Introduction
Halian has sourced and placed six key personnel to provide first, second and applications level support for the Sun Solaris platform at a major global bank’s data centre in Brussels, Belgium. The system is a business critical infrastructure function that protects confidential client data and manages large volumes of customer transactions.

The placements represent “win-back” business for Halian who originally managed the bank’s Solaris infrastructure in partnership with Sun Microsystems. In March 2007 a corporate decision transferred the function to another IT supplier but in just nine months, these new arrangements proved unsatisfactory at every level prompting a Halian recall.

Background
Halian’s original contract with the bank goes back to the end of 2004 when the company began first level support for the Solaris platform.

Finding and managing operators of the right experience and calibre for such functions is a core Halian service and involves candidates being technically vetted and screened to establish their skills in core Sun Microsystems technologies.

However, a central decision taken outside Belgium terminated this arrangement which had successfully operated for two and a half years, transferring the contract instead to a Dutch provider.

In just nine months, what had previously been a professionally managed and quality resource was made unreliable and turned into a potentially damaging business liability for the Bank. Some personnel placed by the new provider were found not to have the right skill sets while sub-contractual arrangements caused other uncertainties, including erratic salary payments and staff walk-outs.

The situation became rapidly untenable for the bank as its key Solaris infrastructure was left without the 24/7 support it needed to protect customer transactions.

Solution
Because of the urgency of the situation, Halian had to begin recruitment of six replacement staff over the Christmas period making sure they possessed the right credentials and qualities to fulfil the key support roles.

“The bank came back to us because of our previous working relationship and because they know we have access to good, qualified people,” explained Halian’s Business Development Manager, Caroline Renoux. “Our challenge was to get them in place quickly and up and running to minimise any systems vulnerability.”

Halian’s response was fast and immediate with the first two resources ready to start on 2 January 2008. The team now comprises three on first level Solaris support, two on second level support and one on SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications) application support. The latter was itself problematic – SWIFT application specialists are few and far between and was a resource the bank did not have on its own in-house team.

In common with all Halian managed services contracts, there is also a team leader who is on-site twice weekly to ensure all manpower issues are properly addressed in step with the bank’s technical requirements. 

“Normally we’d like to get people on board progressively so they can acclimatise to the client’s culture and working operations,” added Caroline. “Happily we were able to approach some of the original team – we maintain a database of qualified personnel to service all our various support contracts – and were also able to tap into our own European network of high calibre resources.”
“That gave us the capacity to call upon people not just in Belgium, but from Poland, France, Germany and the UK as well to get the right technical and cultural fit.”

Outcomes/Benefits
The bank had its Solaris support back up to full 24/7 capability in a matter of weeks, thanks to Halian’s urgent response to the resource crisis the bank found itself in, and is now confident that this business essential is properly manned and managed.

This, in turn, has restored confidence in the data centre function throughout the organisation.
“We re-won the support contract because of the quality of our people,” Caroline Renoux went on. “Good relationships are important to Halian and are the basis of all our managed services contracts.

“The bank made a corporate decision that back-fired in part because the new provider did not understand the bank’s operating culture. But thanks to the strength of our working relationship with them, we were able to step in at short notice and restore this critical function to the right levels.”

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