Managed service considerations

Is your company still calling its system
integrator whenever there is a problem? What if there were no problems

in the first place? Wouldn’t your IT people have more time to work on all new
projects, rather than having to spend
their time putting out fires every day?
Sound good? If so, you may want to consider working with a managed service
provider.

“Managed service is not a new concept,”
says Clay Price, senior consultant with
Systems Evolution Inc. in San Antonio. “It’s
the practice of providing complete
accountability for a company’s networked
system. What is different, however, is the
way providers structure and present their
offerings.”

Price says that managed service is the
wave of the future. “Under the old
model, a systems integrator would wait
for the client to call with a problem,” he
says. “The new model is proactive,
designed to ensure that the client
remains productive and profitable at all
times.”

Smart Business spoke with Price about
the value proposition of managed services.

Can you define managed service?

Managed service is often bandied about.
It is rarely well-defined. At Systems
Evolution, we define it as infrastructure
management and optimization to provide
the highest level of productivity and
accountability to the client.

Managed service should entail a proactive approach, encompassing:

Computer, device and server management, including basic proactive and
preventive management, as well as preventive maintenance through monitoring and reacting to pre-failure conditions.

Security and networking, providing
physical and logical security barrier implementations.

Data protection and recovery, ensuring all user and business data are properly
backed up.

Communications and collaboration,
unified messaging, e-mail, voice, etc.

Why would a company want to consider a
managed service arrangement?

First, it allows the company to move IT
from a variable cost to a fixed, predictable
expense. It allows the company to leverage
its IT staff’s time and knowledge by freeing
them up to focus on strategic, productivity-enhancing projects and training, instead of
the daily minutiae of desktop support.

Next, managed service provides faster
response time and less downtime. Under
the old model, systems integrators would
make money while the client was losing
money. Under the new model, managed
service providers make money while the
client is making money — a mutually beneficial proposition.

Importantly, a managed service agreement can provide greater peace of mind.
Networks are vulnerable. Managed service
providers ensure that all workstations are
up-to-date and fully protected from viruses, hackers and system crashes. Today’s
businesses are now highly dependent on IT
to conduct business. System failures can
seriously derail a company’s operations
and possibly even put some companies out
of business. For example, consider the
consequences of a major system failure for
a CPA firm on April 1.

How do managed service providers differ in
their approach?

One approach is a business proposition
based on the Microsoft Operations
Framework (MOF). Simply stated, this is a
suite of best practices and business processes designed to facilitate the optimization of a
client’s infrastructure. The purpose is to
increase productivity while decreasing costs
through identification and automation of
key business tools and processes.

MOF provides guidance for a managed
service provider aiming to assist its clients
in the following areas.

Optimization — helping to guide the
company into more effective service-level
management, capacity planning and other
long-range planning efforts.

Support — supporting the organization
to help it better align its IT services with its
business processes.

Change — managing IT services to the
same level that a company expects from
the rest of its business processes.

Operations — improving operational efficiency, allowing the company to free up internal IT staff resources, expand and align services with the business, and achieve a stronger
infrastructure ready to meet the ever-increasing demands for availability and security.

What should a company look for in a managed services provider?

What is the provider’s value proposition?
Does it plan to get deeply involved in your
business procedures? Is it going to take the
time to truly understand your business, or
does it just fix problems? Look for a vendor
that comes in, asks questions and helps you
understand the realities of your system and
its future potential. Make sure the vendor will
be accountable for providing fast response,
quick resolution and stable costs. Ask about
its monitoring equipment and remote management tools. Overall, the vendor should
provide a proactive service program to maintain a secure, reliable and optimized system.

CLAY PRICE is a senior consultant with Systems Evolution Inc.,
San Antonio. Reach him at [email protected] or
(210) 734-2664.