Current and Archiving Practices in the Enterprise an Osterman Research research summary

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1 Current and Archiving Practices in the Enterprise an Osterman Research research summary Osterman Research, Inc. P.O. Box 1058 Black Diamond, Washington Phone: Fax:

2 Overview LEGATO Systems sponsored an Osterman Research survey of organizations in order to understand how messaging is used, how information in messaging systems is managed and stored, how is used to conduct business, and so forth. Osterman Research relied almost entirely on its panel of IT professionals to conduct this research. However, the survey was supplemented by 20 respondents who were made aware of the survey via LEGATO s online newsletter, Newsline. In total, 285 surveys were completed for this survey, primarily with individuals in rth America. The results of the research are presented in this document, along with Osterman Research s analysis of the research findings. Osterman Research surveyed organizations that use a wide range of messaging systems. The breakdown of the leading messaging systems in use among the respondent organizations to this survey is as follows: Microsoft Exchange (in use by 66% of respondent organizations) Lotus tes/domino (30%) vell GroupWise (12%) Sendmail (4%) Fischer TAO (2%) Please note that the totals add to more than 100% because multiple messaging systems are in use by many organizations. The median number of users at the organizations surveyed was 1, Osterman Research Page 1

3 Research Findings The Critical Nature of Most users receive a significant amount of on a daily basis. As shown in the following figure, nearly one-half of users receive more than 50 s on a typical workday, while about one in six users receives more than 100 s daily. Number of Business s Received Each Day by the Typical User Under 20 12% More than 150 4% % % % Although the number of s received by the typical user is substantial, messaging system content such as old s, attachments, contacts and other information is more than just communication. Our research has found that more than one half of the critical information that the typical user needs to do his or her job on a daily basis is housed within the messaging system. In other words, the messaging system has become the focal point for most users daily work. Most business users sent and received is internal: as shown in the following figure, 52% of the typical users is primarily internal, although a substantial proportion of traffic is carried out with those outside of the internal organization. Percentage of Internal Sent and Received 11-25% 13% 26-50% 24% 5-10% 7% Under 5% 4% More than 50% 52% 2003 Osterman Research Page 2

4 Most organizations have established policies that they enforce, as shown in the following figure. Does your organization have an enforced policy in place? 32% 68% is used as written confirmation of approvals, orders and other business documents at the vast majority of organizations, as shown in the following figure. Is used or accepted as written confirmation of approvals, orders, etc. within your organization? 21% 79% 2003 Osterman Research Page 3

5 Interestingly, near one-quarter of organizations have been involved in some sort of a dispute with a customer or supplier over an -based issue. Further, one half of organizations have experienced business interruption or monetary loss because of system downtime, as shown in the following figures. Has your organization ever been involved in a dispute with a customer or supplier over an -based issue? 24% 76% Has your organization ever experienced business interruption or monetary loss due to system downtime? Don't know 17% 33% 50% 2003 Osterman Research Page 4

6 Growth in Volume volume has increased substantially during the past two years. As shown in the following figure, 38% of organizations have experienced more than 50% growth in volume during the past two years, while an additional 30% of organizations have experienced growth of between 26% and 50%. Growth in Volume During the Previous Two Years 6-10% 6% 0-5% 2% 11-25% 24% More than 50% 38% 26-50% 30% Reasonably consistent with the growth in volume has been a substantial increase in storage requirements. As shown in the following figure, 55% of organizations have experienced storage growth of greater than 50% during the past two years, while nearly 10% of organizations have experienced storage growth of more than 200% during this period. Growth in Storage Requirements During the Previous Two Years More than 200% 9% % 14% 0-25% 21% % 32% 26-50% 24% The growth in both volume and storage has important implications for the enterprise. First, there is the cost of simply acquiring, installing and maintaining the additional storage required to manage additional volume. While the cost of storage has fallen dramatically in recent years, the total lifecycle cost of managing storage is not an inconsequential part of the overall cost of managing a messaging system. Second, in order to maintain system performance, it is important to keep online storage to manageable levels. t to do so can create a situation in which messaging servers become less stable, restoration of a crashed server takes longer, and so forth. Consequently, the growth in volume and 2003 Osterman Research Page 5

7 storage requirements means that a growing proportion of content must be moved offline to some storage medium more quickly in order to avoid being lost. Archiving Has a Long Way To Go Most organizations do not have adequate long-term archival practices for their systems. As shown in the following figure, our research found that virtually all organizations back up their system on a regular basis, but 56% of these organizations do not keep all of the data on a long term basis, while 13% keep only critical data on a long term basis. Current Organizational Backup and Archiving Strategies IT backs up , but does not keep data long term IT backs up , keeps only critical data long term IT backs up , retains all data long term 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 2003 Osterman Research Page 6

8 Problems with Current Practices The majority of maintenance is handled primarily by IT departments, staff members and IT managers; although a significant proportion of maintenance is handled by individual users, as shown in the figure below. Entities Responsible for Maintenance IT department/staff Individual users IT manager Other 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% The fact that more than 40% of maintenance is handled by end users is one of the most alarming results of this survey. Most users tend to be focused on their primary job responsibilities, not on the long term regulatory or knowledge management requirements of the greater organization. Consequently, a user may inadvertently discard -based information that is important for the organization to maintain on a long-term basis because of regulatory requirements, potential support for the organization in a lawsuit, or some other reason. This is particularly true in organizations that have established quotas: for example, a user that has reached his or her quota at 4:00pm on a Friday afternoon and that must clear data from the message store in order to send a critical attachment to a client may delete potentially valuable information from the message store simply in order to meet the deadline Osterman Research Page 7

9 More than one in three users has lost s due to technical problems, hardware damage, virus attacks or other technical issues, as shown in the following figure. Have you personally ever lost s due to technical reasons? 35% 65% Why Archive? There are three primary reasons to archive messaging system content: Legal requirements. Many organizations, such as those in the financial services or medical industries, are required either by statute or other regulations to maintain an archive of all records-based information which often includes traffic with customers and others. As shown in the following figure, about one-third of all organizations surveyed for this study are required to comply with specific, -related regulations. However, all organizations are required to comply with records retention requirements even in the absence of industry-specific regulations related to retention. Is your organization required to comply with specific regulations related to ? 32% 68% content represents corporate knowledge. Because most users critical data is housed in the messaging system, much of the value that infoworker employees contribute to an organization is kept in the messaging system. t to archive this data and make it available is simply to lose much of the value that employees generate on a daily basis Osterman Research Page 8

10 Faster restoration and protection from data loss. Restoring messaging system content from an archive is easier and faster than doing so from a tape backup. In short, simple tape backups are not sufficient for preserving the enormous amount of content housed in the typical messaging system. Further, most organizations that use tape backups simply do not preserve the data on them on a long-term basis, meaning that much of the corporate knowledge housed in the messaging system becomes lost. Worse, such short-term only storage exposes many organizations to severe penalties for non-compliance with the various regulations and other requirements that exist for and records retention. What is needed for any organization that relies on is an archiving system that will make messaging system data accessible indefinitely with minimal user intervention Osterman Research Page 9

11 2003 Osterman Research, Inc. All rights reserved. part of this document may be reproduced in any form by any means, nor may it be distributed outside of the client organization that has purchased it, nor may it be resold by any entity other than Osterman Research, Inc., without prior written authorization of Osterman Research, Inc. THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED AS IS. ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED REPRESENTATIONS, CONDITIONS AND WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, ARE DISCLAIMED, EXCEPT TO THE EXTENT THAT SUCH DISCLAIMERS ARE DETERMINED TO BE ILLEGAL Osterman Research Page 10