on
driving business growth and innovation in order to create opportunities and out-perform the competition.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: THINK ABOUT THE HUMAN SIDE
There’s no question that automation can deliver significant time and cost savings. But it’s important to keep
in mind there’s a human factor that will play a key role in delivering results.
Even if automation frees up the time of some employees, these systems still only will function in accordance
with the instructions and guidance of employees – yours or those in another department. It’s essential that
they receive adequate training.
There’s also a high degree of decision-making responsibility on the part of those who operate the systems.
As both processes and equipment become more automatically controlled, employees are tasked with
watching them to make sure they stay in control, and fine tuning the process as needed. As a result, their
jobs are changing from “doing” to monitoring and supervising an entire process. The problem is that some
companies are reluctant to empower employees to this degree, either because of concerns about their
lack of expertise or a simple inability to relinquish power. Training can take care of the former. Change
management will be required for the latter.
“[We plan to focus on] …
automating process to reduce
workload, inefficiencies and errors…”
$$$
13. 13
10. Upgrades
Hardware and software upgrades and enhancements are high on the list of spending priorities for many
IT organizations, with end-of-life issues and refresh cycles far ahead of next-generation technologies. The
reason? Continual upgrades and redesigns are what keep the entire business working successfully and
allow for proper IT service delivery — at least in the minds of many IT professionals who don’t have the time
to research and then sell other IT service delivery models to the c-suite.
PEAK 10’S ADVICE: TEST OUT THE CLOUD
The cloud is already a primary initiative for many IT professionals. If it isn’t yet among yours, it’s time
to consider it. While you still may need to operate, maintain and refresh, some hardware for a variety of
reasons, there are many compelling reasons for moving some applications to the cloud.
For one thing, you no longer have to house servers on-premise and can reallocate your IT staff while
diverting cost savings to another area of your business. This has a much greater impact on operational costs
than simply refreshing servers for lower power consumption and connectivity costs. With a cloud service,
the vendor is responsible for all maintenance costs and upkeep to the system. And because cloud services
are powered by data centers that have redundant power sources, redundant connectivity and failover
processes, they can offer maximum uninterrupted service. There are numerous other benefits as well.
This doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing exercise. Move non-critical applications first as a way to test the waters.
“Nothing out of the ordinary, just
regular maintenance, hardware and
software upgrades.”
14. 14
Need More Advice?
For many companies, evaluating, selecting and purchasing IT infrastructure solutions is just the beginning of
what can be an arduous, labor-intensive endeavor. It’s an undertaking that can also eat up already stretched
resources with little certainty that either IT or business requirements will be satisfied.
If your organization is or could soon be in that position, take advantage of Peak 10 Advanced Client Services
and Managed Services. Doing so can help ease some of the burden on your IT staff — and allow you to reap
the benefits of partnering with a company that understands that IT is no longer a company support function
but a key driver for business transformation and success.
Peak 10 Advanced Client Services include a variety of professional services designed to help your company
make the most of its IT investments. From migrating your IT infrastructure to a new environment to
developing data governance policies to support innovation and efficiency realization, Peak 10’s solution
engineers and technology experts are at your service and ready to help you optimize the power of your
technology resources.
TAKE ACTION NOW
Call or email us today to arrange a free consultation with our solution
engineers to discuss your business goals and challenges.
www.peak10.com | 866-473-2510
You can also take advantage of the many free resources Peak 10
offers on the topics covered in this eBook, as well as many others.
You’ll find them at: http://www.peak10.com/knowledge-center/.
