When talking about data protection or the lack of data protection in the corporate environment, I’ve come to the realization; it truly affects everyone across all organizations. Once organizations started realizing they could not function well – if at all without access to critical data, requirements for data protection began to change. Shifts in companies and IT organizations began and new methods for protecting electronically stored information were approached. A colleague recently blogged about The Rise of the “D” in the C-Suite, it talks about the role of Chief Data Officer. This is a great example of how companies are thinking about data differently.
In the data protection podcast series I feature in my blogs, customers are asked, “What kept you up at night before your existing data protection strategy”? Most respond with a version of “waking up and finding that we suffered a loss of data or we couldn’t complete our backups”.
In our latest data protection podcast we heard from Lumenate Technologies. Headquartered in Dallas with operations throughout the country, Lumenate helps organizations sort out implementation details of on-premise IT projects and offers managed services that serve as an extension of its core consultancy portfolio.
By focusing on the 4 Ps in process management — policy, process, procedures, and practices, Lumenate has been able to develop a modern backup and recovery approach against contingencies in its own data center.
Lumenate chose an update and consolidate approach. Replacing its Centera used for archiving with Data Domain and SourceOne, it standardized on NetWorker, and leveraged its existing VNX.
Words of Advice
- Take time up front and plan
- If you don’t line your 4 Ps up, you’re just throwing your solutions out there
- Require data protection to be a part of corporate governance
- Backed up data is live, intelligent data, companies need to consider getting more value out of their investment in data protection – think about using backup data for analytics
Lesson Learned
Data management is not only important for productivity, it’s also important for your organization’s success. Poorly managed data can be significant, if organizations do not set the right framework to protect data, there is potential to opening oneself up to risk and worst-case scenarios.
Catch the full podcast episode here.