CMDB as a Corporate Asset

Transforming the CMDB into
a Corporate Asset
Abbas Haider Ali, VP Product Strategy
October 2nd 2008

managedobjects.com
TM
©2008 Managed Objects, Inc. All rights reserved. The Business Service Management Company

Agenda
Introduction
CMDB 101
– What is a CMDB (v2 and v3)
– D I really need a CMDB? Wh t’ i it f me?
Do ll d What’s in for ?
– How to spot a real CMDB vs. a knock-off
Planning for a CMDB
– Strategy
– People
– Data
– Process
– Adoption
– Where other CMDB projects have failed
Monolithic vs. Distributed CMDBs
Practical guide to implementing a CMDB
Use cases and ROI realized
Discussion topics

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©2008 Managed Objects, Inc. All rights reserved.

Introduction – Who is this Abbas guy?

Pronounced Hay-der A-lee. Common errors: Hater-All, Hi-deer A-lie,
Hader-all, or of course the popular, Ha-<mumble>

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What is a CMDB ?

– ITIL v2: “A database that contains all relevant details of each CI and details
of the important relationships between CIs.”

– ITIL v3: “A database used to store Configuration Records throughout their
Lifecycle. The Configuration Management System maintains one or more
CMDBs, and each CMDB stores Attributes of CIs, and Relationships with
other CIs.”

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Seriously…. What is a CMDB?

It depends...
Source of truth
Encyclopedia for IT, and services it offers
DNA map of IT environment
Decision support tool
Self-service application for IT knowledge
….

Use
U case(s)
( )
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Do I really need a CMDB?

How up-do-date are the Visio diagrams on your walls?
How many p p are involved in SWAT meetings for P1 issues?
y people g
Do many of your planned changes result have unexpected
impacts?
How well do you know the relationships between IT infrastructure
elements and IT / Business services
Do you spend a lot of time generating reports from different
systems and stitching them together?
How effectively can you verify that IT services meet
design/regulatory standards? e.g. DR, license usage ratios, etc.
Are you concerned about impact of rapidly changing technology
in your environment? Virtualization, Green IT, <insert buzzword
here>

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How to spot a knock-off CMDB

Requires a homogenous environment for integration
– Vendor lock-in anyone?
y
Configuration management system by day, CMDB by night
– Not an unusual claim from element configuration management systems
Only supports Extract Transform Load to populate a CMDB
Extract-Transform-Load
– Someone quickly inherits data entry as a 2nd job
Inflexible schema
– Don’t get talked out of having information you need in your CMDB – It’s
Don t It s
your asset!
Limited Federation capabilities
– Data sources WILL evolve over time; CMDB must be able to do the same
Belief that the CMDB is just a big database
– It’s not. It’s an application.

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Poll & Discussion

Who has an operational CMDB (even if you don’t call it that) ?
Are you happy with your CMDB? Why?
Who’s looking at a CMDB right now? Why?
What is the root of your CMDB?
– Service Desk?
– Asset / Inventory?
– Discovery?
– Application dependency mapping?

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Planning for a CMDB – Strategy

Have a clearly defined objective
– No definition = No recognizable value
– Select specific metrics wherever possible
Prioritize services for initial phase
– Don’t try to tackle everything at once
Identify t k h ld
Id tif stakeholders / scope of users of CMDB
f f
Keep an eye on what you want to CMDB to support in the future
– Service oriented monitoring
– Service Catalog
– Automated impact analysis
Examples (good and bad):
– Minimize impact of changes to top 5 business apps
– Merge asset management, application discovery data into single database
– Reduce MTTR by capturing multi-system and tribal knowledge into broadly
accessible application
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Planning for a CMDB – People

Project team / Owners
– Executive sponsor
– Project manager / Product manager
– Relationship manager
– CMDB admin
• Not a DBA More like an application architect
DBA. architect.
Data providers / Contributors
– Select just enough data to meet the requirements
– Choose SMEs who know both front and back end of selected data sources
Users / Consumers
– Identify the parties who MUST be able to use the CMDB for
strategy/objectives to become reality
– Clearly note the backgrounds, skills, time available, etc. for user community
• Critical to selecting a CMDB interface

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Planning for a CMDB - Data

Keep objectives in mind and select minimum amount of data for
persistence in CMDB, rest should be federated
Build CI and CI attributes layout
– Physical configuration Internet Customer
– Location Ordering System

– OS version and patches
– Next planned change Take Orders
Product
Availability
– Trouble tickets
Build CI relationship layout
Create an Credit Card
– Physical Verify Credit
Account Processing

– Logical
– Business services and processes
Identify requirements for CI state
– Performance availability, …
Performance, availability

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Planning for a CMDB - Data

Governance
– Reconciliation rules
– Which relationships should be prioritized
Use layouts to identify data sources
Test integrations early
Record currency information for each source
– How frequently is this data updated?
Identify gaps
– Need discovery, or is asset database complete?
– Application dependency mapping?

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Planning for a CMDB - Process

Review objectives and identify processes that benefit from interaction
with CMDB

Incident Mgmt Availability

Service Problem Mgmt CMDB Service Level Mgmt
Service
Support Change Mgmt Capacity Mgmt
Delivery
Release M t
R l Mgmt Continuity Mgmt
C ti it M t
Configuration Mgmt Financial Mgmt

For CMDB value to be recognized, existing processes have to change
– Deployment of new apps/services
– Analysis of scheduled changes
– Usage / configuration of monitoring systems
CMDB itself should be subject to a review process on a regular basis
Don’t let process become a barrier to getting started

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Planning for a CMDB – Adoption

Most challenging, and most overlooked part of most CMDB
projects
How is the casual CMDB user going to interact with it?
– Avoid software installation as much as possible
Allow everyone to contribute
– Comments, point out errors, inconsistencies, missing information
– Mechanical Turk model
Identify mavens in each community of CMDB users
Examine company culture, risk, regulatory issues and select
editing model for CMDB
– Wikipedia like or strict governance/process
Wikipedia-like
Record all successes and share with CMDB user community
– Start a blog or newsletter
– S
Success b d success
breeds

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Planning for a CMDB – Why CMDB Projects Fail

Not uncommon to hear about 2nd or even 3rd attempts at CMDB
No clear objective
j
– Field of CIs approach: “If we build it, they will come”
Too broad, too deep, or both
Poorly defined roles and responsibilities
Bad data
Inaccessible – only a handful of people know how to use it
Doesn’t stay current

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Always tempting to grab all data from integrated data sources and
store them in a giant database, just in case
– Far more susceptible to problems as underlying systems change or get
replaced
– Much higher cost to architect, store, and operate
– Inflexible and hard to adapt to changing environment
If CMDB usage become pervasive, expect an ecosystem to
develop

Master
CMS CMDB

Server Network
CMDB Team Team

CA HP Service Asset EMC HP Service Asset
Data Sources MOM
Unicenter Desk Mgmt Smarts
Alterpoint
Desk Mgmt

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Specialized CMDBs can be used by individual IT silos, business
units, application teams
Top level CMS can unify key information in support of a larger
CMDB strategy
Federation shouldn’t be limited to traditional CMDB data sources
– must be able to link to other CMDBs
• Need to consider multi-vendor federation between different CMDBs

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Practical Guide – Selecting a CMDB

Well executed planning stage should result in a clear list of must-
have features

Federation

Synchronization

Reconciliation

Vi
Visualization / E
li ti Ease of U
f Use

Interoperability
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Selecting a CMDB – Detailed Features

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Practical Guide – Selecting a Partner

Don’t reinvent the wheel
Review experience
p
– Should have worked with CMDB software and integration points as well
Ask for references
In most cases CMDB vendors have services business
Usual suspects in systems integrator space
– IBM
– Accenture
A t
– CSC
– …

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Partner Example – Managed Objects

Target Audience
Strategy and Planning Objectives
Measures for Success
Identify Services
Specify Requirements CMDB High Level Design
CMDB Depth
CMDB Technology
Select Technologies Automating Technology

Build
Construction and Train
Deployment Document & Turnover
ocu e t u o e

Communicate Value
Ongoing Value / Improvement Plan
Improvement managedobjects.com

Partner Example – Managed Objects

Define Benefits
Strategy/
Planning

Create General CMDB Vision CMDB
Project Kickoff Counsel Team Definition
and Measures
Workshop
of Success
Requirements
s
Specify

Define Define Service Define CI levels Design IT
High Level Define CI Define CI
Governance Catalog IT Service Service Model
CMDB Design Relationships Attributes
Requirements Requirements Model Blueprint
Technologies

Select
Select

Select
Select CMDB
Technology for Technology for
Technology
Population Auditing

Training for
Install CMDB
CMDB
uction and

Technology
Technology
loyment
Constru
Depl

Create CI
Construct Populate Automate Train the CMDB Documentation Production
Lifecycle Mgmt
The CMDB CMDB The CMDB CM team Transfer Ready CMDB
Process
nt
Ongoing Value
Improvemen

Implement Continuous Construction Documentation
Svc Improvement Specify
Measures and of CMDB Test Transfer &
Plan Requirements
Metrics Modifications User Training
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Case Study of Financial Services - Overview

Challenges
– Identify and resolve problems faster
y p
– Complex problems, cross domains – hard to get to root cause
– Poor communication with the business units
Data sources identified for CMDB project
– Combination of commercial management tools and 15+ internal databases
CMDB vital statistics
– Greater than 2 million CIs
– More than 4 million CI relationships

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Case Study of Financial Services - Benefits
Express dependencies quickly and clearly – for Outages, Break Fix
Activities, Maintenance
– e.g. list all hosts for a telco switch, all users for a SAN
Maintenance Interactions
– e.g. identify common components between a SAN upgrade and a Switch upgrade.
Avoid un-expected interactions during multiple changes.
Diversity and Bucketing
– o e.g. take a business flow and prove that their A and B side are diverse and have
no single points of failure.
Concentration Risk
– e.g. report on number of critical apps that are dependent on server X or Y.
Infrastructure Domain Failures
– e.g. Construct and test theories around processes geography
Identify d di t d
Id tif dedicated servers that have cross-BU d
th t h BU dependencies
d i
Enable targeted infrastructure refresh
– e.g. identify non-standard versions of infrastructure and order by number and
criticality of systems dependent on them Provide information to help manage risk
them.
around upgrade plans.
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Case Study of Insurance Carrier – Overview

Challenges
– Better understand planned and unplanned changes
p p g
– Enforce process adherence
– Changes frequently had unintended consequences; required multiple
attempts to complete
– 60% of incidents resulted from planned changes
Data sources identified for project
– Discovery solution (g
y (general and server specific)
p )
– Internally developed asset management system
– Service desk
CMDB vital statistics

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Case Study of Insurance Carrier – Benefits

Real-time visibility to planned and unplanned changes
Clearly understand impact of proposed changes
y p p p g
Lower risk – fewer outages
Superior, always current documentation
Reduced MTTR
Much lower % of incidents with planned changes as root cause
Availability of additional statistics to drive analytics for IT
executive reporting
ti ti

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Measuring ROI

Refer back to the original metrics identified during planning
– MTTR reduction / shorter outages g
– Mean Time Between Outages (MTBO) increase
– Increase in successful change tickets
– Less total tickets
– Shorter maintenance windows
– Increased availability for critical services
– Reduction in software licenses
– Cost reductions from increased DC density or server consolidation
Softer metrics also count
– Process improvement
– Increased productivity
– Shift from reactive to proactive operations
• Strategic projects vs. fixing broken things
vs

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CMDB Project Team’s Work is Never Done

Operational
Efficiency

Services

Users

Business
Effectiveness
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Q&A

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Additional Resources

CIO.com: Managed Objects Adds 'Facebook' Twist to CMDB
ITSMWatch.com: 10 Tips for a Successful CMDB Project
p j
GRIDtoday: Virtual Management, Virtual Mess
Data Center Journal: Myths of the CMDB
Computerworld: How Much Is 'Just Enough for a CMDB?
Just Enough'
Managed Objects Blog - BSM Communique

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CMDB as a Corporate Asset

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