The idea that IT operates on behalf of the business has been around since the time the first international business machines appeared on the horizon. In the early days, it was simply using machine speed and power to complete data acquisition and analysis tasks that much more efficiently or effectively than could be done manually. The concept hasn't changed all that much. But, the technology and potential for contribution has grown as mechanical technologies gave way to the 'smart' and integrated technologies of today.
In the 21st century, business was awash with data ...data that is collected, sliced, diced and presented in a multiplicity of ways. But, somehow the really big payoff remained just out of reach. Clearly, the problem isn't the amount of or access to data. The problem was in the lack of timely, cost effective aggregation and analysis presented as business consumable information.
The first decade of the 21st century, we experienced a beneficial convergence of infrastructure capabilities, architectural implementation and a new understanding between IT and business. Changes in technology, data architectures, maturity in use of the technology combined with a drop in the cost of computing and its support infrastructure to provide the capability to collect, correlate and analyze massive amounts of data from sources and in ways that were previously inconceivable.
The fulfillment of BSM lies in its ability to bridge the communications gap between business and IT operations. That gap has consistently hindered the transformation of IT's data collection and processing powers to services that will seamlessly operate to support and enable successful enterprise operations. It isn't simply a matter of mindlessly adding instrumentation to collect more and more data. It's about improving data quality by identifying and eliminating irrelevancies. It's about improving the quality of communication and cooperation to effectively leverage existing resources. And, it's about focusing on representing the beneficial impact of technology on the measures of business success.
In the 21st century, business was awash with data ...data that is collected, sliced, diced and presented in a multiplicity of ways. But, somehow the really big payoff remained just out of reach. Clearly, the problem isn't the amount of or access to data. The problem was in the lack of timely, cost effective aggregation and analysis presented as business consumable information.
The first decade of the 21st century, we experienced a beneficial convergence of infrastructure capabilities, architectural implementation and a new understanding between IT and business. Changes in technology, data architectures, maturity in use of the technology combined with a drop in the cost of computing and its support infrastructure to provide the capability to collect, correlate and analyze massive amounts of data from sources and in ways that were previously inconceivable.
The fulfillment of BSM lies in its ability to bridge the communications gap between business and IT operations. That gap has consistently hindered the transformation of IT's data collection and processing powers to services that will seamlessly operate to support and enable successful enterprise operations. It isn't simply a matter of mindlessly adding instrumentation to collect more and more data. It's about improving data quality by identifying and eliminating irrelevancies. It's about improving the quality of communication and cooperation to effectively leverage existing resources. And, it's about focusing on representing the beneficial impact of technology on the measures of business success.
Rich, I believe you’re affirming that one of the primary challenges for BSM is to take the many components of IT ...be it the complexity of infrastructure, the massive volumes of data stored, the intricacies of software applications automating functions …whatever …and making business sense out of the mess in a way that moves core business objectives forward. The industry has matured to where tools and processes are available (…if used) to control IT costs and enable a predictive (…no surprises) IT environment.
But how do we gain traction with the tools and processes and people to leverage the IT mess into proactively matching IT opportunities to business needs? Your examples of leveraging and focusing on the “right” data for the task at hand are indicative of the current BSM challenge. We’ve got the tools to reduce irrelevancies of data …but without some very successful IT relationships with the business entities, how does IT know what those irrelevancies are? It’s where the content required is in the hands of the business users and the tools to sift that data into something meaningful is in the hands of IT managers …and the BSM challenge is achieve the capabilities that will provide the right content to the end user. No small task.