CI-CM Converged Infrastructure Capability

Model:
Sample Questions only

Copyright 2013 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P

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Introduction:

The CI-CM Questionnaire is used as the basis for understanding the

current and desired state of IT infrastructure in your organization.
Each question is answered twice: firstly about your current IT
infrastructure, and then for where you believe your IT infrastructure
needs to be to support your organization's overall goals in the
current planning horizon. It is only intended that it should take a
couple of hours to find the required information and to complete
the Questionnaire. Each question has five multiple choice answers,
so exact answers to the more technical questions are not required,
and reasonable estimates can usually be made.
Generally it is not possible to get a valuable outcome from the CICM process without more background than the multiple-choice
answers, and the workshop leaders will generally also want to
discuss additional aspects related to each question during meeting.

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Copyright 2013 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
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constituting an additional warranty or as expanding such express warranty statements.
The recommendations contained in this report are based on a preliminary assessment of responses
provided by you and are given for informational purposes only. As such, HP does not assume any
responsibility and will not be liable for any damages you may incur as a result of the implementation of any
such recommendations. In addition, HP does not warrant any results, progress or improvement discussed in
this report as possible effects of the implementation of the recommendations given herein. This document is
the property of, and confidential to Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP) and all copyrights
are used under license by HP. HP does not assume any responsibility for technical or editorial or any other
errors or omissions contained herein.

Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

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and proprietary to HP and reproduction, adaptation or translation without prior written permission is
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who are directly involved in the project to which this document relates for the purpose of evaluating this
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The information contained herein is subject to change without notice.

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Technology and Architecture

1.1.1 What is the average CPU utilization across all servers in your data center
environment?
Significance: The Server (CPU) utilization is a simple indication of how an asset is being
used. The average CPU utilization in a datacenter is typically quite diversified, with a
large number of servers often underutilized. The intent of this question is to determine the
grade of utilization to understand the potential for consolidating workloads into resource
pools, as well as for freeing up resources for workloads needing greater capacity. If
utilization is much lower outside normal business hours, utilization during these times
should not be included in the average.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

Average 10% or UNKNOWN.

B.

Average <25%.

C.

Average <35%.

D.

Average <60%.

E.

Average < 75%.

Current [

Notes:

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Desired [

1.1.3 What is the average utilization of disk storage across all of your data centre
environment?
Significance: Storage utilization is a simple measure of storage asset utilization. The
average storage utilization in a data center is typically quite varied, with a large amount
of direct attached storage often underutilized. Unused storage should include: LUNs
allocated but unused, free space in file systems, unused storage allocated to databases,
etc. Network attached storage is a key enabler of resource sharing in the data centre.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

Under 40%, typical of direct attached storage.

B.

40-60%, main large databases, and other large data collections, stored on
isolated SAN
connected arrays or NAS.

C.

60-70%, majority of large databases and other large data collections stored on
SAN
connected arrays.

D.

70-80%, NAS / SAN fusion, supporting expansion and contraction of volumes;

information lifecycle management to reduce duplication and archive data that is
no longer needed.

E.

Over 80%, storage assignment is dynamically synchronized from LUN

to files system, database, etc.

Current [

Notes:

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Desired [

1.1.8 How do you best describe your current data center facilities landscape and it's
ability to meet business and technical requirements?
Significance: Data centers are very capital intensive. Having too many data centers or
sub-optimal located data centers can be very costly to operate, maintain and upgrade as well as introducing risk. Data centers must also be able to sustain business
growth/innovation and thus be capable to scale and host modern technologies. This is
also true for outsourced data centers.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

Data centers are highly distributed and close to where business activities take
place. They may also be aligned to acquired company, business unit, and/or
country.

B.

Data centers are mostly distributed, but classified by standard Tier designations
(Uptime
Institute definitions) and standards are in place for each data center class.

C.

Data centers are consolidated in each country and in most regions. Sourcing
strategy is
consistent and optimized; with capacity plans for power, cooling and floor space
in place.

D.

Data center locations are optimized, and capabilities are offered as a fully
optimized,
standardized and consolidated services via a service catalog. IT have ownership
and accountability for Data center facilities and power costs.

E.

Data centers are delivered as a globally consistent service to the enterprise. The
data center is agile and can be rapidly reconfigured to meet changing business
needs due to high levels of automation.

Current [

Notes:

Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

Desired [

1.2.1 At what level of your infrastructure are Service Level Agreements or SLAs defined?
Significance: Determining the quality of service delivered to business users is important.
It is achieved by defining Service Level Agreements between Business and IT for the IT
Infrastructure, including specific measures for operations and support, and then
measuring the degree to which these are being met.
It can range from no measurement through to the service or even business process level.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

No service level monitoring.

B.

Availability monitored at the component level (server, storage, etc.) and for some
applications.

C.

Monitor and report on availability and performance at the component,

infrastructure virtualization, application, and end-user experience levels.

D.

Availability and performance managed at the service level, and for all
dependencies, based on a service catalogue offering trade-off between service
cost and service levels.

E.

Service levels and costs can be dynamically varied to support optimization at the
business process level.

Current [

Notes:

Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

Desired [

1.2.3 How is business continuity and high availability implemented in the data centers?
Significance: Availability and continuity are important to many businesses, and for some
industries mandated by regulations. IT's ability to provide continuous service must be
measured end-to-end across the whole IT stack.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

Individual disaster recovery or high availability solutions may exist for some key
applications but without a structured approach.

B.

A standard approach for business continuity and high availability exists which
may include continuity service providers, but implementation is distributed and
driven by business request.

C.

Consolidated data centers have the capability to support individual, application

driven
business requests for business continuity and availability. Sourcing and delivery of
continuity services are globally optimized.

D.

Business continuity and high availability are integrated in the data center
architecture and
delivered pro-actively as a tiered set of services to the business.

E.

Dynamic reconfiguration of workloads and infrastructure within and across data

centers are globally optimized in the data center architecture to cover the largest
number of critical applications at the lowest possible cost.

Current [

Notes:

Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

Desired [

1.3.1 To what extent do you have consistent low latency storage and data networks
within and between data centers, and across the organization?
Significance: Networking between data centers, and between data centers and users is
an increasingly significant IT cost that needs to be managed. A more consolidated NGDC
environment places greater demands on the SAN, LAN and WAN network infrastructure.
Greater dependency on IT to adapt to changing patterns of use requires greater network
capacity and consistency.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A. Isolated SAN switches, or no SAN. LAN/WAN based on geographic or business
unit
needs.
B.

Consistent SAN and LAN standards across data centers (including connection to
DR sites), consistent WAN backbone across the organization.

C.

Consolidated single data network across most of the organization with VLAN and
endpoint virtualization, and change and configuration management.

D.

Virtual SAN supporting changes in SAN connectivity (e.g. moving test server into
production) without re-cabling. Consistent enterprise wide low latency voice,
video, data, and storage networking.

E.

Unified and virtualized enterprise wide low latency voice, video, data, and
storage networking.

Current [

Notes:

Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

Desired [

 Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

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1.3.4 When a request is made, what is the average time taken to provision all requested
infrastructure resources to support a business project?
Significance: A critical aspect of increasing the speed with which support is provided
to the business is the time it takes to provision all the resources to support a business
project. With increased maturity (AI) the definition of "resources" will change from
hardware/software to "Services". It's again an indicator of the level of standardization of
pre-set configured and shared IT building blocks and the level of automation.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

> 1 month.

B.

< 1 month.

C.

< 1 week.

D.

< 1 day to provision a resource request as a service.

E.

< 1 hour to provision a resource request as a service.

Current [

Notes:

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Desired [

Tools and Processes

2.1.1 What is the current level of standardization of IT processes and Management tools
in your data center environment?
Significance: Standardizing on defined and leveraging relevant standards, tools and
processes across the technology and infrastructure services stack is a key practice in
improving efficiency and optimizing cost envelopes. Standards should be utilized in a
practical and pragmatic manner and derive from industry-best practices e.g. ITILv3,
applicable to the environment.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

Ad hoc.

B.

Documented processes and limited tools that are used enterprise wide.

C.

Selected processes and tools rationalized and integrated across the enterprise.
CMS (Configuration Management System) in place, with automated discovery and
dependency mapping.

D.

Business Service driven operations. Focus on ITILv3. Management of

organizational change in effect.

E.

Business process driven operations. Continuous Service Improvement focus.

Current [

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Desired [

2.1.3 What level of remote management is in place for your data center environment?
Significance: Day to day operations and management of datacenter environments
carried out by personnel working in the physical data center contributes to a significant
percentage of server and storage management and administration costs. Applying
remote management tools and applications is a specific best practice towards optimizing
system management spend and is a key enabling requirement for centralized
management in a lights out data-center environment.
Please look at the range of answers below and select the one that you think most closely
matches the situation in your organization.
A.

Most systems have shared or dedicated KVM (Keyboard, Video, Mouse) located in
data center white space.

B.

Tools for remote management are in place, and are used once hardware is
configured and any operating system is running.

C.

Most systems dont have KVM attached, but it may be plugged in for use in rare
cases. Almost all operations staff can be remote.

D.

The only access to white space is for removable media access, hardware install,
and repair based on remote fault diagnosis.

E.

Lights-out data center, high thermal density, optimized for constrained airflow,
not human access to systems.

Current [

Notes:

Copyright 2012 Hewlett-Packard Development Company LP.

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Desired [