Spring cleaning is typically a chance to reorganize your household. How does this concept apply to the enterprise?

Similar to the way households reevaluate their space and restructure their belonging based on day-to-day needs, it’s important for data center managers to reevaluate their solutions to best understand what is providing the most value to daily operations. Once data center managers shift their mindset to become proactive vs. reactive, they often find themselves asking: what outdated equipment can we get rid of; what systems can we automate; and how can we keep systems in check to avoid overhauls? While it’s in good practice to revisit these questions on an annual basis and ‘spring clean’ their data center, it’s in the best interest for data center managers and organizations to consider and make improvements routinely.

What are your best practices as it relates to data center and cloud infrastructure?

One best practice every data center manager should consider is routine, ongoing system checks to ensure smooth data center operations. With regular access to granular operational data and analytics, IT operators can gain insights and clarity that allows for strategic decisions to lower power usage, increase rack density, and prolong operation during outages. By investing in a long-term strategy, not only do data centers managers get clean, functional data centers now but they can put their worries — and cleaning supplies — away where they belong.

Based on your experience, what do you find is the most effective way to implement these best practices?

In order to gain access to the analytics data center managers need to acquire full visibility of their operations, they should invest in data center infrastructure management (DCIM) solution. While making the jump to an integrated tool like a DCIM solution can seem daunting, it’s an important and critical step to understanding the full capacity of the data center to achieve full utilization. The most effective way that your organization can take the next step towards implementing a DCIM solutions is picking a trusted partner who can develop solutions that match your needs.

No matter the time of year, what’s your number one takeaway for IT or data center managers?

While spring cleaning or an annual system overhaul can be a refreshing, optimistic time, efforts to restructure data centers are often minimized as soon as operations fall back into their normal cadence. What’s key to an organization’s year-around success is rethinking ongoing strategies and implementing systems that will keep efficiency top of mind. This not only allows data center managers to avoid the need to take reactive measures when facing a system failure or regular restructuring to ensure operation efficiency, but will grant your company access into utilization insights never yet achieved.