Mistake #6: Not involving management in data loss and target recovery time decisions
I recently met with a management team to determine acceptable data loss and recovery time thresholds. My strategy was to bring a printed list of questions for the team to consider and answer. It was a truly productive discussion.
The client DBA, with whom I work closely, noticed that I had said very little during the meeting. My answer was, “Well, we DBAs are really only the humble servant in this situation. Management knows what they need, and our job is to listen and tell them what it will take to get them to that place.”
I hope you’ll consider involving your management in deciding how much data your company can afford to lose in a disaster, and also how long your company can afford to be without its database(s). They need to be involved in this decision, as it is more of an operational decision than a technical one.
Some benefits of involving management in the decision making:
• Management will see that you are voluntarily and proactively involving them in what legitimately is a management-level decision. This will show good judgment on your part. And you like brownie points, right?
• You will have a chance to learn management’s expectations about these matters before a disaster happens. This could save your reputation, and maybe even your job, later on.
• You will have a chance to shape or temper management’s expectations. I have started conversations of this sort by asking, “How many minutes of transactional data can you afford to lose permanently?” Often the answer is, “None!” I don’t know if this a problem with how I’m asking the question, is a knee-jerk answer, or is something they really believe is a business requirement. Whatever the case, this gives me a chance to explain what meeting that requirement might entail: possibly a more expensive setup than they have now, and also some database performance impact.
Another question: if there is a disaster, how soon must you be up and running again? I don’t hear “immediately” very often, but I have heard “within 10 minutes” before.
Both of these questions are your chance to talk with management about what your current equipment, configuration, and level of technical expertise can accomplish relative to their expectations, and what additional resources it would take to meet those expectations. Often I see management downshift their demands after understanding what they would cost. At the end of the meeting, management might instead agree that 30 minutes of data loss is acceptable, and that it’s OK for it to take 8 hours to be up and running again. What a difference that would make for you when disaster actually struck: management expectations would be set to the level that you negotiated together, based on legitimate business need, currently on-board technology, and current level of IT funding!
• You will get better policy coordination and buy-in from complementary IT areas. Data loss and recovery decisions will require involvement by and have impacts on technical components other than the database. If the recovery time/data loss decisions are made by management they’ll have some “teeth” to them: the decision will be binding on the other component areas, such as system administration, application server administration, and network operations. In a broad-scale disaster, those areas might have to do their own recoveries before the database and application can be up and running, and their recovery times need to be part of recovery/loss policy making and planning.
• You might get more budget money next time. Having management think about recovery time and data loss issues could get you favorable treatment during the next budget negotiation cycle. Maybe management will better see the value of scrounging up money for that standby database server or springing for a few “U”s of storage at a remote data center, since you educated them about how it will improve business operations in case of a disaster.
Have you inquired about and worked to shape management’s recovery/data loss expectations at your shop?
This goes for just about anything related to technology. Technology should be considered a tool to help you run your business. As such, IT’s goals and strategies should be aligned with the business goals. Meeting regularly with your management team is the best way to make sure this happens. And of course, doing a lot of listening is the key!