links for 2008-9-30

A configuration management repository is essential for IT infrastructure. The benefits of a CMDB are that all service management initiatives can revolve around a common configuration of resources and assets. The benefits are clear in that you gain congruency between service management disciplines like incident, problem, configuration and availability. The challenge of maintaining and populating a CMDB is the discovery process. It is virtually impossible to manually populate a large enterprise CMDB. Enterprises must rely on automatic discovery mechanisms.

According to research firm Enterprise Management Associates, which recently hosted a webinar on developing a CMDB project’s return on investment (ROI), there’s been a dramatic jump in the number of companies that have completed their CMDB, from just 9 percent in 2006 to one-third in 2008…For many companies, it’s a retry of failed efforts undertaken earlier in the decade, but now almost three-quarters say their CMDB initiative is on time and on budget…Matney also advises that CMDB funds be part of the base budget rather than a separate project budget, because it’s so fundamental to other areas.

This makes today a good time to ask, is it time for IT purchasing decision making processes to move forward? Clearly whenever times are tough business focus shifts to seeking out solutions that can visibly demonstrate a clear return on investment. Equally the fear of buying the “wrong solution” can be similarly intensified. The question thus becomes, should some of the IT systems/solutions available today be inherently less risky?

Like dangerous curves on a racetrack, economic downturns create more opportunities for companies to move from the middle of the pack into leadership positions than any other time in business…About 24 percent more firms moved from the back of the pack to the front in the 2001 downturn compared with the subsequent period of economic calm, according to an eight-year study by Bain & Company that analyzed the net profit margins and sales growth of more than 2,500 companies.