Recession. What to do?

The talk around thousands of water coolers and coffee machines across the nation rages about a very important topic - the economy.  Recently Jack Santos (one of our Executive Strategists) blogged  on this subject taking a look at what had happened in the past while overlaying the change in IT's position within businesses.

At Burton Group, we have all been discussing what's happening and we are postulating as to what it may mean for the future.  Ken Anderson, another Executive Strategist, made the following observation: 

During times of rapid growth, IT organizations focus on methods to deploy services as fast as possible to ensure they are not hampering the company's growth. They position their organization as the key corporate growth enabler.  A good analogy is that of laying train tracks as fast as possible in front of the corporate locomotive racing down those tracks.  However, in times of recession, corporate growth stalls, and heaven forbid, may even shrink.  At this point, what do IT organizations do?  IT is no longer tactically laying tracks as fast as they can.  The IT solutions and infrastructure that were built during expansive times were built as quickly as possible and not necessarily with a focus on cost efficiency and agility.  Now is the time to refocus IT efforts on strategic architecture.  During times of rapid growth, the balance of effort is on tactical rapid deployment compared to strategic initiatives.  During times of recession, the efforts should focus on strategic initiatives that prepare the organization and its IT architecture for future growth while containing immediate costs.

In this light, Data Center Strategies has focused our research efforts on those strategic architectures that lead to the Dynamic Data Center vision; agile computing to enable businesses to respond quicker and more cost effectively than ever before to changing market needs and opportunities.  In times of economic slowdown, competition is fiercest. In these times it is imperative that enterprises respond quickly to opportunities before competitors snap them up.  Agility is crucial.

This year at Burton Group's Catalyst Conference, DCS is focusing on agile initiatives with workshops in Server Virtualization, Business Continuity, and iSCSI deployment as well as session themes on Server Virtualization: Beyond Consolidation, Storage for the Virtual Data Center, Data Center Efficiency: Energized, Miniaturized and Highly Available, and Data Center Management Automation.  Furthermore, Burton Group's Consulting Services (BGCS) organization has recently added Rob Schafer, a noted META group analyst and data center veteran.  BGCS has outlined its strategic focus for Data Centers with the introduction of the Infrastructure and Operations Architecture and Sourcing  practice area.

So when your IT organizations are faced with changes in direction this year, Burton Group is ready to help you.

[Posted by Richard Jones]