• Online Training Survey (April - May 2008)
• Bi-Annual tivoli-ug.org website satisfaction survey (April 2008)
• Tivoli Certification (March 2008)
• IBM PULSE (Dec 07 - Feb 08)

• Middleware and Operating System Adoption Rate (Aug - Sept 2007)
• Tivoli Integration Module Survey (June - July 2007)
• Customer Portal on ibm.com (May 2007)
• Server Virtualization (April 2007)
• Communication Preferences (Feb 2007 - Mar 2007)

Thank you to the 228 people who filled out the Bi-yearly TUG website satisfaction survey! With 91% of you satisfied with the website we still have some improvements to make. Base on your comments we are looking into the following:

• Better promotion of current capabilities
• Better website navigation
• More Maximo content
• More Dynamic Pages
• More interactive hints and tips

Look for a new website redesign/refresh in 2nd half of 2008.

When asked if the TUG website has solved problems, we received the following answers:

• "There have been so many issues we have received help with because of TUG; even undocumented features"
• "TUG Newsletter provided me with the latest Tivoli Product information."
• "Use it for researching errors and problems on a regular basis"
• "Helped me identify the correct choice of server for my Maximo implementation"

128 User Group members took the time to complete the Online Training Survey available in April and May.  Here are some of the results.

Off those surveyed
65% will require training or manage a team that requires training.
69% select their own courses.  20% have a manager who makes the selection.
80% must get approval from their manager or upper management to purchase training.
Compared to the 2007 training survey there was an increase of 7% in the percentage of students who have 1 to 10 training days allocated by their organization.
63% plan to purchase online training in 2008 with Web Based Training and Instructor-Led Online classes as the most likely types to be purchased.
80% have the necessary hardware and software to attend Instructor-Led Online classes.
44% take the certification exam after completing the training for a product.
The number of people selecting “Small or no training budget” as the reason for not attending training has decreased by 6% vs. the 2007 survey.  This is the second year in a row that the percentage of people selecting this reason has decreased.
12% need help deciding what courses to attend.

IBM Tivoli Training would like to thank all of you who took the time to complete the survey.  Your responses will help us design the next Tivoli Online Training platform.  We appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule and we value your feedback.

Tivoli Certification (March 2008)
38 Respondents: 3/5/2008-3/31/2008

Of those surveyed:

• The top 5 methods for certification preparation/study include:
  • Self study (20%)
  • Exam objectives available on Tivoli Certification site (18%)
  • Sample Test available free on Tivoli Certification site (15%)
  • Tivoli Certification study guides (15%)
  • On line training (13%)
• 33% receive information about the Tivoli Professional Certification Program from the program's website: specifically information about certifications and exams (37%) and program-related news (21%).
• 27% of TUG Cert Zone users find the "Certification Resources and Quick Links" area the most useful for Tivoli Certification information.
• 53% found the assessment tests on PRIME an effective and helpful way to prepare for the certification exam.
• 42% take advantage of promotions and special discount offers.
• 29% subscribe to the Tivoli Certification e-newsletter.
• The two main reasons for pursuing Tivoli Certification included skill growth/development (31%) and career advancement (24%).

• 39% had heard or read information about IBM Pulse prior to the survey
• Of those who had heard of IBM Pulse an E-Mail notification was the most common communication tool
• 24% were planning on attending PULSE while 51% were undecided as the time
• Relevance of curriculum was the most important factor for determining whether to attend
• Labs & Certifications was the number one feature of what Pulse will offer followed by Networking Opportunities and Sponsor-Driven Education (IBM led sessions)
• About half of the respondents would preferred to have longer sessions that provide more content depth, and the other half wanted shorter session allowing to cover many topics and products
• 64% prefer an E-Mail notification as the best way to provide information about IBM Pulse.

Middleware and Operating System Adoption Rate Survey
Thank you to all 260 people who responded to the August 1 through September 29, 2007 Middleware and Operating System Adoption Rate Survey. The primary focus of this survey was to better understand how quickly our customers adopt new releases and phase out old releases of distributed (non-mainframe) operating systems and middleware that a Tivoli product may depend upon. This survey is helping us to better align our middleware and operating system prerequisite support with the needs of our customers by gaining an improved understanding of:

• How long we should wait after a new middleware or operating system release is generally available before we add Tivoli product function that requires that new release.
• How quickly our existing Tivoli product function should support a new middleware or operating system release.

Some immediate things that we learned from the survey include:

• New middleware releases tend to get put into production either right away or -- more likely -- 13-18 months after they are made available.
• Operating system and middleware fix-packs and service-packs tend to get into production within 6 months.
• About a third of our responders have policies that govern how quickly things can be put into production. Nearly half do not have such a policy.
• Most operating system and middleware releases stay in production about 2 years though the responses varied greatly from 1 to 4 years.
• Most of you keep 2 releases of a given operating systems or middleware in your production environments, Some of you keep 5 or more releases in production at the same time.

Tivoli Integration Module Survey
389 people participated in the Tivoli Integration Module Survey, which ran May 31 to August 1, 2007. Thank you to those of you who took the survey. The primary focus for this survey was to validate the usage and usability of various features that currently exist in the Open Process Automation Library (OPAL) On line Catalog and possible new features that could be implemented in OPAL .

Here are the results of the survey:

• 36% were aware of OPAL which is a 16% increase from the 2006 survey.
• There is an increase in the number of integration modules that have gone into a production environment
• 35% want the ability to provide a rating and review for integrations that they use. 30% indicated ratings and reviews from other users impact their decision to use an integration.
• The top three features that are important when searching for integrations , the ability to search by: 1) Product 2) Solution, such as Service Desk and 3) Open Search Field versus Searching by Integration Type, Industry, ITIL processes.
• Summary of repeated comments: IBM is the preferred vendor where people go to get integration modules for their Service Management environment.

What we, IBM/Tivoli  learned, was even though there was a 16% increase in the number of people who are aware of the OPAL catalog from last year, continued communication and broadcasting to customers about the 600+ integration modules in the catalog is necessary.

TUC Members Communications Preferences
Thanks to the 285 Tivoli User Group members who responded to a survey on communications preferences that was conducted in February and March. Here are highlights from the survey.

When asked what forms of communications they preferred to receive from IBM on new products, events and other news:

• 37% said an e-newsletter
• 25% said the Tivoli or TUC Web site
• 24% said Tivoli or TUC events
• 11% said webcasts; only 5% said podcasts

When asked what IBM news interests them the most:

• 27% said getting more from existing products
• 24% said new products
• 15% said Tivoli events
• 11% said IBM strategy and news
• 6% said upcoming podcasts and webcasts
• Only 5% said new business trends

When asked how often they preferred to receive communications from IBM:

• 52% said weekly
• 31% said monthly
• Only 4% said daily or quarterly

When asked which IBM e-publications they read regularly:

• 31% said IBM Tivoli Monitoring Newsletter
• 29% said IBM Software Newsletter
• 21% said Tivoli Advisor

When asked which IBM Web sites they visit regularly:

• 49% said www.ibm.com/software/tivoli/
• 17% said www.ibm.com/itsm
• 14% said http://www-306.ibm.com/software/Tivoli/ Tivoli user groups/index.html

Two questions were specific to the TUC Web site (www.tivoli-ug.org)

When asked if they'd ever contributed content to the TUC site, 94% of survey respondents said no.

When asked which incentives were most likely to motivate them to contribute content to the TUC site:

• 27% said a personal technology item as a recognition gift for top contributors
• 25% said a thank-you letter from IBM that is also sent to the contributor's company
• 20% said receiving recognition for contributions at a TUC event or on the TUC site
• 20% said being named or featured on the TUC site as a contributor

Thanks again for your participation in the survey. Your communications preferences will be communicated to the Tivoli Marketing and Communications organization through internal e-newsletters. Your opinions will help us develop and offer you more effective communications in the future.

Summary of Server Virtualization Survey

Over 120 responses to the survey

Major virtualization platforms used in production:

VMware(46%), System p AIX(31%), Microsoft Virtual Server(13%), Sun Solaris Containers (10%)

ITM, TSM, CCMDB, TAM, TPM, TWS, TIM, TLCM, TSLA, ITUAM, TSA/MP

• Sever Consolidation & Reduce Server Hardware purchases
• Business Continuity & Disaster Recovery
• Improve Server Utilization
• Reduce floor space requirements

Online Tivoli Training Survey
245 User Group members took the time to complete the Online Training Survey available in December and January. Here are some of the results.

Off those surveyed

• 75% will require training or manage a team that requires training.
• 62% select their own courses. 25% have a manager who makes the selection.
• 85% must get approval from their manager or upper management to purchase training.
• Compared to the 2005 training survey there was a 10% increase in the percentage of students who have no training days allocated by their organization – from 8% to 18%.
• Only 6% of those surveyed purchased online training in 2006.
• 80% plan to purchase online training in 2007 with Web Based Training, remote lab and the combination of the two as the most likely types to be purchased.
• For 69%, “downloadable courses/content” is the most important feature of an online training platform.
• The number of people selecting “Small or no training budget” as the reason for not attending training has decreased 5% vs. the 2005 survey.
• 15% need help deciding what courses to attend

Proactive LIVE Chat assistance
Thanks to the 280 of you who took the time to tell IBM what you thought of the initiative to offer proactive live chat assistance on the Tivoli Web site.

Your response was crucial in IBM's decision to move forward with this rather unique program. The Survey results were overwhelmingly supportive of the idea:

• 67-70% of respondents hadn't used or encountered live chat assistance functionality before
• 74% said they would take advantage of it
• 85% said they would use the Tivoli site as often or more often if it had this functionality
• 94% of you have a positive view of IBM's motivation for offering this assistance. (Great news for IBM!)
• The one anomaly we encountered is that many respondents apparently do NOT believe IBM is concerned about and protective of visitors' privacy. (This area of concern is a surprise because IBM has an industry-leading privacy policy as well as a corporate culture that is very protective of customers' privacy, but clearly, some work needs to be done about communicating this.) Despite this you still liked the idea of proactive chat assistance.

TUC Website Satisfaction Survey
Thank you to the over 340 of you who filled out the October 2006 TUC website Satisfaction Survey.

The results indicated that approximately 91% of you, the respondents, were either very satisfied or satisfied with the Community overall. We had a slight improvement with regards to the satisfaction of the content on the website and will continue to increase the communication to our members.

Here are a few accomplishments in 2006 based on the September 2005 survey actions:

1. Include a new member checklist (What should I focus on within the Community) Done - http://www.tivoli-ug.org/steps
2. Improve the Navigation on the site Done - reorganized a few areas
3. Add search capability Done - http://www.tivoli-ug.org/cgi-bin/htsearch
4. Add Product Roadmap/more technical information Done - http://www.tivoli-ug.org/product.php
5. More promotion of communication services (increase awareness among Community) Done - http://www.tivoli-ug.org/newsletter.php
6. More information on the benefits of using Tivoli products, to help sell using it. Done - http://www.tivoli-ug.org/references.php
7. Publicize more GTUG council information to the website Done - http://www.tivoli-ug.org/gtug.php

Thank you GTUG council committe.

Support Technical Exchange program (STE)
Of the 318 respondents 78% had not heard of the STE program prior to taking the survey.

For the 38 people who had heard of STEs the breakdown is:
34% heard of the STEs by receiving a invitation forwarded to them.
34% heard of the STEs through the certification program.
18% heard of the STEs directly from Tivoli Support.
14% heard of the STEs from the GTUG website or from GTUG meetings.

Of the 178 respondents only 8% have attended a STE event.

When asked if they had a topic or product they would like to see covered the response was:
29% provided topics they would like to see covered.

When asked if they would participate in an STE designed to help pass a certification exam the response was:
73% of the respondents answered yes, they would participate in an STE designed to help pass a certification exam.

Thanks again to everyone who participated!

Tivoli Product Extensions Survey
June and July are heavy vacation month so thank you to the 149 people who took the Tivoli Product Extensions Survey from June 5 to July 1, 2006. Here are the survey results:

• We learned that 55% of you said that product extensions were needed when your department purchased an IT management software product and 85% of you thought that product extensions influenced your selection of product/brand.
• 83% favorably agreed that the reason you use IBM or IBM Business Partner product extensions is to shorten deployment time with 76% of you agreeing that product extensions reduce the need for application domain expertise.

• When prioritizing the attributes of a product extension by importance, to consider it of value or useful, 80% consider functionally tested very important , 66% considered fully supported very important, 61% considered performance tested as very important and 39% would consider as-is as very important
• When it comes to using other customer developed product extensions, 60% of you thought that they would be of value/useful. When ranking the attributes of customer developed product extensions the prioritization was the same as IBM or IBM Business Partner developed extensions- 68% thought functionally tested was very important , 54% thought fully supported was very important, 52% thought performance testing was very important and 32% considered As-Is customer developed extensions very important.

• 82% thought that customer references also played a role in determining the importance/value of a product extension
• We learned that 68% of you were not aware of the Tivoli Open Process Automation Library (OPAL) that contains Tivoli product extensions developed by IBM Business Partner and IBM. However, the majority of you who used OPAL were able to find what you were looking for.

Thank you again to everyone who participated, we will consider your responses in our planning efforts.

IT Problem Management Survey
Thank you to the over 240 of you who filled out the IT Problem Management Survey in April/May 2006.

We learned performing root cause analysis and problem determination is still a very manual process in most companies, but 1/2 of you have IT staffs that are able to isolate the root cause of most problems in less that a day.

We also learned a few things about performing problem determination and root cause analysis in your environment:

• about 68% of companies that participated in the survey have more than 1000 people in their company
• about 78% of your IT organizations have more than 10 staff member
• about 45% said their IT teams need to gather in a room sometimes to preform problem determination and root cause analysis
• 1/3 have between 11 - 20+ problems per month that need to be assigned to someone for further analysis
• 1/2 are using homegrown or no tools for problem determination and root cause analysis , while 1/3 are using multiple vendor tools
• In 40% of companies the system administrator is making the decision on what tools to use for further root cause analysis and problem determination
• 1/3 of companies feel their current problem determination tools are inadequate
• 1/3 of companies spend more that 1 day performing root cause analysis and problem determination

IT Needs Survey
Our sincere appreciation to all of those who filled out the IT Needs Survey that ran in February and March this year.

We learned that server performance, application performance and backup/recovery are the top three software functions of importance to your IT organizations, and that most of you are following established/documented procedures for IT operations. Also, while some (13%) always follow those procedures, nearly half of you (48%) follow them most of the time.

We also learned a few things about the environments you support. For example:

• 74% of you support applications that have to meet an availability target specified by your users
• about 80% of your IT organizations have more than 10 full-time staff members
• 2/3 are supporting more than 100 Windows servers
• 1/3 are supporting more than 100 Linux servers
• 1/4 are supporting more than 100 Unix servers
• more than half are supporting at least 1 mainframe, 15% are supporting more than 10 of them
• most of you are managing more than one brand of database
• you are split about evenly between Lotus Notes/Domino and Microsoft Exchange for e-mail, with some supporting both as well as other e-mail products

While the median expected price was $50K, a vendor like IBM would appear to have quite a bit of flexibility since the expected prices ranged from "free" to "50 million dollars." That leaves plenty of room for creativity in writing value propositions and setting goals for Sales.

Thanks again to everyone who participated!