In a perfect world we would have every single piece of IT gear we own in a database with it’s own footprint and power consumption rates. This program would easily calculate what our total power consumption is. With some additional data, the cost per Kilowatt hour, it would tell us what we spend every month on our power bill. Well this is a pretty simple spreadsheet we are creating so it won’t do all that for us, but we can get pretty close to the real numbers.
Jan 06
I had some work and personal things pop up today, so I could not continue the lesson. I did however run across this painful Computer World article that I thought is probably appropriate for my readers. While it is bad news, it is probably no surprise to any of you.
Jan 05
Yesterday we set up a spreadsheet framework to serve as our basic financial model. I know it was quite a chore to add those column names… But seriously today we will start to delve into the meat of the model. The first cost we will be adding is one that everyone has, staffing. Staffing is an interesting cost as there are other costs that are buried in it. For instance, staffing usually includes benefits, social security tax, and any other employer covered expenses.
Jan 04
Let me start by wishing everyone a very happy and prosperous 2010. If you are here now, it means you survived the holidays and the new years eve parties and are probably sitting back at your desk for the first time in at least a few days. Maybe you have your new budget or maybe you don’t. Either way you have a job to do and you’re hoping some factoid or tidbit in this post will help you do it better. I appreciate your tenacity and quest for self improvement and I want to help. So my contribution to your new year is this:
Dec 23
For many companies the new year means a new budget. For most of these companies the budget planning has been in full swing for a couple of months. If your company is like most it also means you are not really all that close to having your IT budget finalized yet. This breakdown usually occurs because the requested budget and what the CFO/CIO agree on approving takes several iterations. For some companies their budget won’t reach final approval stage for another few months. As IT professionals the lag between start of the year and budget approval can be a source of great frustration.
Dec 22
I was doing an interview for a magazine article earlier today. One of the questions the interviewer asked me was “If you made a mistake in your consolidation, is it too late to recover?” My answer was, “It’s never too late to fix a mistake, and being virtualized only makes it easier.” This of course got me to thinking about the mistakes I have seen when people virtualize. Mostly the mistakes are implementing without a well devised plan.
Dec 18
I was at a customer earlier today and they are getting a 23:1 consolidation ratio by moving to the latest and greatest blade server platform running the newest virtualization software. This is a great scenario, but it brings up a good point most people never think of… converting 90 servers to 4 or 5 blades takes an environment and reduces it by 95%. That is 95% of the machines will be moved out. This might not sound like a big deal but walk into your data center and look around. Now imagine 95% of everything disappearing. For most people making a change like this means radically rethinking the data center infrastructure.
Dec 17
We all know budgets are like buckets. Each bucket holds some money to pay for something. When we make are budgets, it’s like setting out our buckets, labeling them and getting them ready to hold some money. When the budget gets approved, we virtually put money into the buckets. So in IT, we see our money in these separate little pools, to be allocated to each predetermined expense. When you move up from IT the little buckets of money roll up into a bugger bucket of IT budget. If the higher ups view your money as one bucket, does that mean you can vary how it is spent?
Dec 15
We are looking for contributors who want to write blog postings about Information Technology and how it applies to the business side of the business. If you have been looking for a creative outlet and a way to get your voice heard then this might be the right avenue for you. Right now there is absolutely no revenue associated with this website, but who knows what the future holds. I am not actually intending this as a money making site, just a way to convey my ideas and beliefs to the broadest audience possible. That being said, if your articles are the ones that draw users in and we can sell some advertising space, then you would be entitled to a share of the profits.
I am looking for contributors that can add some additional real-world experience. I would prefer to have a couple regular contributors that have IT and Financial backgrounds. Ultimately it would be nice to do some think tanking about methods, formulas and process that could really help revolutionize the way IT people look at and understand finance. If you are interested, please sign up for an account and post a comment in reply to this. I will pull your email address from your registration information and get in touch.
Dec 15
We all know that you can’t save any money if you don’t earn any money. But on the corporate bottom line is saving a few bucks the same as earning a few bucks? Unfortunately for those of us who are employed saving money is close enough to earning. Why do I say unfortunately? Well, if you have ever been the victim of a RIF (Reduction in Force, AKA a layoff) then you know why it sucks to look at savings and earnings in the same light. But the story is not all bad, read on to see why…
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