Specifications

www.ibm.com/support/techdocs 31

Summary of Best Practices for Storage Area Networks

Change control processes should be designed to make the execution of change go as

smoothly and quickly as possible, not merely slow down change (through endless

checks, verifications, and meetings) in an attempt to reduce risk. The delay imposed by

inefficient change controls lead to rush jobs that actually increase net risk.

This is not to say that anybody should be able to implement any desired change at any

time, but rather that the purpose of change control should be to help the appropriate

administrators (with some level of review) make the right implementation decisions to

begin with as opposed to imposing roadblocks that are ultimately treated as an

inconvenience instead of a control.

It seems counter-intuitive that eliminating double and triple checking can actually reduce

risk. However, for a given amount of manpower, the development and maintenance of

standard operating procedures for common processes, major review of truly major

changes, along with coherent planning for growth, is a far better use of time than

attempting to review every change with a fine toothed comb. Based on the collective

experience of SAN Central, some highly dynamic environment’s use of double and triple

checks have become double and triple rubber-stamping, because there is simply

insufficient time to truly inspect every last “i” for dotting and “t” for crossing.

Will unplanned outages due to changes still occur? Yes; SAN administrators are

human, and mistakes will happen. However change management should allow for the

evaluation of risk versus benefit for the company with reasonable review efforts to

prevent such mistakes. If administrators are given the correct tools to enable them to

consistently make error-free changes, everybody wins.

The author of this white paper is not a management consultant. It is the role of the

business to adequately evaluate how many layers of approval should be necessary for

various types of changes within the SAN environment as well as provide the means to

determine the appropriate administrator and/or team responsibility for change reviews.

Another key concept of change management centers is effective communication to all

personnel that may be impacted by the planned change, whether other administrators

or end-user, of the upcoming change so they can evaluate the potential impact within

their respective area of responsibility.

A change ticket, or record, should contain sufficient technical detail that any

administrator skilled in the deployed products with some degree of familiarity with the

SAN environment should be able to sit down at the appropriate console(s) and make

the changes given the Standard Operating Procedures. These tickets should be

available to the entire SAN administration staff.