Greening IT by Eliminating Redundant Services

Greening IT operations is fast becoming a business necessity, but redundant and duplicated services can act as an obstacle to greener computing.

There are several ways to eliminate redundant, duplicate services that don't provide business value. First, determine if you can centralize.

Don't have multiple "cold rooms" with raised floor. AC for even a small data center is expensive. If you have several data centers in the same facility, and can fit everything into one, do it. The other room is there for growth, when it's needed. Until then, money is saved.

Don't have "the server" or servers at each office or location. They're not needed. This won't work for everyone, and some enterprise functionality requires distributed services to ensure functionality--but not many, with current technology.

A few big systems are easier to deal with than many small scattered ones. And one large group of systems is easier to power than many: AC and power is more efficient at the larger scale, cooling and powering a smaller data center. This is similar to the point(s) about centralizing, but distinct.

For similar reasons, outsourcing backup and fail-over can use less power and money, because an outside firm that specializes in that benefits from economies of scale. So you benefit as well.

A few big systems with redundancy use fewer total parts, too. Having spares and replacements for many different systems costs more. One type of spare part for a few bigger systems costs less.

Related to concepts in centralizing and scaling, consider online or centralized backup, multiple backup devices in multiple locations cost to purchase, operate, have spares & media in each location, etc.

Printers. Do your staff members really need this many printers all over the place? Toner cartridge and ink recycling, disposal, and having them available are all green concerns. Fewer total printers means less power, maintenance, and waste. Heck, just print less! Save a tree.

A common case of duplicated services happens when companies merge or there is an acquisition. Normally there is a process in place to identify duplicate and redundant departments, services, and costs. IT departments are often slow to merge due to operational requirements and complexity. For smaller organizations, in my experience, redundant services are almost always present long after a merger, and simply need to be identified and eliminated.

Larger organizations may require some redundancy to satisfy mission critical or business requirements. Redundancy is not a negative term for enterprises. It's up to you to decide if you need redundancy and if eliminating it is a smart, and low risk or risk-free business move. There are no hard and fast rules.

You may be concerned that after centralizing, you've got a single point of failure for those services. The network may fail. In some cases, power failures at the facility are a risk. Well, if the power or network fails and your business grinds to a halt, you've got bigger problems, in my opinion.