New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?
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Two articles that I highly recommend as good, general reading just to have things at the ready are:
http://www.smbitjournal.com/2011/07/never-get-advice-from-a-reseller-or-vendor/
http://www.smbitjournal.com/2016/06/buyers-and-sellers-agents-in-it/
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@stess : Have you sat down and spoken with the new manager about your concerns?
Sit down with him and find out why he wants to just switch to VMware and show him how well your infrastructure has been built and how much money you are saving the company by sticking with Hyper-V.
I'd at least do this before going over his head. If he refuses to listen, then it may be time to get the folks higher up in the food chain involved.
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Also, look at the change of environment not as an affront to you, that's certainly not what it is. (Well, 99% certain.) This is either someone who is looking to change things because he thinks that they will be better or someone who is looking to do something to their own advantage. But it is pretty much definitely not about you. So don't let any of it feel personal.
If it helps, think about all of the ways that this change will be beneficial to you. You will get to learn new technologies, work with new products and vendors, grow your resume, talk about the migration, etc. What's good for the company and what is good for you are rarely tied together. Get excited, just a bit. Definitely do your best to determine and promote good ideas. But don't despair if the new manager and management don't listen or agree - fight for what you feel is right despite the fact that it is not in your interest. If you convince them to do whatever is right (we don't know what that is yet) then be happy with doing a great job. If you can't convince them then be happy in knowing that you will grow in your career options.
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@scottalanmiller said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
Also, look at the change of environment not as an affront to you, that's certainly not what it is. (Well, 99% certain.) This is either someone who is looking to change things because he thinks that they will be better or someone who is looking to do something to their own advantage. But it is pretty much definitely not about you. So don't let any of it feel personal.
If it helps, think about all of the ways that this change will be beneficial to you. You will get to learn new technologies, work with new products and vendors, grow your resume, talk about the migration, etc. What's good for the company and what is good for you are rarely tied together. Get excited, just a bit. Definitely do your best to determine and promote good ideas. But don't despair if the new manager and management don't listen or agree - fight for what you feel is right despite the fact that it is not in your interest. If you convince them to do whatever is right (we don't know what that is yet) then be happy with doing a great job. If you can't convince them then be happy in knowing that you will grow in your career options.
I guessed I took things too personal. I did try my best to keep the infrastructure afloat for so long. Duct tape this, patch that, replace loose screws...I guess sometime an overhaul is needed. Just have to make sure that we are getting something that benefit everyone. Still going to try to present my stand point (with numbers) to the manager first.
@dafyre said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
@stess : Have you sat down and spoken with the new manager about your concerns?
Sit down with him and find out why he wants to just switch to VMware and show him how well your infrastructure has been built and how much money you are saving the company by sticking with Hyper-V.
I'd at least do this before going over his head. If he refuses to listen, then it may be time to get the folks higher up in the food chain involved.
I did have a quick talk. I did not go in deep because at the time I did not have any value data to back me up. I will hear what he has to offer/propose and see if there is any area I can step in and reduce the cost. Definitely I am against paying labor to service provider/contractor, unless the changes involve more than hardware/software infrastructure like building moves or office moves. Where do you draw the line when service provider should step in for assistant/consultant?
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@stess said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
@scottalanmiller said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
Also, look at the change of environment not as an affront to you, that's certainly not what it is. (Well, 99% certain.) This is either someone who is looking to change things because he thinks that they will be better or someone who is looking to do something to their own advantage. But it is pretty much definitely not about you. So don't let any of it feel personal.
If it helps, think about all of the ways that this change will be beneficial to you. You will get to learn new technologies, work with new products and vendors, grow your resume, talk about the migration, etc. What's good for the company and what is good for you are rarely tied together. Get excited, just a bit. Definitely do your best to determine and promote good ideas. But don't despair if the new manager and management don't listen or agree - fight for what you feel is right despite the fact that it is not in your interest. If you convince them to do whatever is right (we don't know what that is yet) then be happy with doing a great job. If you can't convince them then be happy in knowing that you will grow in your career options.
I guessed I took things too personal. I did try my best to keep the infrastructure afloat for so long. Duct tape this, patch that, replace loose screws...I guess sometime an overhaul is needed. Just have to make sure that we are getting something that benefit everyone. Still going to try to present my stand point (with numbers) to the manager first.
You can do a lot no matter what the final outcome is to steer things to "in the past we did X to great success" and "now the future is to do Y because factors have changed." Remember that doing something new today in no way suggests that what was done in the past was wrong. Things change. The products that you work with change and the company that you work for changes. At @NTG we change things all of the time, that doesn't mean that we think that we failed in the past, just that we have more options, different options, different needs and more insight today than we did then.
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@stess said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
Definitely I am against paying labor to service provider/contractor, unless the changes involve more than hardware/software infrastructure like building moves or office moves. Where do you draw the line when service provider should step in for assistant/consultant?
That depends on skill levels. What is the internal skill level, and how long will it take internal resources to perform a task? Versus how long will it take a skilled consultant that does it every day? Your labor is not free. Every minute that you are spending doing some one off job that a consultant could have done faster is a waste of company resources.
Now obviously, it is not just black and white hours versus hours. Because hiring a consultant requires overhead. Your time to find one, hire one, explain the task, confirm the bid, etc. But very often it is still going to be cheaper to outsource one off projects.
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@JaredBusch said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
@stess said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
Definitely I am against paying labor to service provider/contractor, unless the changes involve more than hardware/software infrastructure like building moves or office moves. Where do you draw the line when service provider should step in for assistant/consultant?
That depends on skill levels. What is the internal skill level, and how long will it take internal resources to perform a task? Versus how long will it take a skilled consultant that does it every day? Your labor is not free. Every minute that you are spending doing some one off job that a consultant could have done faster is a waste of company resources.
I agree with this, but I have known and seen many business owners and managers insist on "doing it in house" regardless of how long it would take or effort involved to find a consultant to do it.
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I am a big fan of doing stuff "in house" -- especially when A) the IT team has the internal resources and skill set to be able to configure a product correctly and securely, and mainly B) The internal IT team can make the time to do the project.
Obviously there are times when IT is just plain too busy, or a project is too critical and needs to be done two weeks ago... those times it makes sense to have outside help doing stuff.
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@stess said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
@scottalanmiller said in New IT manager making changes... should I be concern?:
Your big challenge here, if you decide to pursue a counter to these recommendations, will be in properly assessing business need (if you feel that his designs are not in the best interest of the company then you should, in theory, be able to not just put that into words but be able to put it into numbers) and then communicating that effectively to the powers that be. This is where the average IT person fails hard - IT tends to attract people who struggle to be able to quantify, qualify and communicate IT in business terms. Maybe you are not one of these people, but if you work in IT the chances are extremely high that this is an area where you feel a particular challenge.
Thanks for the insight. I'll gather more information before making any decisions. These changes are estimated to take 6-8 months at least. I got time.
I will look at the link you posted and make a better judgmental decision. I am 110% against SAN and know there are alternatives that could deliver results with fraction of the cost. *cough starwind virtual SAN *coughI'll see if I can have a quick talk with the management to give my input about all these changes. Obviously I am not going in empty hands.
yeah we can do that! one thing to note: there are many ways to skin a cat (and hang a dog) so you may go SAN or SAN-less route and ether route will split into myriad of options! on your place I'd allow to pick up from at least 3 possible ones. imho
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As for the SAN-less solutions out there you can look at StarWind Hyper-Converged Appliance in case you are looking for something that is very easy to implement and will easily work with any hypervisor.
Another option that you may want to explore is VMware vSAN, that one will be good if you would like to stick to VMware and you are fine with having one node as a witness.
S2D is also an option that is worth your attention, that option should fit well if you would want to stick with Hyper-V as hypervisor and you have multiple VMs licensed with Microsoft Windows.
