Global Tenancy Overview

Instead of doing mechanical tasks manually, which requires more effort and time, it is preferable to automate and enable the system to perform manual tasks. The same effort and time can be applied to more complex tasks. The concept of Global tenancy, as well as the ability to inherit configurations from Global tenant to Local tenant, is essential to move in this direction.

First let us understand What is Global Tenant and Local Tenant, then we can dive into what is Global Tenancy and its Key features and Advantages. This infographic illustrates concept of Global Tenancy.

Figure: Infographic Global Tenant

What is a Global Tenant?

To configure a Global Tenant for an MSP (Managed Service Provider), under which there are multiple Local Tenants for each organization/customer that the MSP will manage. In this way, an MSP can maximize the efficiency in managing each service provider according to their needs and requirements.

What is a Local Tenant?

Different customers have different needs, and it is critical to cater to each customer's needs in an appropriate manner.

All the Tenants under a Global Tenant are known as Local Tenants. The Local Tenants inherit configurations made at the Global Tenant level. These configurations that are inherited from the Global Tenant cannot be edited/modified in Local Tenants unless they have been De-linked from the Global Tenant. De-linking Global Configuration action is performed from the respective Local Tenant.

When you create the tenants as Local Tenants, such as Information Technology, Retail, Finance, Banking and so on, you have the flexibility to add different modules under different Tenants such as for Incident Management, Change Management, SLA, Impact, Priority etc. These modules are configurable based on the Customers’ needs and requirements which are best suited for their organizations.

Consider this following example for a Global Tenant named GLOBAL TENANT.

Local Tenant 1, Local Tenant 2, Local Tenant 3, and Local Tenant 4 are four Local Tenants under the GLOBAL TENANT. The configurations, such as Impact, Priority, Urgency, etc., made for Incidents under GLOBAL TENANT are available with globe icon next to the names of Local Tenants. With the help of a Global Tenant, it is easier, faster, and less error prone, to set up the configurations at the Tenant level.

Difference between Global Tenant and Local Tenant

What is Global Tenancy?

Global Tenancy is a concept of having one main Global Tenant/Domain that further branches out into multiple Sub-domains and Local Tenants.

Global Tenancy helps in reducing the time and effort involved in the manual configuration of multiple Domains and Sub-Domains as the configurations from the Global Tenant are inherited by the Sub-Domains and Local Tenants.

This is useful in an MSP (Managed Service Provider) environment which manages multiple organizations/customers.

Global Tenancy - Key Features

• Global Configurations can be created in the Global Tenant, which is indicated by a Globe icon.

• Ability to inherit the configuration created at Global Tenant to the Local Tenants automatically.

• Introduced icons to easily identify configuration with various icons displayed on the List page of Local tenant(s).
  
  

• Provision to limit the scope of configurations that are created at the Local Tenant to remain in the same Tenant.

• Configurations created at Global Tenant can be deactivated and will be reflected as deactivated in Local Tenant.
  
  

• Global values can be edited at Global Tenant and the same will be updated in Local Tenant.
  
  

• Configurations created at the Global Tenant can be deactivated at the Local Tenant and will only be reflected as deactivated in the Local Tenant.
  
  

• By Delinking, the Configurations created at the Global Tenant can be changed at the Local Tenant.

IMPORTANT:

When you create a New Tenant (Local), all the Global Tenant configurations gets inherited to the newly created Tenant, by default.

Advantages of Global Tenancy:

Global Tenancy Use Cases

Acme Services  

Consider the below scenario, where Acme Services is a Global Domain with Information Technology as the Global Tenant. Acme Services manages 7 different customers (Local Domains) namely,

• Acme Retail Industry

• Acme Fashion

• Acme Healthcare

• Acme Motors Corporation

• Acme Properties Ltd.

• Acme Communications

• Acme Media

The Tenants under the Local Domains are the Local Tenants namely Information Technology, Fashion, Retail, Telecom, Manufacturing, Support etc. 


Figure: Global Tenancy concept for an MSP

If there are 100 common configurations in each Domain, then Admin configures these values individually (manual configuration) for 7 customers, which is 1300 configurations.
[Configurations (100) * No. of Total Tenants (13)]

When a Global Tenant IT is created under a Global MSP Domain Acme Services, the configurations are created once, and this is automatically inherited to all Local Tenants under each Domain.

Outcome

With this configuration, an Admin needs to configure 100 values in the Global Tenant, which are instantly available in all Local Tenants. This eliminates the need to configure 1300 values.

Global Tenancy – Implementation

1. Creation of Global Tenant is done using backend scripts and cannot be done from the Application UI.
   Note A Global Tenant can be created only under a Global Domain.
   
   

2. Enable Global Tenant Configuration on the Application Settings page.
   
   
   Figure: Enable Global Tenant Configuration option on the Application Settings page
   
   

3. Configure the values in Global Tenant.
   
   

4. Configured values are reflected in the Local Tenant.
   
   

5. Edit the configured values in the Local Tenant.

Icon Description