HAS IT BEEN ALMOST 10 YEARS ALREADY?

It has actually been close to 10 years since the discussions and preparations started in our hectic database team in the Netherlands. Shell had finally made the decision to outsource their IT Infrastructure to Deutsche Telekom’s daughter company T-Systems and this meant big changes for us. A transfer to T-Systems and many months later, operational support was finally transferred to us (now T-Systems). The model that was chosen was a standard 24/7 – follow the sun model but with operational headquarters outside Kuala lumpur, Malaysia.

Having spent most of my life as a database administrator and consultant has given me the insight that database administrators/engineers/consultants are always very centric in discussions at all levels of the enterprise, from their team mates to senior management and very often involved in both the planning, engineering, operations of both infrastructure and production solutions. As guardians of our most valuable assets – our data – we were involved at all stages and in most related matters like engineered solutions, operational ITIL processes, organisational processes, infrastructure selection and engineering and many more. To say the learning curve was high is an understatement and as a person who enjoys a challenge, I thrived.

Bugs were discovered. Missing operational procedures were identified. Processed changed frequently. Lessons were learned by all – in real time. And then, eventually, we had all green dashboard light. All SLAs met. KPIs were good and all parties happy.

And here we are, almost 10 years later. 10 good years of traditional outsourcing experience in my backpack.

 

COMMON CHALLENGES WITH TRADITIONAL OUTSOURCING

comment on some common seen challenges (time difference, language, communication skills, political/economic instability, cultural differences, availability of expert skills (mainly daytime local hours),  current and future local salary increases,  )