From cup to server: Surprising parallels

For many of us, the first (or second, or more) cup of coffee in the morning is indispensable for getting the day’s activities underway. If your coffee is somehow delayed or unavailable, routines are disrupted and everything else just seems harder.

We rely on our IT systems just as much. Without them, we would be less productive and our daily routine would suffer accordingly. It is seriously bad news (albeit in very different ways) whether someone stole your coffee supply and damaged your coffee-making equipment or encrypted and ransomed your data and disabled your servers. The point is, both your coffee-making and IT infrastructures need the right types of support and protection.

A good cup of coffee – and quality IT infrastructure – both come from paying attention to the details. For coffee, do you have enough beans? Are they good quality, the preferred type, roast and grind? Does the brewing method – cold brew, press, drip, perc, moka pot, etc. – produce the desired results?

Similar questions apply to IT infrastructure: Have all systems been maintained and updated? Do they function smoothly and securely and fulfill computing requirements? Is the admin interface intuitive and efficient? Each of those factors plays a role in the quality of the work you accomplish from day to day.

From growing to harvesting to roasting, grinding, packaging, shipping and selling the beans, advanced technologies are behind nearly every cup of coffee you enjoy. Modern IT management also depends on a complicated mix of servers, networks and software to process, store and transmit data used in today’s businesses. Today’s UEM solutions use advanced tools and technologies to automate routine tasks, eliminate vulnerabilities, optimize operations and keep users productive.

Coffee and IT infrastructure also require a degree of flexibility. Passionate coffee lovers may try out different brewing methods or types of coffee to achieve the perfect result. Their selections may vary as their personal tastes change over time.

IT systems also need to be flexible and able to adapt to changing technologies and business needs. In the past few years alone, employees now want or need to work from home as well as the office. The initial push to the cloud and the ongoing switch to hybrid on-premise/cloud-based computing also is keeping IT admins busy making the necessary adaptations.