Identifying, Developing, or Buying NNM Training

For a large, enterprise-wide rollout of NNM, a great many users will require training. A 20-site rollout with 10 users per site means 200 training units have to be purchased. Not all users have the same training needs. Training needs can be loosely grouped into three categories: full, dual, and basic.

The IT staff probably builds, configures, updates, and patches the NNM systems remotely, so these administrators are already trained simply because they are the same people responsible for the pilot test. These people need the full NNM training. The remote user community falls loosely into the two remaining categories. The users that need to configure the NNM tool (such as the map builders) or conduct ad-hoc data collections (such as the capacity planners) should take dual training that covers both administration and use of NNM. Users that take advantage of predefined functionality need only basic user training.

HP provides NNM customer training all over the world, and customers travel to conveniently located training centers to take basic or advanced classes. Equipment is generally limited to a simple classroom lab environment. HP also provides on-site classes at customer locations. When the economies of scale apply, customers with many students find this approach economical, with the additional benefit that students can train directly on their corporate network.

Ideally, the training that users receive is delivered at their own facilities using the corporate network and working on their customized version of NNM as delivered by the IT group. This conflicts with vendor-supplied training that is uniformly delivered and dependent on repeatable labs and exercises. Consequently, the IT group in large companies may recruit their corporate training group to develop in-house, customized NNM training. Alternately, the IT group may contract their favorite NNM training supplier to deliver a customized on-site course.