Now is the time for virtual desktops.  There are a lot of people in the industry saying that you should wait: Nonsense.  There are serious savings in support and energy costs to be garnered along with significant other factors that will increase agility and lower TCO.  Don't wait.  If you follow the advice and steps outlined below, and build a solid business case, you will be successful.

Virtual desktops are the next hottest virtualization project for 2009.  There are a handful of companies doing virtual desktops in one way or another, but it seems that these "early adopters" aren't sharing what has worked and what didn't.  I know that the projects couldn't have been that easy, nothing is anymore.  So what did they do that made them successful and how can others learn for them?  I conducted a very non-scientific survey of the people that I have on my Twitter account.  I asked them why they thought VDI projects fail.  The main reasons I got back were, "lack of understanding what the user needs to do their job effectively".  I can certainly understand that.  The other reason, believe it or not was, "trying to push a square solution into a round hole".  I'm paraphrasing here but you get my point.  Basically trying to make the virtual desktop solution fit every user case.  And the last one, "lack of business case development and marketing".  That one I can certainly see.

So let's ask the first question; Why implement virtual desktops?  I'll give you my top five reasons:

1. Improve client system manageability 
2. Improve security
3. Cut upgrade, support, and maintenance costs (One side-note here is that even well-managed PC environments require constant maintenance and support to repair problems and keep systems in compliance with policy)
4. Eliminate application conflicts
5. Improve business continuity and disaster recovery

I think we can safely say that there are many reasons why you should be doing virtual desktops.  So what are some of the pitfalls that have been seen in the real world?:

1. Scope creep in the project implementation
2. Poorly managed expectations of results
3. Lack of support for video, multimedia, printing and profile issues, all of which can lead to,
4. User revolt (seriously, I've seen it and it isn't pretty)

Before you start down the road of Proof-of-Concepts, Pilots, etc. you have to do some investigation first. What are some of the questions to ask of your IT organization leaders? 

1. Try asking your desktop support lead how many calls and desk-side support trips result from OS or application related problems. 
2. Ask your security lead about the gaps that remain to ensure that your data is secure and can be accessed only by who has authorization. 
3. We all know that the business runs on applications, so the applications team lead should be in here as well don't you agree?  Ask them what the characteristics of all "corporate-approved" apps, like performance, availability, and compatibility requirements are. 
4. And finally, from the business perspective, ask the senior business managers about what objections and push-back might the business users raise about giving up some control over "their" workstations and laptops.

As I stated above it's critical to get a solid handle on what your users are doing and how they work.  I was in a meeting recently and the company that I was meeting with was moving down the path to virtual desktops.  This company put their users in tiered groups and outlined what each group needs to be productive.  I'm even more impressed with the bottom text box:  "Align the solution to the employee's need" Exactly.

Graphic used with permission from Scott Valeri

With an understanding of what, where, and how around your user base, focus on the marketing of this new solution.  This is what I call "pull adoption". This is in stark contrast to the way most users view the way new applications and other technology changes, etc come at them, which is typically "push adoption" by IT.  By taking the time to start sharing with users the benefits of this new computing model in terms they can understand (like cost savings to the company, ease of use, etc) it will make life much easier for you when the full rollout begins.  It then becomes "our" initiative, not "your" rollout.

The next big hurdle is the business case for virtual desktops.  The top five reasons I gave above are all fine and good, but what it really comes down to is the business case you build for this initiative.  Here are my seven key components of solid business case development:

1. "Scope".  This is where we will avoid back-end confusion and user revolt, through clear definition of the business case contents and project plan.  In this step we will identify what resources are needed.  It will help us avoid time-wasting detours that pop up in every project and it will accurately set management expectations.  A business case is far too important analytically and too highly visible politically to contain avoidable mistakes.  But guess what?  This is where I have seen a lot of folks create those needless errors.
2. "Criteria".  This step is where we will determine who our audience is and the factors they will use (criteria) to make the investment decision.  By doing this step you are going to hopefully avoid missing any key decision criteria.  If anything important is missed it will undermine the validity of your business case and you.
3. "Align".  A simple definition here is, keep all your activities and resources heading in the same direction.  Here is where you are going to take your decision criteria, confirm it, and then link it to key business goals.  One key thing I want you to take away is that your best business value occurs if you directly support your enterprise needs.  As a rule, I have always kept this thought in the back of my head.  An enterprise will consistently succeed only when all of its parts are in a strong cause-and-effect relationship with one another. I can guarantee you that "alignment" is at the front of every executive mind when they are faced with making decisions on IT investments.  You need to ask yourself this question; How strong is the cause-and-effect between investing in a virtual desktop initiative and realizing key business objectives?  This is your job as the business case team to discover and communicate the strongest possible, truest value alignment you can.
4. "Calculate".  I was told by my mentor that when it's about money, get it right.  The purpose here is to compute the realistic "hard-money" costs and benefits.  Why?  Money impacts have a major influence on investment decisions.  I have seen many times that a client has built what they thought was a great business case only to be told in an executive level meeting that "I don't understand it" or "I don't believe it."  Why?  After reviewing these business cases I found some very basic arithmetic errors.  No matter how small, this will discredit you and show carelessness.
5. "Prove it".  All the best work in the world around calculations, scope, criteria, etc are worthless if no one believes them.  I define proof as simple as this, evidence sufficient to convince someone that something is true or believable.  Your evidence is really important in business case development because every executive I've come up to is skeptical when it comes to approving IT investment requests.  You need to use the most compelling evidence you can find to make your calculations and claims believable.  I have seen through my years that it's reasons, not arithmetic that ultimately make a business case a success.  You have to play the role of an attorney or a detective here.  Keep your explanations logical and rational.  I have seen some cases that used reasoning that was ambiguous, illogical, or completely untrue.  I have also seen folks use weak proof.  Proof that couldn't stand up to a slight breeze let alone some good solid management push-back.
6. "Analyze".  Here is where you sit back and determine what type of information has been created from all that data you have gathered and what recommendation should be made and why.  Here is where you have to align the values to key management drivers of business success.  Your recommendations need to be logical, believable, and most importantly, clear.  You can't forget to also base your recommendations on both tangible and intangible factors.  This is really where the computation of ROI is done.  Here is where you will "do your math" and calculate the overall financial results using whatever method is requested by the executive decision makers.
7. "Explain it".  I can't stress enough that the business case "story" you are about to tell has to be easily understood.  You need to speak the audience's language.  If you do, you raise the likelihood of acceptance of your business case recommendations, and you can truly improve your audience's ability to share the message with others.  I like to use stories that illustrate key points if I can.  I'm not a big PowerPoint fan, so I would encourage you to prepare well and use the whiteboard to share the content if possible.

In today's perilous economic times IT budgets are being slashed.  CIOs are having a tough time with changes happening continuously, more of the shrinking budget is going to maintenance and integration tasks, with little left over for innovation; but it's not time to retrench.  Retrenchment will surely buy you time, but it will not buy you opportunity, growth or a future. Now is the time for virtual desktops.  With some solid planning around the business case and understanding the business and use cases you can make sure that your virtual desktop initiative is successful.

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