Teradata Managed Services provides individualized support.
by Phil Britt
The benefit derived from a Teradata Warehouse depends on getting the right information to the right decision maker at the right time. That's why availability, performance, data protection and proper user access are crucial to maximizing return on investment (ROI). But what is the best way to ensure that a Teradata system is optimized, especially as a system grows and evolves?
"Through managed services," says Mark Hancock, managed services offer manager at Teradata. "The key is the support environment. Effective service depends on understanding all of the components of your system and how they interrelate. All data warehouse processes need to be orchestrated and supported."
A managed services approach provides coordinated, skilled support to all aspects
of the Teradata enterprise data warehouse (EDW)—from hardware and software, to applications and queries, to users and data—across multiple systems and disaster recovery solutions. This holistic view of the EDW delivers the highest levels of reliability, performance and end-user satisfaction. The key is to align expert resources to support strategic business and tactical IT goals.
"Customers tend to opt for managed
services because they know they're getting higher levels of expertise," says Bob Igou, research director of software support and
IT services and management for Gartner,
a research and consulting firm, based in Stamford, CT. "That's particularly true
of companies with small IT staffs. A
managed services vendor provides some economies of scale."
Improving performance
One example of the benefits provided through a managed service approach is in the case of a multi-billion dollar producer of communications systems, services and software. This company relied on its 12-node Teradata production system for its financial reporting, so the accuracy and safety of their data, as well as system availability during reporting periods, were paramount. While Teradata provided Enterprise System Support (ESS) on both the production system and a two-node development system, a third-party service provider delivered application development support and system/database administration (S/DBA) of the Teradata EDW.
The goal of this company, like many
organizations, was to streamline data warehousing and operations support by working with a single service vendor. They enlisted the expertise of Teradata Managed Services to audit and analyze their operations. It was during this review that gaps in the producer's current service delivery became apparent. The company re-evaluated its support model and decided to transition the S/DBA service to Teradata. The positive impact was immediate: in the first four months, unplanned downtime was reduced by 75% and incident resolution time improved by 83%. Even more impressive is that this was achieved during a system move and consolidation.
Teradata's effectiveness was its ability not only as a provider of S/DBA services and system-level performance, workload and capacity analyses, but also as an integral partner to both the customer's IT support infrastructure and that of its primary IT service provider. For this particular communications customer, what changed with the incorporation of Teradata Managed Services was the system support philosophy.
By employing managed services, this communications company is guaranteed better access to its data so it can concentrate on its core business, not on self-servicing its EDW operations. This is just one example of how these services help businesses succeed. And the trend is growing, not only in communications but also in all types of industries, including retail, technology, healthcare and airlines.
Service Management best practices
Teradata's IT Service Management (ITSM)
is a best-practice framework for evaluating
customer service requirements and developing the appropriate support processes. Teradata follows IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) standards, the world's most accepted IT service management approach. This ensures Teradata's Managed Services solutions keep pace with its customer's changing environment and business goals, satisfying needs from the executive level down to the operational level.
The benefits of implementing an ITSM framework are:
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Reduced risks through managed security, change predictability, and data recoverability |
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Fiscally responsible behavior through cost-benefit justification and services that are constrained to business objectives |
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Improved return on investment (ROI) through continuing resource optimization and training |
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User satisfaction driven by improved availability, ease of use, single assistance point
of contact and ongoing communications |
Like any process improvement method, implementing the ITSM framework is an
ongoing endeavor. Several factors are involved in ensuring its success: establishing the sponsorship and ownership of the program,
development planning, monitoring and adjusting, and system governance and verification. The proper resources must be in place to efficiently achieve corporate business objectives in a financially equitable manner.
"We are uniquely positioned to help customers manage their Teradata environment," explains Marc Fabbo, Teradata professional services offer manager. "Not only do we have consultants who are experienced in employing best practices in a Teradata environment, but these consultants also have access to key internal resources such as engineering,
support and communities of practice. This gives the customer an expert consulting team that is backed by an even larger team."
Providing solutions for every need
"Teradata Managed Services integrates expertise and best practices across a portfolio of operational services. With this broad operational support of the Teradata environment, customers can focus on their core business objectives with the security that comes from service level agreements [SLAs]," says Fabbo.
To assist firms in determining where they need the most help, Teradata offers an audit that unveils any gaps in a company's operations. This ITIL-based scoping survey, which Teradata conducts free of charge over a two-
to three-day period, examines how a company handles change management, configuration, availability, capacity, service continuity and service levels. The survey also analyzes how reactive or proactive a company is in problem management. From there, Teradata submits
a proposal and builds a joint transition plan including production and operations manuals.
"A customer needs to know where they're starting from and where they're trying to go," Hancock says. "Through our analysis, we can provide them with managed services designed
to meet their needs." For customers new to Teradata, this can mean enabling a full suite
of managed services in order to benefit from immediate system productivity without the need to develop and manage talent in-house.
For customers with systems that are growing and evolving, Teradata Managed Services is an appropriate choice to handle its EDW scalability while ensuring optimal performance and capacity. Other companies engage Teradata Managed Services for significant business events, such as mergers and acquisitions,
or when focusing internal resources on core
business issues.
"Our flexibility enables customers to benefit from Teradata's expert resources to serve as a complete service solution or to enhance their existing support organization," says Louise O'Neill, Teradata director of global managed services. Teradata Managed Services can also
be an excellent partner to a larger IT support service vendor.
Achieving leverage, value
By taking advantage of Teradata Managed Services, customers can augment their existing staff, says O'Neill. "Sometimes they have a project or other priorities to deal with." With the services provided by Teradata, the company's regular staff can go about its usual business while its management concerns are covered
by Teradata Managed Services.
Teradata Managed Services provides flexibility as well. Customers can select those items that make the most sense for Teradata
to handle. In addition, customers can supplement existing in-house expertise with Teradata consultants to team up and focus
on specific tasks. Whatever mix a company chooses, Teradata Managed Services works
to communicate with the customer's in-house staff and third parties who may handle some portion of overall IT-managed services.
"Whether we're managing all of the support or only a portion of it, our goal is to drive efficiency, cost savings and proactive service management," says O'Neill.
Simplified support management, increased system availability and minimized service incidents are just a few of the reasons firms are turning to Teradata Managed Services to help them maximize the ROI from their Teradata data warehouse systems. The outcome is a win
for all parties. T
Phil Britt is a Chicago-based writer whose
work appears in several national publications,
primarily in the technology and financial
services industries.
Illustration by Bryan Leister
The Teradata Managed Services suite |
The following is a more detailed look at the components that comprise Teradata Managed Services:
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Service management provides oversight for all underlying functions, including maintenance, operations, production and business continuity. This holistic approach administers a range of planning, service management and integrated reporting functions that coordinate best practices across all support services. |
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Maintenance and support provides proactive services for hardware, software and the operating system (OS), which reduces system downtime and improves incident resolution. Teradata also offers software updates and helps with software implementation, including identification of shareware configuration, software and firmware levels. First, the Managed Services team conducts support reviews and system health checks and determines system availability to help the company meet or exceed its system availability targets. Then, before following through with upgrade plans, Teradata determines the optimal migration path and details steps, timeframes, roles and responsibilities. |
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Operational support provides system-level support and conducts daily operational tasks that are vital to the performance of the Teradata environment. Flexible options can be grouped into two categories: system reporting and system management. System reporting delivers optimal system performance, workload profiling and capacity-usage monitoring. This service is highly recommended for customers who want to evaluate and improve their existing system's performance and capacity, but don't have the time, tools or skill set required for continuous monitoring and regular reporting. This service is also valuable as a short-term engagement, such as preparing for significant system-level changes (e.g., upgrades, moves, application installations, large increases in the user base, speed degradation or capacity exhaustion). System management delivers day-to-day system administration, regular backups and operational incident management to ensure proper user access and manage planned downtime, as well as prepare for and recover from unplanned downtime. |
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Production support addresses data warehouse administration, support and performance needs. This includes monitoring batch processes to ensure they reach successful completion, performing day-to-day database administration (DBA) tasks, monitoring and tuning queries and applications, and managing the workload and performance of the environment. These services are tailored for customers' needs and can range from monitoring of process (such as extract, transform and load (ETL))
to complete system administration, including design, development and maintenance of load processes and applications. |
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Business continuity includes disaster-recovery management and multi-system management, which Teradata coordinates across data warehouse operations to ensure minimum risk and maximum system availability. Teradata experts help plan, coordinate and execute critical functions using Teradata best practices so that an organization can meet its business requirements. |
Customers can seek support from Teradata Managed Services for any of these areas or their components. This approach to Teradata support provides a range of planning, service management and integrated reporting functions. By combining best practices, service level agreement (SLA) management, strategic planning, resource, risk and change management, education management and consolidated reporting under the service management umbrella, Teradata Managed Services aligns IT service with a company's strategic business needs.
—P.B. |
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� Teradata Magazine-September 2006
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