One of the cornerstone tenants that application migration technology and company Rimo3 is built on, has been this “lazy” CTO's decades-long CTO’s mantra:
“Automate the mundane.”
- Samit Halvadia, CTO of Rimo3 (not the CEO of Microsoft)
However, since I don’t think I have ever tweeted in my life, it has not gone viral yet.
I assume this Rimo3 blog will change all of that… but don’t worry, I will still acknowledge my EUC brethren after I have “influencer status.”
What Automate the Mundane Means in Terms of Legacy IT Processes
“Automating the mundane” may sound like a relative no-brainer. Of course, I don’t want to do manual and tedious tasks, yet it is never as simple as it may seem on the surface.
In early 2022, I wrote a blog on the rise of automation as it pertains to legacy IT processes, and a fair chunk of that has come to fruition over the last few years. A combination of updated practices and processes, along with newer tooling, has allowed us to remove some of the manual burden that sits in modern IT today.
Adopting Continuous Integration and Continuous Development (CI/CD) DevOps
The adoption of Continuous Integration and Continuous Development (CI/CD) DevOps principles have been adapted and become the backbone of automated change management processes inside of IT.
I like calling this new trend “Enterprise DevOps.”
But as with any new technology or process change, there are always barriers to adoption. Especially when most IT orgs are short-handed and still responsible for keeping tens of thousands of users productive, secure, and happy.
There just doesn’t seem to be time or budget for innovation with the limited resources available.
Oftentimes, people have started modernizing some of their processes and invested in ITSM tools and solutions, but they are not being utilized to their full potential. And while this sentiment typically results in a sad head nod of acknowledgment from me, I still see this as an opportunity to break away from the historical inertia of “this is how we have always done it.”
“Doing more with less doesn’t mean working harder or longer. It means applying technology to amplify what you can do and ultimately what an organization can achieve amid today’s constraints.”
- Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft
Historical Inertia in the face of change. Be better than this:
Side note: Shameless plug for our podcast. Scott Manchester and Rimo3 had the chance to discuss historical inertia here.
How Can We Address These Adoption Barriers?
While a fair amount of the burden sits with the customer and partner community to evolve their processes and embrace a growth mindset while still ensuring that security, productivity, and business continuity are not compromised (pffft… no big deal); I believe that an equal part of the burden sits with the technology provider and vendor community.
Based on our partner community and customer feedback, I am very excited to announce a major shift in our Rimo3 Cloud platform to deliver and support an extensible API framework that will provide our install base and prospects the ability to build 90% of Rimo3 functionality into their existing processes today.
As part of “doing more with less,” my goal with this release is to allow people to leverage their existing investments in their change management technology (whether it is ITSM tooling or a modern application delivery and management plane).
Read all about the Rimo3 Congo release here.
What Does New Extensible API framework Mean for Our Customers and Partners?
With this new extensible API framework, developers can create custom integrations with existing tooling, automate repetitive tasks (like testing and packaging of apps), and orchestrate complex workflows (like patch rollouts and OS upgrades).
Integration
The new API framework enables seamless integration between different applications (both homegrown and 3rd party) and processes that already exist today. By exposing the Rimo3 APIs, it has allowed these partners to build automations around a lot of their Service Line Offerings for their customers across different silos of IT today.
Workflow Orchestration
Enabling the orchestration of complex change management workflows involving multiple applications and stakeholders. This allows our customers the ability to define and manage the flow of actions between different platforms, while ensuring that tasks are executed correctly.
Event-Driven Automation
Supporting an event-driven architecture, Rimo3 enables automation based on real-time events or triggers. This means that when certain conditions or events occur, the API framework can automatically initiate corresponding actions or workflows, reducing the need for manual intervention.
Get Automation Solutions with the Help of Rimo3
Being app nerds, we have built the Rimo3 platform to automate the mundane as it pertains to application migrations and management from legacy to modern… with whatever technology you might choose to embrace. But the part that gets me most excited about this release is the innovation potential.
Greater minds than mine in partners and customers will surely demonstrate intricate and creative workflows for use cases that we haven't even considered.
The "art of the possible" is something I personally cannot wait to see.
