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Following last week's memo issued by US President Barack Obama's office, adding pressure on the federal IT departments to meet deadlines outlined in earlier orders to consolidate their data center footprints, an organization for government IT professionals issued results of a survey that revealed that most federal IT professionals do not think the White House-issued timeline is realistic. The report, titled "2010 Federal Data Center Demolition Derby," was produced by MeriTalk, an organization for government IT professionals, and sponsored by the Silicon Valley-based IT vendor NetApp.
"This new study sheds light on the gap between the vision outlined in the (Office of Management and Budget) guidance and the detailed execution required by the federal agency data center leads as they move toward meeting the deadlines and milestones outlined in the federal data center consolidation initiative," NetApp's US Public Sector President Mark Weber said in a statement.
"Dovetailing off the White House's memorandum, this report reveals a timely opportunity for OMB to improve guidance, set realistic timelines and clarify the goals to allow federal agencies to reap the initiative's benefits."
The first orders to consolidate, which included deliverables and deadlines, came from the Federal CIO Vivek Kundra in February. Agencies were given about five months to come up with detailed consolidation plans. By the end of July, agencies have to come up with a target post-consolidation footprint and final consolidation plans are due by the end of August.
The report included responses from 143 federal IT professionals and system integrators surveyed in person in May.
While agreeing that shared infrastructure would be the best strategy for consolidation, most participants said government culture was the single largest obstacle to such an approach and to a successful consolidation program. The culture is mistrustful of shared infrastructure platforms, with only half of respondents saying it was realistic to think that their agencies would give up their data centers and use another agency's services instead. Almost half of respondents also said their agency would be weary of using a private company's data center.
The study also found the OMB's, Kundra's and Obama's cloud vision somewhat too ambitious. Only 45 percent of responders thought the cloud plan was realistic at all and 62 percent thought it would take up to five years for their agencies to transform its IT infrastructure to where the primary processing environment is served in a cloud-like delivery style.
Following last week's memo issued by US President Barack Obama's office, adding pressure on the federal IT departments to meet deadlines outlined in earlier orders to consolidate their data center footprints, an organization for government IT professionals issued results of a survey that revealed that most federal IT professionals do not think the White House-issued timeline is realistic. The report, titled "2010 Federal Data Center Demolition Derby," was produced by MeriTalk, an organization for government IT professionals, and sponsored by the Silicon Valley-based IT vendor NetApp.
"This new study sheds light on the gap between the vision outlined in the (Office of Management and Budget) guidance and the detailed execution required by the federal agency data center leads as they move toward meeting the deadlines and milestones outlined in the federal data center consolidation initiative," NetApp's US Public Sector President Mark Weber said in a statement.
"Dovetailing off the White House's memorandum, this report reveals a timely opportunity for OMB to improve guidance, set realistic timelines and clarify the goals to allow federal agencies to reap the initiative's benefits."
The first orders to consolidate, which included deliverables and deadlines, came from the Federal CIO Vivek Kundra in February. Agencies were given about five months to come up with detailed consolidation plans. By the end of July, agencies have to come up with a target post-consolidation footprint and final consolidation plans are due by the end of August.
The report included responses from 143 federal IT professionals and system integrators surveyed in person in May.
While agreeing that shared infrastructure would be the best strategy for consolidation, most participants said government culture was the single largest obstacle to such an approach and to a successful consolidation program. The culture is mistrustful of shared infrastructure platforms, with only half of respondents saying it was realistic to think that their agencies would give up their data centers and use another agency's services instead. Almost half of respondents also said their agency would be weary of using a private company's data center.
The study also found the OMB's, Kundra's and Obama's cloud vision somewhat too ambitious. Only 45 percent of responders thought the cloud plan was realistic at all and 62 percent thought it would take up to five years for their agencies to transform its IT infrastructure to where the primary processing environment is served in a cloud-like delivery style.