Chapter 7. Building a Worldclass Infrastructure

We've heard this terminology from executives for the past several years. They all want to build a worldclass infrastructure. It sounds good, but what does it really mean? In this section we actually tell you what it is and show you how to implement it. Building that elusive worldclass infrastructure is a five-step process. If you implement the first four steps, congratulations, as you're three quarters of the way there! You're farther along than the 40 companies with which we performed case studies and probably 95 percent of the IT organizations out there.

The fifth step is to implement all the processes outlined in Table 5-1. But realistically speaking, in today's ultra-fast-paced world of technology advancement and limited resources, be content with implementing the first four steps. At least do that much and maybe the sequel to this book will be case studies on the IT infrastructures that made it.