Thank you to our guest blogger and vendor partner – Shari Christofferson – President, Connect Inc.
Promise and risk
The promise of new technology and the process of integration can often seem at odds. People and processes both experience a disruption when infrastructure and existing solutions are changed. Incorporating Android OS – based devices into a mobile deployment is a change that is taking place part and parcel across mobile enterprises. Mobile OS changes often come with other system changes, such as ERP and WMS applications, increasing the opportunity for disruptions and risk to the business.
How can we reconcile the promise of new technology benefits with the challenges of changing mission critical systems and processes? An effective methodology to ease this transition and limit disruption is an end to end process that enables the adoption of beneficial innovation into today’s enterprise.
The right data set
As Android OS devices are introduced into production any real or perceived issue will be automatically blamed on the thing that changed. Capturing an unbiased baseline that measures the speed and stability of the mobile device, networks, and applications relative to the mobile user is critical. The resulting data set is a valid means, currently the only means, to compare systems because the frame of reference is consistent – the effect on the mobile user.
The next step in limiting disruption is to capture the deviations from baseline at the point of impact across the distributed system remotely and in real-time. These deviations are the interruptions experienced by the mobile user that disrupt productivity.
Problem capture and resolution
With only 1% of mobile issues reported to IT, it is critical that monitoring also capture the mobile user point-of-view and user feedback along with the corresponding mobile infrastructure performance at the time of disruption. Linking these data sets results in swift and definitive diagnoses.
Equally important, the data capture must result in analysis that informs the right people to take the right actions for resolution. This can make a diff
erence between 48 hours to get the deployment back on track, versus weeks or months.
Validate Success
All too often ad-hoc troubleshooting results in a temporary masking of an underlying systemic problem. Tracking the exact root cause will validate efforts and expenditures on sustainable fixes. Typically persistent mobile issues have more than one root cause. Another strong argument for making sure the original data capture is unbiased and consistent to guarantee disruptions are solved completely, not partially.
Deliver New, Now
Enterprise IT and Operations teams embarking on an Android OS migration are finding that data-driven approaches to technology integration are key to delivering innovation to the business. Mobile Systems Intelligence by Connect Inc. is providing the required technology and process to limit disruption related to Android OS migrations. Adopters of the service describe the difference as stark as night and day relative to past technology integrations. Diagnostics and performance analytics captured across the mobile infrastructure before, during and after technology transitions confirm the reduced impacts on mobile users and set a new standard for change processes.