Академический Документы
Профессиональный Документы
Культура Документы
IT consolidation and
the bottom line
By Richard M. Melnicoff, Marc E. Snyder and Rockwell Bonecutter
Once upon a time, there was a company committed to running its business better by giving
managers the IT systems they needed. Given the economics and the technologies prevailing
at the time, executives knew that rolling out new systems built on a distributed, server-
based computing model would be the most cost-effective way to do this. They were even
more pleased that managers in the company’s five divisions could incrementally add new
servers to meet growing processing demands or when new offices were established.
Fast-forward 15 years: Today, the and network all these servers? infrastructure consolidation and
company has accumulated more Unfortunately no one really knows. rationalization. In fact, there are
than 1,000 servers (some of which Top management has limited insight few more ready and material means
were swept up during the acquisi- into the total amount spent on its IT of improving earnings per share
tion of a number of new businesses), systems. Decisions about replace- than infrastructure consolidation
consisting of a veritable rainbow ments and most other technology and rationalization of operating
of technical platforms and propri- investments were made lower in the systems, hardware and software,
etary variations. These servers are organization (a common enough processing and storage, networks
spread over more than 50 locations. practice at the time), and now all and facilities.
About half are housed in data cen- this IT infrastructure is scattered
ters, many of which (though not over the books and budgets of dif- Infrastructure consolidation requires
all) have an assortment of backup ferent divisions. no additional customer channels, no
power sources and security and new products, no new revenue
operations staff. The rest reside in The good news is that over the past streams or increases in gross mar-
closets or sit beside workers in 15 years, product designs and con- gin, and no reformulations of core
various offices. figurations and systems manage- value propositions. It is based
ment technologies have changed to entirely on internal policy changes
How much does it cost the company such a degree that it is now possible and program execution. In fact, it
to run, back up, maintain, upgrade to reap significant savings through isn’t really a technology decision at
Information Technology
Nor was it unreasonable for many In some cases, the C-suite has not
IT managers to have been skeptical been sufficiently apprised of the
of infrastructure consolidation business opportunity due to more
exercises, particularly in organiza- parochial disincentives operating
tions with no track record of suc- in the IT management ranks. Infra-
cessfully transforming the business structure consolidations do carry
effectiveness of IT. First, as mid- perceptions of risk—particularly
range computing has evolved from political risk—common to most
attractive option to industry stan- large-scale, far-reaching IT initia-
dard, the conceptual tide (and expe- tives. They can entail job reassign-
rience base) within IT has flowed ments, reducing the size of local
in the opposite direction, away organizations and cultural disloca-
from the center. Second, most enter- tion. They ask IT executives already
prises charge their senior IT execu- concerned about their organiza-
tives primarily with operations tion’s ability to directly manage
management and project delivery. close-at-hand infrastructure to place
Integrated, stakeholder-based finan- confidence in a model in which
cial perspectives are welcome but physical assets may be far removed
not required. or run by someone else.
76 www.accenture.com/Outlook
Therefore, perhaps the biggest imped- In our marketplace conversations, sitions, and large-scale technology
iment to IT infrastructure rationaliza- we do encounter IT organizations consolidation solutions.
tion is behavioral. This is about turf that understand the benefits of
and about governance—about fear on infrastructure consolidation, but see rockwell.bonecutter@accenture.com
the part of divisional managers and it only as an incrementally imple-
their IT organizations that ceding mented adjunct to their existing dis- D. Neil Gissler is the global managing
control of their servers will under- tributed model. We would suggest partner for the Accenture Data Center
mine their ability to run their opera- market developments have made Technology and Operations practice.
tions. Senior management has been that viewpoint increasingly obsolete. Mr. Gissler, who has more than 18 years'
loath to push such initiatives when experience working with Fortune 500
divisional managers warn that their corporations, has led a large number
ability to deliver on commitments
About the authors of data center rationalization projects
may be jeopardized. Richard M. Melnicoff, a partner in the focusing on server consolidation and
Accenture Strategy service line, leads tiered storage solution implementation,
IT infrastructure rationalization the company's Strategic Information as well as on standardizing operational
can be done, however, and, with Technology Effectiveness (SITE) group processes and tools in the energy,
proper planning, done in a rela- in North America. He has worked utilities and retail industries. He is
tively straightforward and pro- extensively with clients in the high- based in Chicago.
grammatic way. And given the tech, communications, pharmaceuticals
significant earnings-per-share and other industries. In addition to d.neil.gissler@accenture.com
upside, it is well worth the effort. 15 years of consulting, Mr. Melnicoff
Ten years into the mid-range com- has 10 years of industry experience
puting revolution and two to three in executive and marketing roles at
years (by our estimate) into the high-tech companies and IT service
current era of centralized support providers. He is based in San Francisco.
and shared services, we believe
there is a sufficient pool of market- richard.m.melnicoff@accenture.com
tested experience to point to the
right ways to go about this for Marc E. Snyder is a partner in
predictable success. the Accenture SITE group. His work
focuses on IT transformation and
There are reliable contingencies for optimization. He has more than 25
the unexpected, methodologies for years of both domestic and interna-
the proper care of “mission-critical” tional experience helping clients assess,
capabilities, and proven execution plan and implement changes to reposi-
roadmaps. IT organizations can now tion and rationalize IT both pre- and
selectively complement their own post-merger. He is based in Wellesley,
competencies to minimize risk, and Massachusetts.
scale or accelerate their efforts (see
sidebar, page 75). marc.e.snyder@accenture.com