Forbes Marshall’s CIO on Managing End-users and Vendors Effectively

Summary:

All the CIO of Forbes Marshall, Sharat Airani wanted was to virtualize. He didn’t know that he would have to battle user resistance and vendor defiance. Not that it stopped him.

Highlights:

Sharat Airani, Chief-IT systems and security, Forbes Marshall, says he walked a thin line between walking ahead and with users to convince them to go virtual.

When executives at Forbes Marshall first heard of virtualization, it sounded like a bad word. You can’t blame them. In 2008, for a manufacturing company situated in Pune, going virtual seemed surreal. Butwhat really got them was that virtualization meant change. And nobody likes change. But for Sharat Airani, chief-IT systems and security, Forbes Marshall Group, virtualization was the only way to bring down opex costs and secure the company’s intellectual property. “I knew that virtualization could solve my problems,” he says.  He also knew that if he wanted to virtualize, he would have to bell the cat himself.

Solutions to technical problems are available. But the trust people put in you and your solution cannot be bought, it needs to be earned.

The Importance of Self-belief Airani was confident about virtualization even if the technology was still in a nascent stage. “I realized that we needed some time to understand and get accustomed to the technology before I promise the management an ROI,” says Airani. He also needed to run trials. “The trial phase was not within our planned IT budget so we freed standalone servers and I set up a small lab. I believed in my idea and I had to make it work.” And that’s critical for any project to be successful. It is important for CIOs to convince themselves before convincing others, especially about an initiative which is bound to bring change. With the promising results of the trial run, management was convinced that virtualization fit Forbes Marshall. But Airani’s battle was only half done. Running Alone The next challenge was user resistance. “The real test comes with end-user adaptability. Solutions to technical problems are available. But the trust people put in you and your solution cannot be bought, it needs to be earned,” he says. That’s why Airani’s says his first step in any project is to identify the people whose work would be most impacted by a solution. And determine user demographics: Defining end-users based on age, previous product experience, and the kind of applications that they use. “For example, I identified a set of users between the ages of 30-45 years-old. I realized that most of them held managerial positions or were team leaders. They don’t care where data is stored as long as their teams can access it quickly. I spoke to all the supervisors and head of various business lines about the need of a technology which ensures better IP protection and would make the systems faster and enhance productivity,” he says. This user segmentation helps CIOs recognize their user’s needs better—and their disposition to change. During his research, Airani found that between 40 and 60 percent of enterprise data is not business critical. “So when I informed everyone that files or applications that were non-business critical would not be stored at the server level, I knew that people were not going to be happy about it,” he says. The unhappy lot consisted of a relatively younger bunch aged between 25-30 years. But Airani didn’t let them frown for too long. “I just stuck a win-win deal. We dedicated a standalone PC where they could enjoy music and entertainment.” Inversely, users were also uncomfortable with critical data being saved on servers. This is among the most common reasons virtualization projects hit a roadblock. “Users realized that they would have to give up control of data being stored in their own machines. At one point, they were on the verge of junking the solution,” he says. It was up to Airani to make end users understand that virtualization would ensure business continuity and faster performance. “It took a lot to ensure that stakeholders knew that we were actually trying to find a better solution. We tested the response time of the solution using stop watches to compare actual desktops versus thin clients,” he says. And users bought it.  Getting Vendor Support If handling users was tough, convincing vendors was tougher. Forbes Marshall uses software like AutoCAD and Solidedge for its industrial drawings. When Airani proposed the idea of going virtual, his partners weren’t supportive. “In 2008, my vendors did not have extensive knowledge of a virtualized environment. They were apprehensive about their license policies and terms of software use. They were not sure if heavy graphical interfaces would function seamlessly on a virtual desktop.” In the face of that opposition, Airani put his best foot forward. “I convinced them to restructure a new evaluation license for the test phase. I was told point blank that they would try their applications on the VMs in the test lab, but if things did not work out I would still have to pay them.” It’s times like these, when CIOs have to make critical decisions on their own, that makes them realize how change management is a lone battle. And what it means to be a leader. “I decided to take the risk,” he says. “I had invested time and patience into making this project a success. I was sure of my plan and my back-up plan as well. I had to hold on. Had I lost my self-confidence, the project would not have been here today,” he says.

Solutions to technical problems are available. But the trust people put in you and your solution cannot be bought, it needs to be earned.

Leading Change Currently, the company’s virtual servers are in a 13:1 ratio. Airani virtualized at a time when many of his servers had to be replaced or the licenses had to be renewed. The technology saved Rs 40-50 lakh on replacements and license renewals. It helped the company cut down TCO by 40 percent. These benefits aside, the project taught Airani a lesson or two in change management. “It’s all about your approach. When you want to change people you can’t afford to dictate a situation. You walk on a thin line where you are moving forward but you are walking with everyone else,” says Airani. Virtualization isn’t that bad a word after all. Neither is change.