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Summary: Rich is right on
Review: I was impressed with Rich's grasp of the IT industry going back to 1970's and the steady progression of the mainframe and it's re-birth. Well worth reading if you want a view of the ever changing IT environment and it's impact to those within the industry and to the business community. I thought his writing style was smooth and his concepts were easy to grasp. I thought his interjections of his years of experience well supported the book's chapters. Being in the industry myself since the early 80's it has been quite a journey as this book points out. I think that this book will be a vaulable tool for today's IT professional.
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Summary: Schiesser Review
Review: In "IT Systems Management", Mr. Schiesser documented his wealth of life experiences, and created a roadmap for those of us in the business of making "IT" happen. The book offers concepts in an easy to understand format, and couples them with templates that can be used in real-world situations. Its use as a reference tool should not be understated.
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Summary: Schiesser Review
Review: In "IT Systems Management", Mr. Schiesser documented his wealth of life experiences, and created a roadmap for those of us in the business of making "IT" happen. The book offers concepts in an easy to understand format, and couples them with templates that can be used in real-world situations. Its use as a reference tool should not be understated.
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Summary: Useful
Review: IT Systems Management is a valuable reference for the whole IT community.
It is written in a clear style, with a lot of useful lists and worksheets.
I definitely recommend it.
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Summary: This Covers IT
Review: IT Systems Management: Designing, Implementing, and Managing World-Class Infrastructures by Rich Scheisser is an excellent book covering such a broad and diverse topic.
The experience Rich brings to the writing of this book is obvious from the first page. IT Systems Management has gone through many changes, especially in recent years. Rich has been able to explain much of IT Systems Management in terms that are easily understood.
Rich has touched on every phase involved with an IT environment, including, but not limited to, Production Acceptance, Change, Storage, Network, Configuration and Problem Management along with Disaster Recovery, an often overlooked aspect within IT.
An understanding of all of these topics is crucial to a solid foundation within this industry. Rich has been able to combine all of this information into one wonderful book. Even people that have been in the industry for many years can learn or enhance current knowledge of IT Management by reading this book.This would no doubt be an excellent text book in any MIS or CIS program.
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Summary: A framework for IT success
Review: Managing today's complex IT infrastructures can be a serious challenge without a framework for success. Mr. Schiesser's book offers one such framework: people, process and technology. This comprehensive structure addresses the three critical dimensions of any IT environment. In the people section, you'll learn how to gain executive support; organize and staff your department; and understand what it takes to deliver good customer service. Twelve critical processes, including production acceptance, change management, problem management and disaster recovery are all presented in an easy-to-understand format including case studies from Rich's own experiences. The final technology section tells you how to put it all together to achieve meaningful results. If you were to simply follow the advice presented in this book, your IT infrastructure would probably be orders of magnitude better than most out there today.
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Summary: Amazingly complete and packed with knowledge
Review: Mr. Schiesser has managed to capture all of the essential service delivery processes in a single book, and he covers each of these topics with a thoroughness that will give you a foundation to implement world-class system management. He starts out with three chapters that cover the history of system management and had it has evolved into an important discipline that is currently challenged by issues that were not foreseeable when I started in the industry 25 years ago. Today systems are interconnected into complex supply chains and extend onto the desktops of home and business users who are not known to the managers of the systems. Although these chapters can be skipped, they do provide context for the details that come in later chapters. In fact, each topic in the book is introduced at a basic level, then built upon in layer upon layer of detail. This makes learning the complex discipline of system management easy to someone new to IT, and exposes details that even seasoned veterans may not have encountered. The book's best feature is that covers each of the key processes (support and problem management, availability, performance tuning and capacity planning, change control and configuration management), and ties them to related areas (security, disaster recovery, facilities management, and infrastructure management areas for storage and networks). Although the book is not sequenced in the key process and related areas in the order I've listed, a pattern emerges as each topic is covered. The glue that ties all of these together is the way the author develops a strategy for organizing for systems management, including staffing considerations, and the integration of the processes at the end of the book. I especially like the way tactical and strategic processes are identified and how the relationships are developed. As an IT operations management specialist with extensive experience I appreciate the way the book has accurately captured the essence of systems management. As a consultant I found the checklists and worksheets provided in the book to be invaluable. This book represents an important contribution to the overlooked body of knowledge of systems management and IT operations, and should be on the bookshelf of every IT manager or service delivery specialist who takes their job seriously. It should be carefully read by those in the dot com and ASP industries because the processes described in this book, if implemented, will differentiate your services and give you a significant competitive advantage.
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Summary: This book ties everything together!
Review: Rich has done an excellent job in analyzing and reviewing what IT managers need to know in Systems Management, Network Management, Capacity Planning, Storage Management, Security, Disaster Recovery and Facilities Management. The tables and graphs are extremely helpful in making sense of it all!
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Summary: Great handbook for IT managers
Review: Rich Schiesser does an excellent job of organizing the many aspects of successful IT systems management. His presentation is comprehensive. But I also found it very easy to read and digest. I like the way he has given equal coverage and importance to the technical, business, and people components that make up a successful IT organization; especially the people issues, which I find are often down-played in organizations. The book is written in a drill-down fashion, starting each section with background and discussion and ending with practical guidelines and how-to's. It's packed with steps and checklists for establishing each of the various systems management processes that Schiesser covers. You also get information on common issues and pitfalls to look out for along the way. I really like the sample assessment documents for determining the effectiveness of a current process, and for measuring performance once your new process is in place. For anyone with a background in IT infrastructure who is looking to move into a management role, this will make a great handbook. It contains the practical stuff that would normally take you several years of experience to gain. It's also an informative reference for anyone in applications support and other IT departments, who wants a better understanding of the larger systems management environment and the role it plays in the total organization.
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Summary: Great handbook for IT managers
Review: Rich Schiesser does an excellent job of organizing the many aspects of successful IT systems management. His presentation is comprehensive. But I also found it very easy to read and digest. I like the way he has given equal coverage and importance to the technical, business, and people components that make up a successful IT organization; especially the people issues, which I find are often down-played in organizations. The book is written in a drill-down fashion, starting each section with background and discussion and ending with practical guidelines and how-to's. It's packed with steps and checklists for establishing each of the various systems management processes that Schiesser covers. You also get information on common issues and pitfalls to look out for along the way. I really like the sample assessment documents for determining the effectiveness of a current process, and for measuring performance once your new process is in place. For anyone with a background in IT infrastructure who is looking to move into a management role, this will make a great handbook. It contains the practical stuff that would normally take you several years of experience to gain. It's also an informative reference for anyone in applications support and other IT departments, who wants a better understanding of the larger systems management environment and the role it plays in the total organization.
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