1. Poor Planning: Oregon's project technology administrator admitted that the relocation plan underestimated the number of servers the new facility would have to accommodate. Underestimating the complexity of data center moves—the time it will take, the skills required to do the job, the hardware needed—is more the rule than the exception when it comes to relocation and consolidation.
This is especially true when it comes to taking into account application dependencies. In the heterogeneous environments that characterize most IT application portfolios and IT infrastructures—with their many bolt-ons and homegrown systems developed over the years—no software tool exists today that can see all of the interdependencies. To account for them, the knowledge has to be collected from the people managing the applications—a time-consuming task. Indeed, moving a data center the right way places a large burden on IT departments that already are fully utilized and often over-booked.
In our experience, it's wise either to dedicate a full-time team to planning the move or to look outside the organization for professional help.
2. Underestimating Power Requirements: The Oregon project administrator allowed that the electrical power the facility was designed to provide—55 watts per square foot—was too low. Data centers built for today's equipment range from 150 to 300 watts per square foot.
IT professionals frequently underestimate power requirements, and power costs, particularly if facilities management pays the bills—as is typically the case.
In a recent survey, 68 percent of IT managers said they were not responsible for power bills related to their data center's IT equipment. It is important to make sure facilities and IT talk about their respective issues so that they gain an appreciation for their differing perspectives and areas of expertise. This is the only way to prevent their issues from turning into problems, and their problems from turning into data center relocation and consolidation disasters.
3. Failure to Establish Pre-Move Baselines:
It was difficult for Oregon to determine whether the agencies it had moved were realizing any of the cost reductions originally sought because "the baseline data provided by the agencies before the consolidation was either grossly understated or nonexistent."
It's an old saw that you can't improve what you can't measure. A corollary is that you can't compare one thing to another if you don't know what the first thing was. Know your current data center TCO and have the numbers in hand before moving into your new facility or risk opening yourself up to ceaseless fingerpointing and complaining.
4. Upgrading Systems During the Move: Oregon consolidated its facilities before "the underlying architecture, standards, and licensing issues had been worked out." In our experience, any change undertaken during a move adds risks and complicates the project. This is especially significant when it comes to today's popular practice of using a data center move or consolidation to drive server virtualization.
Although worthwhile, virtualization is a significant project in itself, and attempting to implement server virtualization during a move means trying to do two very difficult things at the same time—a sure recipe for disaster. In short, try to minimize changes during the move planning and execution periods: don't switch vendors, and certainly don't virtualize. The exception to this rule is that it often pays to re-IP and purchase new networking gear before the move. This will save the effort of reinstalling new gear in the new site during the move.
5. There's No Substitute for Experience: Because a data center move is generally a once in a career event for IT professionals, few companies have the expertise on-hand to do it well. Very high density power and cooling environments require specialized expertise and coordination. Unfortunately, IT knowledge does not translate into an understanding of how to move a data center, nor does a knowledge of facilities (and operations) translate into an understanding of the singular requirements of today's data centers, not to mention tomorrow's.
Experience counts. If your organization has someone with the requisite experience, get him or her on the moving team. If it doesn't, find someone who does.
Lacking A Complete Infrastructure Assessment
Unclear Leadership
Not Recognizing Dependencies
Skipping Business Validation
Underestimating The Migration Timeline
Setting It And (Actually) Forgetting It
Thinking You’re Done
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It was difficult for Oregon to determine whether the agencies it had moved were realizing any of the cost reductions originally sought because the baseline data provided by the agencies before the consolidation was either grossly understated or nonexistent.
how to avoid the five mistakes that can turn your data center relocation into a disas
