Turbo Talk

After spending most of the last 6 years working in the virtualization space as a vendor (now VMTurbo and previously VMware), it’s funny to see how much things change as well as how much they stay the same.

One thing that has definitely not changed is that it is still very hard to move from what I like to call the ‘1st wave’ of virtualization (test & dev systems or low criticality production systems) to the ‘next wave’ (e.g. business critical production systems, heavily utilized databases).

On that note, I wanted to share a few practical tips that I’ve picked up along the way that have helped customers and partners keep the virtualization momentum going – and can help keep your virtualization momentum going in 2010!

1.  Use a disaster recovery or business continuity project to spur additional virtualization and consolidation.

Most companies have challenges around meeting disaster recovery and business continuity goals.  DR in the physical server world is tedious, error-prone, and in my experience mostly ineffective.  If there is a DR initiative at your company, it is a good bet that some of the problems you are trying to solve could be addressed by virtualizing those systems which  don’t have DR capability today or that have been problematic to recover using traditional physical server techniques.  Another tactic that I really like and have seen a few times is using your test and dev environment for DR.  Most virtual server environments I see still have plenty of capacity with which to handle a burst in the event a DR scenario occurred, so having a hybrid test/dev/DR environment is a great way to leverage an investment you’ve already made.

2.  Use a hardware refresh as an opportunity to virtualize.

Most IT shops refresh their server hardware every few years.  Why not use the refresh as an opportunity to remove hardware from your datacenter while adding flexibility to your operation?  Some of these systems may represent some of the more challenging applications to virtualize, and you may receive some resistance from application owners who are new to virtualization, but the CAPEX (and potentially OPEX) savings will be hard to ignore.

3.  Educate your peers.

Many companies do ‘lunch and learns’ or other informal gatherings where the virtualization team leads will discuss how server virtualization works.  These gatherings are a great way to get your network, storage, and applications guys up to speed with your specific initiatives and virtualization technology, and get them talking and asking questions.  This education and relationship building will pay dividends when you start to move more critical applications into virtual machines and need to work closely with other groups within IT on capacity planning and troubleshooting.  Just ask the network guys, they’ve been getting blamed for years for problems that aren’t theirs!  Fortunately for them (and sadly for the virtualization administrator), the new whipping boy is the virtualization environment, and educating your peers can help mitigate this challenge.

4.   Connect with others in your city or industry who have successfully made it to the ‘next wave’ and gather best practices.

Certainly the web and social networking give us a great way to connect with virtualization experts, but there is still no substitute for face-to-face discussions or phone calls where you can ask questions directly to someone who has done it before.  If you know of another company in your industry or city who have already made it to the next wave of virtualization, and have learned the lessons (good and bad) along the way, reach out to them and see if they’d be open to a discussion.  I’d also recommend including when possible any key peers or managers in these calls and meetings.  This way, they have the opportunity to ask questions as well as internalize the information.

5. Measure and then publicize your success.

Don’t be afraid to let people in your organization know that you’ve saved money, increased responsiveness of IT to the business, and built a strategic, virtualized platform!  Keep an eye on your ‘before’ and ‘after’ metrics, and share them with management as well as folks on the business side.  Your results help build the confidence within your organization that you have a good handle on building and operating a virtualized environment, and are fully capable of onboarding additional applications and business units.

What did I miss?  Are there other techniques that have worked for you?  Please share them in the comments.