Submitted by admin on August 11, 2010
Far from treating it as an emergency room drama, learn the secrets behind this prestigious medical school's successful and deliberate implementation steps resulting from a spot-on cloud computing diagnosis.
If there's one thing that can rival the speed of light, there's no doubt in my mind that it could be 'spreading bad news'. I guess we're all wired for fear owing to our primeval survival instincts but sometimes, it just flatly obscures a great story about overcoming obstacles.
The tech world, obviously, is no different. Case in point are cloud computing fears. At the rate that it's becoming a meme, it won't be such a surprise to see that one day it will make it to a list that includes vampires, zombies and public speaking among other less-desirable things.
Fortunately, the good news – one that supplies insights as well as solutions, still manages to break through from the periphery once in a while. It is my fervent wish that someday it becomes the norm, but I'd take 'once-in-a-while' over no good news, anytime.
Today's great news comes from a post (and a podcast) from which we can get lessons in implementing clouds across an organization such as the Harvard Medical School.
A few choice excerpts from Dr. Marcos Athanasoulis, Director of Research Information Technology for Harvard Medical School:
The business of Harvard Medical School is research …Similar to many industries, there is a culture that requires that, for IT to be successful, it has to meet the needs of the users.
We set out about five years ago to start thinking about how to provide infrastructure. Over time, we’ve evolved into creating a cloud that’s a private cloud at the medical school.
It’s always easier to show someone something that’s already working … It’s having the ability to let people walk before they run. Come on and try it out. If it doesn’t work for you, so be it, but you also have demonstrated successes that people can point to.
But this one just sums it all about cloud deployment or any new endeavor, whether IT or not. Doesn't matter really. Just about perfect.
… Four words that begin with P to describe where I would emphasize. One, pilot, as we have already been saying. Two, participation. You have to get buy-in and participation across the entire group. Three, obviously produce results. If you don’t produce results, then it’s not going anywhere. And then, promotion. At the end of the day, you also have to be out there promoting this service, being an advocate and an evangelist for it, and then, once the snowball gets going, there is no stopping it.
Full post can be found here coming from the Open Group Conference, Boston.
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