BIOS: Technology Means Business

Despite the fact that IT systems now underpin every business, public and private sector organisations still focus on faster and better systems and applications, while continuing to neglect the IT environment.

With the data centre now the heart of many businesses, IT directors are failing to take full ownership of this environment, often pointing the finger of blame at facilities managers when it comes to downtime and loss of service.

To prevent classic buck-passing when incidents arise, organisations must stamp out divided responsibility for the computing environment. IT directors must be accountable for the data centre as well as the hardware, software and infrastructure, so they can start to do the job they are paid to do.

While it may be exciting and challenging to be at the leading edge rolling out the latest technology, IT directors have to be judged on the resilience and availability of all the computer services that they provide. Currently, IT directors are failing to implement basic policies, processes and procedures that will minimise the total IT risk within the data centre. The result is that many organisations are sitting on a disaster that is waiting to happen.

The modern data centre is a high density environment - there are multiple servers, storage devices, firewalls, network control equipment - all absorbing power, generating heat and expecting to be kept at an ambient temperature. The effect of an engineer simply walking into a control room changes the dynamics of the space. Couple that with poor ventilation, temporary wiring, dust contamination and humidity, not to mention static and electro magnetic influences, and the results could be catastrophic for any company who relies on the electronic information held in its data centre.

The first rule of risk management is to avoid dividing responsibility. For IT directors with the job of managing and providing technology, their remit has to extend to every element that has an impact on IT delivery - and that includes the environment that technology and infrastructure equipment is placed in. Too many organisations, due to valid historical reasons, leave the responsibility for the IT environment within the organisational facilities management (FM) function.

Technology environments have become too important for responsibility to remain in the hands of generalists - however good they may be. The modern computer environment has become so specialist that it needs looking after by people who understand exactly how computer racks and server arrays need to be cooled, what humidity ranges are appropriate and what the effect of adding another piece of equipment will have on the overall environmental balance of the area.

Unfortunately, many computer rooms and data centres have grown up piecemeal, with more attention paid to installing and keeping the systems running rather than taking a holistic view and creating a strategic plan that covers the whole environment. The result is that the need to adopt best practice in environmental control is only recognised and understood following some type of crisis or emergency.

The first priority of every IT director must be to ensure that the IT environment is able to provide technology and business continuity. For example, it doesn’t matter how well designed your IT infrastructure, systems and software are if the equipment is slowly being overheated due to poor ventilation, or the use of inappropriate length patching of cables in the comms cabinet is causing air vents to be blocked. Poor air flow, or more commonly lack of it, is one of the major causes of equipment failure.

Another common problem is that responsibility for designing a computer room is given to people who have limited knowledge of the real requirements of the vitally important electronic equipment that it is going to hold. For example, a design company will probably build a state-of-the-art data centre, but one that takes no account of the humidity levels, cable restrictions, multiple power supply and UPS requirements of the specialist computing equipment that will be installed.

Risk management is not just about getting the design of the computer room right - it’s about ensuring that it stays in good shape and still provides the ideal environment when equipment is augmented, upgraded or replaced. One of the biggest risks to the IT environment is unstructured maintenance. Often the focus is on maintaining the UPS and air conditioning units with regular service checks, but what gets forgotten are the more mundane activities such as regular cleaning of the equipment to minimise dust, dirt and static, in order to ensure correct air flow is maintained. Vermin control is also important as are regular checks on heat gain, power supplies and even just the simple physical check that equipment and cabinets have not been accidentally moved, cables trapped or air vents blocked.

Once the risks have been identified and assessed, the everyday tasks can be routinely delegated to support staff. However to identify these risks requires specialist mechanical, electrical and architectural knowledge that is often outside the current remit of the IT or FM departments. This specialist environmental knowledge needs to be found and then brought into the IT department. Only in very large organisations is this level of expertise likely to be found in house. For many mid-size companies the only sensible way to ensure that the correct level of knowledge is available is use a reputable third party to complement the skill set of the IT department.

If IT directors are to guarantee the integrity and availability of the data and systems that they are entrusted with, then it stands to reason that ownership of the IT software, hardware and environment must also come under the same remit. Otherwise the overall service delivery will be compromised, putting the whole business at severe risk. IT directors everywhere will be failing in their duty if they attempt to offer any guarantees without first demanding, and then accepting, control and responsibility for the IT environment.