Datalink has announced the expansion of its cloud-related consulting services with a broad cloud service management practice designed to help IT teams transition from being technology providers to their new role as IT services organizations. Datalink consultants can now assist customers with service catalog development, service delivery workflows, cloud readiness assessment, overall cloud strategy and related activities required to make the change, including establishing processes to align IT services with business units’ needs.
“Moving IT to a service broker role requires a whole new approach to IT architecture and delivery models. Most IT organizations lack both the manpower and the expertise to plan and execute this shift,” said Steve Zipperman, general manager of Advanced Services, Datalink. “Each of our cloud service management services is an important building block that not only helps customers navigate their cloud and IT-as-a-service journeys but also gets them there faster, with less risk, and with a clear strategy that links directly to their business objectives.”
Cloud service management services available immediately from Datalink are:
Cloud readiness assessment, including evaluating the customer’s current technology environment and business needs, identifying the appropriate cloud service model, and developing a roadmap for implementing the right cloud and service solutions.
Cloud strategy and workload alignment, encompassing an evaluation of application workloads for cloud computing suitability, analysis of infrastructure impact and financial feasibility, identification of the best-fit service provider, and development of an implementation plan.
Service catalog design and deployment, providing an evaluation of business requirements and IT capabilities as well as a deployment plan for creating a self-service portal enabling business users to submit IT service requests.
Service automation and orchestration planning, laying the groundwork for automated provisioning of compute, storage, network and operating system resources required to fulfill requests submitted through the portal without manual intervention.
IT process design and deployment, establishing process manuals, flows, KPIs, procedures and policies to help IT teams improve operational efficiency, service delivery and governance in order to meet their commitments.
Datalink’s expanded cloud service management practice is part of an Advanced Services suite that also includes data center transformation and IT resiliency practices. The company’s dedicated in-house consulting team works closely with the company’s infrastructure architects and deployment specialists to ensure that recommendations match technology capabilities, best practices and the customer’s specific business environment.
Datalink also offers a fully functional cloud demonstration environment called Datalink on Demand Labs for validating cloud use cases, plus a full range of other professional services for architecting and deploying data center technology implementations. More information on Datalink consulting services is available at www.datalink.com/cloud-service-management.