Design Thinking: Peer Graded Assessment                                                                 Claudio Said

Email: john03@yahoo.com

Challenge

I was working for a Consulting Firm and was on an assignment/project to reduce operational costs from  an IT Infrastructure department. The client company’s Infrastructure (data center) was built in an  unplanned fashion as they were facing a significant spike in their Operational Expenditure as the system  lacked a Governance Model. As a Program Manager / Consultant it was a Herculean Task for me to  identify the different pieces of puzzle and see how these fit well so that I could define a Project’s Scope  that would give an Estimate for the Business Case to be generated so that the project could be initiated.

The client Infrastructure had many aspects like Power Distribution, Cooling, Disaster Recovery, Test and  Production Environment, Virtual / Cloud Appliances etc. that were contributing in a large carbon foot  print of the data center.  The steering committee were more concerned about the Production  Environment as it supported 21 Airline Companies’ Reservation Systems across Europe and Asia and for  them their customer impact could cause a huge loss in credibility and market share.

Selection

Since, the management wasn’t clear on how to proceed in budgeting a new project since, they had some  unusual data (numbers) but no visualization on the negative impact if the project is not executed.  Visualization tool was selected by me to provide a mind map of how things could potentially affect in  the longer run if the project isn’t initiated.

Application:

The depiction on ‘WHAT IS’ phase was done with a Fishbone diagram (Ishikawa Diagram) in which the  cause and effects of the present situation was shown which could directly be related to potential cost  overrun happening.

The depiction of ‘WHAT IF ‘was shown with a mind map, showing the quantified objective on cost and  potential sub projects that could be performed like Migration of Physical to Virtual Servers in the Cloud  to reduce carbon footprint / power usage, IT Green Certification, Decommission of Servers that have  reached end of service so that we can de-clutter the data center etc.

Root Cause Analysis using Fish bone diagram (Ishikawa Diagram)

OPEX Cost Saving

Impact on  Budget  High Cost

Penalties from  3rd Party

Carbon  Footprint

No Compliance   Power Overrun

Design Thinking: Peer Graded Assessment                                                                 Claudio Said

Email: john03@yahoo.com

Mind Map of Projects Selection for Business Case

Insight and Approach

Upon using this Visualization as a powerful tool to not only denote the benefit realizations of driving  projects, I realized that it makes absolute sense to represent risks and mitigate them in an assertive  fashion. The visualization helped the project team to go back and reflect on what went wrong, what can  be done better and how we can improve in a changing environment as a good retrospection always  gives better insights to performance and learn from failures in each iteration.

As a Project Manager / Consultant my job of facilitation was at ease to different cross functional teams  and other CxO Levels of Steering Committees as Visualization helped in getting rid of barrier of different  levels of technical understanding.

The visualization tool helps in Value Stream mapping of different project themes and see if by executing  them will really bring value to the performing organization and help to save cost, position themselves  better in the market and gauge more customers and eventually increasing the revenue growth

Program Objective

1.  OPEX Cost saving by 300K Eur  per Qtr.

2.  Build Resilient Data Center  (Disaster Recovery)

3.  Reduce Carbon Foot Print of  Data Center

Project 1: Migration of

Physical Servers to Virtual

Environment (Cloud)

Project 2: Secure Green IT

Certification

Project 3: Secure

Green IT Certification

Project 4: Decommission of

EOL Server


Design Thinking : Peer Graded Assessment Claudio Said Email : john03@yahoo.com Challenge I was working for a Consulting Firm and was on an assignment / project to reduce operational costs from an IT Infrastructure department . The client company ’s Infrastructure ( data center ) was built in an unplanned fashion as they were facing a significant spike in their Operational Expenditure as the system lacked a Governance Model . As a Program Manager / Consultant it was a Herculean Task for me to identify the different pieces of puzzle and see how these fit well so that I could define a Project ’s Scope that would give an Estimate for the Business Case to be generated so that the project could be initiated . The client Infrastructure had many aspects like Power Distribution , Cooling , Disaster Recovery , Test and Production Environment , Virtual / Cloud Appliances etc . that were contributing in a large carbon foot print of the data center . The steering committee were more concerned about the Production Environment as it supported 21 Airline Companies ’ Reservation Systems across Europe and Asia and for them their customer impact could cause a huge loss in credibility and market share . Selection Since , the management was n’t clear on how to proceed in budgeting a new project since , they had some unusual data ( numbers ) but no visualization on the negative impact if the project is not executed . Visualization tool was selected by me to provide a mind map of how things could potentially affect in the longer run if the project is n’t initiated . Application : The depiction on ‘ WHAT IS ’ phase was done with a Fishbone diagram ( Ishikawa Diagram ) in which the cause and effects of the present situation was shown which could directly be related to potential cost overrun happening . The depiction of ‘ WHAT IF ‘ was shown with a mind map , showing the quantified objective on cost and potential sub projects that could be performed like Migration of Physical to Virtual Servers in the Cloud to reduce carbon footprint / power usage , IT Green Certification , Decommission of Servers that have reached end of service so that we can de - clutter the data center etc . Root Cause Analysis using Fish bone diagram ( Ishikawa Diagram ) OPEX Cost Saving Impact on Budget High Cost Penalties from 3rd Party Carbon Footprint No Compliance Power Overrun Design Thinking : Peer Graded Assessment Claudio Said Email : john03@yahoo.com Mind Map of Projects Selection for Business Case Insight and Approach Upon using this Visualization as a powerful tool to not only denote the benefit realizations of driving projects , I realized that it makes absolute sense to represent risks and mitigate them in an assertive fashion . The visualization helped the project team to go back and reflect on what went wrong , what can be done better and how we can improve in a changing environment as a good retrospection always gives better insights to performance and learn from failures in each iteration . As a Project Manager / Consultant my job of facilitation was at ease to different cross functional teams and other CxO Levels of Steering Committees as Visualization helped in getting rid of barrier of different levels of technical understanding . The visualization tool helps in Value Stream mapping of different project themes and see if by executing them will really bring value to the performing organization and help to save cost , position themselves better in the market and gauge more customers and eventually increasing the revenue growth Program Objective 1 . OPEX Cost saving by 300 K Eur per Qtr . 2 . Build Resilient Data Center ( Disaster Recovery ) 3 . Reduce Carbon Foot Print of Data Center Project 1 : Migration of Physical Servers to Virtual Environment ( Cloud ) Project 2 : Secure Green IT Certification Project 3 : Secure Green IT Certification Project 4 : Decommission of EOL Server