ILM not completely here yet
ILM not completely here yet
Despite massive strides gained towards managing the storage and compliance needs of enterprises, an expert from the Storage Networking Industry Association does not believe that the perfect Information Lifecycle Management has been unveiled as of yet.
Mark Hollands, the Principal of ITR, a new research company that focuses on Australian technology usage and buying trends, and former vice-president of Gartner, said that companies realise the need for real-time, on-demand, adaptive storage solutions, but they need more help with managing the process of these systems.
He spoke to 74 companies in Australia and discovered that these organisations know about the value of the technology, but they need assistant with managing these solutions.
"Organisations should design and articulate a long-term strategy before they embark on a complete storage solution. They need to establish storage resources to cope with the implementation and make sure they can handle the process in all parts of technology deployments.
"As for vendors, they should concentrate on focusing on effective, truth-based marketing, for instance, citing customer references and case studies, and showing users that their solutions work through "proof of concept".
"Word of mouth has proved to be the best way for selling solutions. Many CIOs I have talked to told me that they integrated a system after hearing about the benefits from a colleague. Many software vendors, for some reason, seem reluctant to provide "proof of concept" testing, saying instead: "If you want it, then go and buy it."
He added that the bottom line is that we are still on a journey towards the perfect state of ILM and he believes that business priority has to be the main reason for adopting a solution with technology being the secondary consideration.
In closing, he advised that colleagues should educate each other on the value of ILM and why it is a worthwhile goal. In addition, organisations should listen to many different vendors before buying but CIO's should ignore the possible benefits of ILM at their peril.
Related Article: