Making good decisions is not just a requirement of the C-Suite. It’s a critical skill at every level of an organization.
When considering a data center move, how do you know which decisions you’ll encounter?
How do you avoid decision paralysis costing valuable time?
What if you could attend a customized workshop at your facility? Once that demystifies the process of moving a data center?
Introducing the Data center moving workshop for all stakeholders. From executives, to IT directors, to staff, we cover important topics including:
- The Executive’s Guide to Data Center Moving
- Common problems that undermine almost every data center move, and
- Critically important Post-Move issues that require planning right now
Decision-making is such an important skill in these data center relocation moves, that organizations need to avoid the paralysis trap.
Decisions that are not timely or not made at all are in fact more damaging than poor decisions.
Establishing a common sense of urgency for your move is one the best first steps you can take.
All the workshop details can be found at http://datacentermoving.com/datacenterworkshops
Reserve a spot right now!
Watch a Video explaining the
Workshop.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
Whether you move your data center yourself or engage data center move services, you are going to need to budget, plan, execute, and clean up the post-move mess. Avoiding common relocation mistakes while keeping your job can be quite a challenge. Our free data center moving guide can help you understand the relocation process. We’ve revised the moving guide to touch on budgeting, project plan checklists, and virtualization.
You might be surprised to learn that we help companies of all sizes. The data center move guide can be helpful for moving a small computer room as well as guiding your own development of a move project checklist.
Navigating the Perfect Storm
A data center move is often one component of a larger corporate relocation and can be a bit overwhelming. How much pressure are you experiencing? Time constraints, budget constraints, organizational pressures, and overworked staff all contribute to the perfect storm. The place to start is to understand the process, identify the milestones, and keep your options open when dealing with contingencies.
Our Services Give You Options
The consequence of indecision is often the most expensive mistake when moving a data center. Our expertise helps you navigate your unique data center relocation by avoiding costly mistakes. The first step is a conversation. Give us a call at 303-485-1115 .
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
Transitional or Interim services are not for every organization, but few are prepared for the sudden departure of a key executive.
While it’s typical for us to provide these transitional services as part of a Data Center Relocation, the services are available to all organizations.
What Problem Are You Trying to Solve?
We don’t pretend to read your mind and prefer to engage in a conversation about the issues that are driving your need for transitional services. Common needs include:
- An unplanned and sudden departure
- A desire for a new direction
- Returning a sense of urgency to organizational priorities
- Fixing long-standing operational or technical issues
- Resolving complexities during a reorganization
- Allowing the search process to find the right permanent candidate
Whatever your reason, the first step is the conversation. Give us a call at 1-877-485-1115 and let us know how we can help.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Relocation
Data Center relocations can be justified from a number of perspectives. Out of power, out of space, and inadequate cooling are all common reasons for a data center move. But what are the compelling reasons to stay put?
- Lack of a comprehensive data center moving plan. Don’t be rushed into a data center relocation without dedicating adequate resources and time to a detailed moving plan.
- Inadequate attention to solving the cooling problem. Even with all the information about proper hot and cold aisles, dueling CRAC (Computer Room Air Conditioners), and improper return air dynamics, IT staffs still operate inefficient data centers with glaring problems. Seek out a data center audit to ensure easily corrected mistakes get corrected.
- Swinging for the fences with Virtualization. While virtualization can deliver impressive cost savings, it also changes the way your data center operates. Betting that you can completely move to a virtualized platform as the underlying strategy of your data center move without unintended consequences ignores the complexity inherent in the data center.
- Unreasonable construction time lines. It’s rare that a construction completion date is met for a variety of legitimate reasons. The data center commissioning process is often compromised in the rush to recover the time consumed by construction. Delaying the data center move will cost less in the long run than moving into a a new data center that has inadequate soak time and testing.
The decision to relocate your data center should be made carefully. As this video explains, a data center move readiness assessment can make the difference between a successful data center relocation and a fatallly flawed move.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
While many organizations operate more than one data center, it’s rare that any two are alike. External forces often manifest as a crisis where something must be done about the data centers. Expand, contract, consolidate, or relocate are common outcomes.
While it’s true that best-practice experts will preach continuous planning, it’s also true that most corporate data centers are understaffed. It’s not unusual for the Executive Management with oversight responsibility to have no actual data center operational experience. In this environment, how can you expect anything other than accidental data center planning?
Unfortunately, when it comes time to plan the move of these data centers, the perfect storm of accidental planning, understaffed neglect, and the crisis-driven mindset can doom the move before it begins.
Moving Unstable Data Centers Will Be Painful
Moving a data center that’s unstable operationally is a prescription for certain failure. Freezing changes in the data center must be enforced. This freeze for any meaningful length of time is one of the most difficult parts of a data center move. For organizations with an ad-hoc planning approach, the need to freeze changes is particularly acute because even small changes cause huge disruptions.
It’s not practical to believe that an organization used to ad-hoc methods will first change their culture and then move their data center. This is particularly true when the need to move a data center is urgent.
Here’s a helpful data center moving video that explains why our free data center moving guide can help you understand your move. Starting early is the number one factor for a successful data center move. If your need is urgent, give us a call.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
Our Data Center Moving Blog helps you learn more about data center moving. The posts to this site can be found by category:
The Sitemap below shows all of the topics on this site. Subscribe to Blog updates via e-mail on the form on the right or follow us on Twitter at @datacentermove.
Jump Start Your Learning with These Popular Posts
I’ve selected some of our most popular topics to get you up to speed quickly:
Let us Earn your Business. Here’s how to Contact Us:
- E-Mail: urgent@e-oasis.com (Let us know your urgent need)
- Phone: 303-485-1115 (Leave us a voicemail anytime with your contact information)
- Follow @datacentermove on Twitter
We welcome all your questions about Data Center Moving. We’re ready when you are. Give us a call.
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Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation, Data Center Site Selection
Every data center move is unique and every move is important to us. We’ve updated our popular data center moving guide for 2009 doubling its size to over 20 pages.
E-Oasis Wants to Earn Your Business
While many white papers are written carefully to disclose very little information, ours are different. Make no mistake – we do want to earn your business by planning your data center move. However, we think the best way to do that is to explain the anatomy of a data center move including common mistakes to avoid.
This 2009 edition of the data center move guide contains:
- Is Your Move Feasible?
- Anatomy of a Move
- Budgeting
- Site Selection
- Pre-Move Planning
- Teardown
- Transit
- Arrival
- Re-Assembly
- Post-Move
- Top Mistakes to Avoid
Get your guide by providing your e-mail address in the sidebar on your right.
Survive or Thrive?
Data center relocations are major projects. But just surviving the relocation may prove to be the wrong strategy. Our relocation planning will save you money, help you avoid costly and potentially embarassing mistakes, and minimize the disruption to your business.
Check our our blog-at-a-glance feature if you’re new to this site to learn more about data center moving.
We move data centers.
Put our systematic methodology for planning and moving a data center to work for you. We make you the Super Hero of your move.
- Planning – Helping you avoid costly mistakes with our data center move playbook.
- Execution – Keeping the data center move on-track.
- Post-Move Support – Critically important post-move services ensures success.
Give us a call. We’re ready when you are.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation, Data Center Site Selection
Should you move your data center yourself? Of course that depends on quite a few factors. When talking to most do-it-yourselfers, you quickly discover that this will be their very first data center move. You also learn that they are already planning to commit many of the common data center move mistakes that will make their move difficult and costly.
If you’re going to attempt a data center move on your own, get an outside assessment of your data center relocation plan. And that means your first step is to document your move plan so that it can be reviewed.
You’ll also need a strategy to correct common Executive Misconceptions as you seek approval for your plan.
Finally, pay attention to your assumption errors because surprises will cost your organization money.
When you get stuck, give us a call. One of our service offerings could make the difference between a successful data center move and dusting off your resume.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
You’ve been tasked to find out how much it’s going to cost to move your data center. After searching, downloading data center move white papers, and expanding your search to data center move checklists, you haven’t found a single “average cost to move a data center”. And if you received an answer from your search, would you trust it?
Isn’t your move unique enough to warrant careful consideration beyond frantic web searches?
It could cost your company quite a bit if your plan underestimates the costs and the time required to successfully relocate your data center. Let’s not forget that data center moves are bigger than transportation of equipment from the origin to the destination. Neglecting staff retention issues , for example, can doom an otherwise successful move.
Assumption Errors Cost Money
What do you suppose the cost of your assumption errors will be? The most common assumption error is assuming you know when your data center move cost model is complete. Even small assumption errors can be quite costly. Assuming, for example, that moving on a weekend is the least disruptive time to move will not only increase your costs dramatically but also interject unnecessary risk into your move. A number of misconceptions can lead to assumption errors and increased costs.
Budgeting for data center moves should be less about getting the number and more about getting the right process in place to move a data center successfully.
You need a process that documents all of your assumptions and also tracks those that change with time or events. A process that surfaces budget impacts early serves to ensure you’ll have the necessary fuel to complete the data center relocation journey. Some suggestions:
- Document your Move Narrative
- Identify your Assumptions
- Seek out an Assessment to identify the gaps in your analysis
Our data center move readiness assessment can identify the assumption errors that could be sabotaging your move plan. Give us a call to discuss your unique data center relocation challenges.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
You may be required by your organization’s purchasing policy to use a formal solicitation and selection process for your data center relocation. Good Data Center Relocation RFP’s are not easy to write and are even harder to evaluate. A data center move of even moderate complexity contains equipment from many vendors. A data center move of this type will require that many of those vendors move their equipment to preserve your warranties.
After the RFP, you’ll still end up needing to manage a multi-vendor move. Larger vendors will have their own relocation process that they follow to deliver their services. This process typically overpowers your staff who are unprepared and unfamiliar and often already exhausted from the RFP process itself.
Additionally, the RFP has likely used up valuable time and has increased the pressure on time-lines.
Pay attention to these items following an RFP:
- Staff Retention Issues – This time period often marks the beginning, not the end, of staff retention concerns.
- Vendor Scope Creep – Following a contract award, vendors often have the first opportunity to accurately determine the work scope. It should be no surprise that this discovery rarely matches the original bid.
- Multi-Vendor Coordination Issues – Every vendor will have their own timeline, but a data center move requires an orchestra-like cooperation. Larger vendors with their larger staffs equipped with their corporate methodology will overpower smaller vendors and your own staff.
Is it time for an intervention? A fresh and independent assessment of your data center relocation including multi-vendor management strategies, cost containment strategies, and a look forward to equally critical post-move issues can provide welcome relief from an exhausting RFP process.
Give us a call. We can give you new insight into your data center relocation project at a time when your staff is weary and exhuasted from the RFP. You’ll want an advocate who is independent from the self-interest that the equipment vendors have in your data center.
Corporate Relocations, Data Center Checklist, Data Center Relocation
