The attempt to connect to http://servername.domain.com/PowerShell using Kerberos authentication failed

“The attempt to connect to http://ExchangeServer.domain.com/PowerShell using “Kerberos” authentication failed: connecting to remote server failed with the following error message : The WinRM client cannot complete the operation within the time specified.  Check if the machine name is valid and is reachable over the network and firewall exception for Windows Remote Management service is enabled.  For more information, see the about_Remote_Troubleshooting Help topic.”

You might notice above error message after opening a Exchange Management Console. This error message indicates that connecting to given exchange server using WinRM has failed. Today I received the same error and verified that exchange is doing well on this box. I tried opening the console from different server and it worked file. So, it appeared some sort of profile problem to me.

I did the following to resolve the issue.

1. Close Exchange Management Console MMC
2. Go to %appdata%\Microsoft\MMC
3. Rename “Exchange Management Console” file to “Exchange Management Console.old”
4. Launch the console again.

Hope this helps…