Who’s On Phirst

Evelyn Hubbert of Forrester Research just came out with a new report, “Low Hanging Fruit That Service Operations Teams Should Consider Now”, which details some of the IT tools that organizations can use in the short term to increase efficiency and save money. I had the chance to have lunch with Evelyn this summer and get some of her thoughts on the IT tools landscape, and boy, does she know this space well.

Here are some of the nuggets from the report that I think everyone in IT ops should be thinking about:

• Approximately 75% of the IT budget is spent on simply maintaining existing IT operations, and IT organizations must evaluate automation solutions.
• Leverage existing tools to their fullest, but also look for complementary tools that can support your focus area and bring immediate benefits of improving efficiency, reducing risk, and supporting end-to-end business services and at the same reduce cost.
• In 2009, the general IT battle cry will be to do more — or at least as much — with less and that most IT organizations will be able to keep their IT staff constant at best.

In evaluating tools, IT organizations are going to have to look at fast implementation times, and fast returns on their investment. Tools will need to be able to show how they can either cut costs directly or allow current staffing levels to scale to more support more assets. Or both. The time of soft ROI is over. Paybacks should be measured in months, not quarters.

Click here to read the full report.