Charbel Khneisser, VP Solutions Engineering, EMEA, at Riverbed Technology

We no longer live in an age of broad expertise. Instead, professionals are now required to specialize within their field based on the specific technology they use. The challenge is that there’s more variety in the systems being used by companies than ever before. Plus, there is a lack of individuals with a top-level understanding of the data and analytics needed to deliver actionable insights. This is crucial to have, so companies can maximize operational efficiency.

Companies are investing more in technology, such as unified observability, that provides IT with a unified view to see through massive complexity and transform data into actionable insights across the entire digital ecosystem. This allows for agile pinpointing and solving of IT issues which improves end-user experience, leading to optimal customer service. However, many organisations have difficulty leveraging telemetry for insights due to a lack of analysis. Resolving this issue requires a new class of employee, one that’s situated within performance management. 

Transforming the workforce through performance management engineers

Today’s world is technologically complex. To keep up, IT teams need experts dedicated to understanding, analyzing and improving performance management for enhanced end-user experiences. By introducing a new breed of IT specialist – performance management engineers – businesses will empower themselves to operationally transform. 

As an example, IT teams were traditionally assigned to analyze network in response to an issue occurring that needed to be resolved. Now, with experts in place to conduct ongoing monitoring, organisations can reduce resolution timeframes through a proactive approach.

This is accomplished through four key factors that make up issue resolution – namely, the mean time to discover an issue; the mean time to pinpoint where the issues originating from; the mean time to fix the issue; and the mean time to verify resolution. 

Organisations have been able to resolve the third factor ‘the mean time to fix the issue’ but have not been able to address the other three areas. The answer lies with performance management engineers who are capable to read telemetry in real-time, across the entire business network, enabling them to manage all four areas of issue resolution. This has a substantial butterfly effect, where end-user experience is greater for both staff and customers alike, due to a reduction in downtime.

It can also save costs. This is because, although the time needed to resolve issues is fixed, the mean times to discover, pinpoint and verify fixes can be streamlined and reduced, minimizing costs by maximizing efficiency. 

Responsibilities held by both universities and companies

Performance management engineers have the potential to become the go-to problem solvers for all IT teams. However, a shift in how universities and companies’ approach building this talent pipeline is needed.

Building a talent pipeline requires universities to update their course offerings to include performance management from the offset. Students need the correct foundation to comprehend broad concepts that can be polished under the light of performance.

For instance, courses could include providing every student with a base level of understanding around coding. Then, arming them with the critical analytical skills to grasp knowledge and make sense of the different outcomes, can help them to effectively analyze performance issues.

At the same time, organizations need to evolve their mindsets and recognize that staff need base knowledge to grow from because specifics will continuously evolve. Based on this understanding, it’s easy to see why performance management engineers would have a key role.

Closing the skills gap 

Introducing a new category of employee goes beyond improving network and business application performances. It also ties into a larger issue we’re seeing today: the digital skills gap.

Tackling the digital skills gap, even with innovative technology coming into force, requires IT teams to be nurtured with new training in order to keep up to date. By motivating employees, through intellectual growth and solid financial incentive, companies can retain the talent while also keeping employees equipped with in-demand skills.

Investment for the future

Establishing a new profession of this scale to the workforce is a significant undertaking and one that will require cultivation by universities and businesses alike. 

However, training and investment will empower organizations to drastically improve their network and application performance across the board, achieving outstanding benefits. These include greater employee and customer experiences, as well as helping to support retention and reduce costs. So, now is the time to introduce performance management engineers for today’s digital savvy workforce.