Planning for growth is key to effective IT monitoring,
but it can be stymied by certain mindsets. Here's how to overcome them.
As IT professionals, planning for growth is something that
is done all day almost unconsciously. Whether it’s a snippet of code,
provisioning the next server, or building out a network design, we’re usually
thinking: Will it handle the load? How long until I'll need a newer, faster, or
bigger one? How far will this scale?
Despite this almost compulsive concern with scalability,
there are still areas of IT where growth tends to be an afterthought. So, to address
growth planning (or non-planning) as it pertains to monitoring by highlighting
several mindsets that typically hinder this important, but often surprisingly
overlooked element, and showing how to deal with each.
The fire drill mindset
This occurs when something bad has already happened either because there
was either no monitoring solution in place or because the existing toolset
didn’t scale far enough to detect a critical failure, and so it was missed.
Regardless, the result is usually a focus on finding a tool that would have
caught the problem that already occurred, and finding it fast.
However, short of a TARDIS, there’s no way to implement
an IT monitoring tool that will help avoid a problem after it occurs.
Furthermore, moving too quickly as a result of a crisis can mean you don’t take
the time to plan for future growth, focusing instead solely on solving the
current problem.
Start by quickly, but intelligently developing a short list
of possible tools that will both solve the current problem and scale with your
environment as it grows. Next, ask the vendors if they have free (or cheap)
licenses for in-house demoing and proofs of concept.
The bargain hunter
The next common pitfall that often prevents better growth planning when
implementing a monitoring tool is the bargain-hunter mindset. This usually
occurs not because of a crisis, but when there is pressure to find the
cheapest solution for the current environment.
How do you overcome this mindset? Consider the following
scenario: If your child currently wears a size 3 shoe, you absolutely don’t
want to buy a size 5 today, right? But you should also recognize that your
child is going to grow. So, buying enough size 3 shoes for the next five years
is not a good strategy, either.
Also, if financials really are one of the top priorities
preventing you from better preparing for future growth, remember that the
cheapest time to buy the right-sized solution for your current and future
environment is now. Buying a solution for your current environment alone
because “that’s all we need” is going to result in your spending more money
later for the right-sized solution you will need in the future. Use your
company’s existing business growth projections to calculate how big of a
monitoring solution you need. If your company foresees 10% revenue growth each
year over the next three years and then 5% each year after that, and you are
willing to consider completely replacing your monitoring solution after five
years, then buy a product that can scale to 40% of the size you currently need.
The dollar auction
The dollar auction mindset happens when there is already a tool
in place -- a tool that wasn’t cheap and that a lot of time was spent
perfecting. The problem is, it’s no longer perfect. It needs to be replaced
because company growth has expanded beyond its scalability, but the idea of
walking away from everything invested in it is a hard pill to swallow.
Really, this isn’t so much of a mindset that prevents
preparing for future growth as it is something that's all too often overlooked
as an important lesson: If only you had better planned for future growth the
first time around. The reality is that if you’re experiencing this mindset, you
need a new solution. However, don’t make the same mistake. This time, take
scalability into account.
Whether you’re suffering from one of these mindsets or
another that is preventing you from better preparing your IT monitoring for
future growth, remember, scalability is key to long term success.
