E2 Equipment Hosting

Facilities are not managed simply because they exist and are owned by an organization. They are managed so that the people and equipment they contain can be used for specific purposes. In the case of IT Facilities, such as Data Centres, this adds some very specific demands to the manager of that facility.

One of these is the hosting of IT equipment. This is not just a case of providing a room and allowing the Technical Management teams to install and manage equipment. Different types of equipment have very specific requirements of the facility in which it is housed, for example:

• Water-cooled equipment needs access to cool water – which has to be supplied by the facility
• The weight of equipment varies and has to be distributed so as not to place too much stress on the floor
• Electrical supply may vary for different types of equipment.

If equipment is simply placed in the Data Centre in the order in which it is received, it will be very difficult to find anything and staff may have to cross the floor several times to tend to similar equipment. This traffic jeopardizes the integrity and security of other equipment on the floor.

This means that Facilities Management has to own the responsibility of planning and designing the layout of the Data Centre for optimal access and security of the equipment that will be hosted there. At the same time, it should be remembered that this equipment is being used to deliver IT services, and any requirements for that service need to be taken into account in hosting the equipment. For example, Data Centre standards may have to be changed in order to accommodate a non-standard server.

In addition, most Data Centres also offer the following hosting activities:

• Receipt of new equipment
• Unpacking, configuring and installing standard equipment
• Producing and maintaining Data Centre layout diagrams
• Managing the schedule of any maintenance activity to equipment hosted in the Data Centre
• Disposing of retired equipment.

From this list of activities, it is clear that Facilities Management should not be seen as a separate function, but very much part of the overall operation of IT in the organization.

Date: 2014-12-29; view: 906