A presentation from the BCS COnfiguration Management Special Interest Group conference 2009. It gives "the other side of the story from a Operation Manager\'s perspective.

1. The Operations View… An Operation Manager’s perspective on Change, Configuration and Release Management (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 1 14/06/2009

2. Who am I and Who are you? Why are we here today? How Ops see you... Some “Ops Mgr Rules”... Some Operations Requests... Some examples of tools Summary Questions? 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 2 Agenda

3. Stephen Thair MBCS CITP MBA 19 years IT experience in Australia (9yrs) and UK (10yrs) Development, Support, Technical Architecture etc 3 yrs as Operations Manager for Totaljobs Group 1 yrs as Operations Manager for TSL Education Seriti Consulting – web operations and performance consulting 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 3 Who am I?

4. Who are you? Hands up... Who is a Change / Configuration / Release (CCR) Manager? Who is a Operations Manager? My definition of "Operations Manager“... "the person who gets it in the neck when the servers/applications/systems go down" (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 4 14/06/2009

5. Why are we here? The 3 Conference Objectives... getting more from what you’ve got! cost and risk of not controlling environments (virtualised, end-to-end, testing, etc.) how the benefits of being in control can be measured and communicated to the organisation. The ITIL Objectives... “ITIL is a top-down, business driven approach to the management of IT Services that specifically addresses the strategic business value generated by the IT organisation and the delivery of high quality IT services. ITIL is designed to focus on the people, processes and technology issues that IT organisations face.” – ITIL Official Website (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 5 14/06/2009

6. Why are we here? (2) But why do we have Change / Configuration / Release Management at all? The Answer as always is CIA Confidentiality Integrity Availability We have these disciplines to help the Operational staff do their job better and to deliver a better service to the business so that the business can be more productive and make more profit (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 6 14/06/2009

7. How “we” see “you”... Are you a hurdle we have to jump? Or are you the lubricant that makes everything run smoothly? Or worse... (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 7 14/06/2009

8. The worst case scenario... 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 8

9. Part of the problem or part of the solution? What happens if you are seen negatively? We will ignore or workaround the CCR processes And we'll get away with it for two reasons As long as we are delivering on the service and we don't mess up a change, all we are going to get is a slap on the wrist (unless it's a high-security environment) And unless you have automated configuration management tools you probably won't even know... (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 9 14/06/2009

10. Ops Manager rule #1 “CCR without automated configuration management is “optional”” How much “Hidden Change” goes on inside your organisation? (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 10 14/06/2009

11. The Four Quadrants of Change Unsuccessful Authorised Un-Authorised Successful (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 11 14/06/2009

12. Rules #2, #3, #4... No-one likes someone watching over their shoulder... AKA the “Big Brother” Rule You get the marketing wrong... AKA the “FUD Marketing” Rule Where are you when we need you? AKA the “Dial 999 rule” (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 12 14/06/2009

13. Rule #2 – “Big Brother” No-one likes someone looking over their shoulder – that’s just a fact of life... Ops people interpret it as "you guys don't trust us to do our jobs properly so we have to get everything approved" Which is arrogant because everyone makes mistakes... Especially someone who is "less technical" than they are... (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 13 14/06/2009

14. Rule #3 – “FUD Marketing” FUD Marketing FUD will get your budget signed off But all the Ops people will hear is "blah blahblah" Marketing 101 Tailor your message to the audience You need to sell the vision just as much to the Operations people as to the IT Executive... and you can't use the same slide deck... (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 14 14/06/2009

15. Rule #4 – “Dial 999” Ask yourself the question... When something goes wrong does your change / release / configuration management system help your front line staff fix the problem? And if not, why not? (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 15 14/06/2009

16. Some Operations Requests... Always ask yourself "How does this help us deliver better IT services to our Customers?" And NOT "How can I implement a Change / Release / Configuration Management Process“ A set of processes and tools that help us do our job better Help us transition changes into Production, not stand in the way Help in dealing with the business sponsors Getting it approved and signed-off Help in translating Tech speak to Business 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 16

17. Help us with Information! Can you answers these questions quickly and easily? What changed on server XYZ today? What fixes where in the release last week (down to the file level?) If something has gone wrong on server XYZ what applications are affected and who do I need to notify (RACI Matrix?)? Can I get a up to list of all the servers running IIS in my data center with their CPU, RAM, Disk, OS version and patch level in under 30 secs? If I want to roll out Change XYZ across 100 servers how do "your" processes help me do that? What changes are planned on the Bank Holiday Monday in August? (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 17 14/06/2009

18. Standard Changes Rule! Work on the “standard change” list! ITIL has the concept of a standard change but rarely have I seen it implemented effectively If it is something that has been done successfully many times and/or will incur no service impact (due to redundancy etc) then make it a standard change and let people get on with the job! "If this change goes wrong will it have a material impact on the service to customers?" If the answer is no - make it a "standard change" (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 18 14/06/2009

19. Integration... Change, Configuration and Release should work together smoothly... AND Be integrated with Incident / Problem! Can I go from an Incident to a Change and updating the CMDB in 2-3 clicks? AND Be integrated with the configuration/CMDB automation “Closed loop change” (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 19 14/06/2009

20. Some concrete examples Configuration Management Configuresoft ECM Service Management www.service-now.com Closed-Loop Change (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 20 14/06/2009

21. Configuresoft ECM 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 21

22. Why I like ECM Comprehensive depth of coverage Database-driven = fast reports Agent-based Only delta’s sent over the wire = less network traffic Web UI – all I need is a browser Lots of pre-canned templates for different compliance regimes = ECM-driven change remediation = “fix the ones that are different” 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 22

23. Service-Now.com 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 23

24. Why I like Service-Now SaaS no infrastructure to worry about Access it from anywhere Web UI Easy customisation from the UI No hordes of developers required “One stop stop” – ITIL in a box Integrated CMDB... 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 24

25. The “Holy Grail” 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 25

26. Summary What matters is Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability... To deliver IT services to the Business so that the business can deliver service to its customers & clients Operations are the people who ultimately have to deliver that service So please make sure that your Change, Configuration and Release processes enable us to do our jobs BETTER  (c) Seriti Consulting – BCS CMSG 2009 26 14/06/2009

27. Any Questions? 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting - TextExpo 27

28. If you have any questions around Web site operations & management Web Performance Tuning Near-shore development & functional testing Email me – Stephen.Thair@SeritiConsulting.com Connect with me on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/in/stephenthair Contact Details – Seriti Consulting 14/06/2009 (c) Seriti Consulting - TextExpo 28