Monday 19 June 2017

Hardware's a commodity - Why bother managing capacity? Capacity Management Maturity levels (4 of 7)

As we look at each of these levels, consider how being at each of these levels as an organization can impact the perception of you as the Capacity Manager.

Level 1 – Initial
        No process activity
        Regular capacity breaches and outages
        Minimal funding
        No documentation or governance
        All CM activities are reactive
        Small pockets of CM – only in technical silos
        A mixture of platform-specific tools, no CM focus
Processes are undocumented and in a state of dynamic and chaotic manner.  They tend to be driven in an ad hoc, uncontrolled, and reactive manner.  Processes at this level tend to be unstable.
Organizations at Level 1 tend to not have dedicated Capacity Managers or teams dedicated to Capacity and Performance.  If you ask who manages capacity in the organization, you’ll typically hear that the administrators look at that (and everything else) and that there aren’t capacity problems often because “they buy a lot of hardware and make sure problems don’t happen.”
But problems happen anyway, since throwing hardware at problems doesn’t prevent all of them.
Level 2 – Repeatable
        Some acknowledgment of CM – technical silos actively managing capacity
        No objectives set, all activities still ad hoc
        Some process definition, focus is still reactive
        Pockets of people doing some CM
        Some key metrics captured, individual data sources
        Still very component focused
Some processes are repeatable, possibly with consistent results.  Discipline is unlikely to be rigorous, but where it exists it may help to ensure existing processes are maintained during stressful periods.
There are organizations at this level that have Capacity Managers.  These tend to be those organizations who have one person managing thousands of hardware components, usually with inadequate tools, data, and information.  Capacity Managers in these organizations are frequently thought of as firefighters and are as likely to be thought of as ineffective as effective, depending on the current day’s crisis.
Level 3 – Defined
        Capacity Management exists but communication interfaces are undefined
        Objectives set and basic capacity plans produced
        Processes are defined and documented
        Key deliverables are being produced – usually manually
        Roles and responsibilities are defined
        Component level data is being captured and stored centrally
        Reports are being generated automatically
        Component Capacity Management being done well – organization at a minimum is looking at Service Capacity Management
Sets of defined and documented standard processes are established and subject to some degree of improvement over time.  
Organizations that have reached this level are doing a pretty good job of Capacity Management from a technical perspective.
However, in today’s age of cost-cutting, I’d argue that this isn’t enough to guarantee that you’ll be considered vital to the future success of the business.  I’ve seen entire Capacity Management groups dissolved only for the organization to realize a year later how crucial they are.  That’s too late for you, the Capacity Manager.
The key point above to consider is the first one – Capacity Management has to actively consider and make an effort to put in place communication interfaces with various processes and teams:
        Administrators
        Storage
        Business analysts
        IT management
        Business management
        Other ITSM processes (Incident, Problem, Change, SLM, etc.)
Level 4 – Managed
        Capacity Management has been fully implemented and integrated with the business and IT
        Business objectives are defined (and being met)
        The process is proactively focused
        Process, activities, and communication interfaces are now documented
        IT is using defined Capacity Management processes and activities
        Capacity Management spans all IT with champions ensuring benefits are understood and being realized
        Component and service level tools being used
        Data stored in a CMIS
        Service Capacity Management has been implemented and is actively used
Using process metrics, management can effectively control processes and identify ways to adjust and adapt the process to particular projects without losses of quality.
Ideally, this is a great goal for an organization and the Capacity Manager.  Having a fully implemented Capacity Management process with a proactive focus with communication interfaces defined and actively used means the Capacity Manager and the team/process is considered a vital part of IT and the business.
Level 5 – Optimized
        Capacity Management now embedded in the business and culture
        Awareness of Capacity Management company-wide
        All Capacity Management objectives aligned with the business objectives
        Key capacity metrics included in all SLAs with all reactive/proactive elements understood
        An experienced and well-trained group supports the Capacity Management process, including a process owner, manager, and capacity champions
        All communications / interfaces are defined with relevant information automatically exchanged
        A strategic solution has been implemented – includes component, service, and business data
        Data captured is being analyzed and correlated using a CMIS
The focus is on continual improvement through both incremental and innovative changes / improvements.
Few organizations actually reach this level of maturity, but there are a few things here that the individual Capacity Manager can strive to implement.
The two key things here, in my opinion, are company-wide awareness of Capacity Management as well as the automatic exchange of information between teams, people, processes, and between IT and the business.
If Capacity Management is providing value to the rest of the business automatically, then that frees the Capacity Manager to provide even more value to the business in other areas, such as finding new interfaces / avenues to provide information or even improving the level of knowledge about specific IT services or the technologies that underpin those services.
Don't forget to fill out and submit our survey to find out where your organization is on the Capacity Management Maturity Scale 

Rich Fronheiser
Chief Marketing Officer

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