The Hub Commentary_

I challenge folks to put on their strategic business service management practice hats when they approach extremely strategic projects like VDI.  This is an area that has the large cost savings potential or biggest failure and money sucking projects.

Yesterday, I came across a couple of articles regarding the support of any device an employee has to avoid capital expenditure.  My mid career roots are deeply planted in the service and support arena and the human cost of supporting non-standard infrastructures is the biggest misuse of resources in a service and support organization.  VDI projects are about standardization and cost reduction, but that will only occur successfully with the proper management baked in from the beginning.

I agree with the article considering the network impact and security, etc. are all areas to explore and plan for, but the management of the infrastructure and a view for the service and support staff is a must have planning and design consideration upfront – not an after thought for implementation.

We had the opportunity to work with an extremely large retail organization this past year for the purpose of putting the face on top of the VDI infrastructure for the service and support organization.  Huge cost savings are realized with standard images, lighter desktops and a face to the infrastructure that indicates where the failure is when the business cannot access an application.

How do you visualize and manage your end-to-end VDI?

Michele

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Network World — Cost-saving technologies remain a priority for IT in 2011 and virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), with its ability to streamline operations, is one of the technologies at the top of the list.  (Read Full Article…)