Zerto’s Steve Blow explains how setting up the right data foundations early can save time and money
Elly Yates-Roberts |
This article was originally published in the Summer 2019 issue of The Record. Subscribe for FREE here to get the next issue delivered directly to your inbox.
The market as we know it has been changing dramatically over the last decade, with each digital development outpacing the other at every turn. It has become increasingly clear that having the right foundations early on in any digital journey is critical to the success of transformation initiatives. As such, building data protection within a robust and resilient IT infrastructure will be essential for day-to-day business success, as well as ensuring complete transformation, modernisation and cohesion. From my experience, there are three recommendations that are key to help businesses achieve this.
First, you must plan for the worst and implement a clear action plan. Every decision maker within the company needs to ensure they are fully aligned with the business on the expectations for IT resilience. This IT resilience plan must include how often data must be backed up, as well as how quickly systems can be restored when something goes wrong. Backing up cannot be an afterthought. Afterall, what is the point in having digital transformation plans that focus on the use of valuable data if you could lose it all in seconds without the right strategy in place?
My second recommendation is to look carefully for the right technology. In my experience, purchasing more products to fix issues only tends to make things worse. It exposes vulnerabilities in the business, leaving it open to malicious attacks and disruptions.
I would advise IT teams to begin to streamline their technology portfolio, seeking a converged solution that has the capabilities to manage their entire IT resilience operation, as well as improve cloud mobility, back-up and disaster recovery.
Finally, businesses need to properly test their kit. By running a full failover test, enterprises can be sure they can fully recover valuable data when necessary, ensuring all plans for digital transformation are not quashed by increasingly sophisticated cyber-criminals. Plus, testing that the IT works the way it should ensures businesses can freely move application and data workloads within just seconds of an event taking place, without losing a single piece of data.
With the right technology for IT resilience in place, businesses can drive their digital transformation efforts forward, safe in the knowledge that the risk of downtime is mitigated, with an always-on business that will maintain superior customer experience in any eventuality.
Steve Blow is a tech evangelist at Zerto