The brittle old geek with years of experience can't get a word in, as the
young system administrator, tells everyone how to concentrate on their expertise
and let others do what they do the best. “You are great in making branded
products for your consumers but IT infrastructure management is like a Russian
bird to you”, he says.
It is a blessing that business leaders have begun to understand that,
technologies are critically important today not only for everyday business
operations but also business continuity. More technology-centric businesses
employ their own technical staff to build, deploy and support software that is a
unique part of their business. Regardless of your level of IT sophistication,
the management and support of business infrastructure is most likely not a core
competency.
The solution hence is outsourcing the IT Infrastructure to professionally
competent companies.
Let's have a look at the mantras of IT infrastructure outsourcing.
Focus on your core competency- IT infrastructure management is not a
core competency of your company. You may be a world leader in planning go to
market strategy for your clients , provide them with the best of legal services
or even manufacture industrial products for them. The IT Infrastructure
supporting all or any of these core activities is not a direct revenue
generation function for your organization. However it has a definite bearing on
both your topline as well profitability.
So while you focus on your core business, leave the IT Infrastructure
management to those whose core business is just that i.e. IT Infrastructure.
However, you should be very careful in choosing the right outsourcing vendor
matching your business needs.
Predictable costs over time- There are 2 distinct advantages here; you
can fix the cost of managing your IT Infrastructure by out sourcing the same
instead of fire fighting with an ever increasing spend, or the cost of out
sourcing IT Infrastructure Management always works out to be more cost effective
if all the factors like recruitment cost, attrition cost, employee support cost
et all are taken into consideration. IT infrastructures can experience
significant cost savings. You can save 20-30% on overall costs to support your
IT infrastructure. Most companies are not accounting for all the costs
associated with employing good technical resources and tools to support their
infrastructure. The cost of IT staff includes salaries, vacation, sick time,
software for help desk management, upkeep on technical training and
certifications, and general business overheads — not to mention the cost of
employee turnover. These costs also do not include hiring specialized IT
resources when more complex issues arise — a service usually provided as part of
an overall service agreement with an IT outsourcing company.
Service Level Agreements (SLAs) - Experienced IT services companies
provide you with the control over the work that gets done through Serice Level
Agreements (SLAs), so you always know what you're paying for. The best IT
outsourcing companies provide you with the right kind of tools with customized
dashboards, so you can monitor work being done real-time. This gives you
visibility into how infrastructure support work is being assigned and completed
and how satisfied your systems users are with the service they are receiving.
A right mix of own team and out sourcing - You can supplement employed
technical staff to improve overall performance and efficiencies by outsouring
the repetitive and volume part of the scope. A fixed schedule maintenance and
support agreement that covers specified areas of technical support can be an
important part of a proactive approach to supporting your IT infrastructure.
This can ensure that the basics are getting covered while internal staff focus
on new demands and the strategic roadmap for the organisation.
No need to hire in house technical expertise — The ever changing
business dynamics and thus the need for various technologies, platforms and
skill levels creates a challenge to keep hiring technically skilled resources in
different technologies, platforms and levels. A professional outsourcing partner
will make this seem easy through a consistent process of scope evaluation and
thus suitable solution.
If you feel like the only way to support your IT infrastructure is by hiring
employees you should explore your options. There are several options for IT
outsourcing that most business leaders do not realize they have. There are free
and easy ways to explore your needs, potential costs and qualified IT services
firms with no obligation to buy and keeping your name private so you won't be
solicited.
Your business might be growing or changing and your existing IT resources may
not be adequate to keep up. If your IT support is having trouble keeping up with
the pace of change they often are not fulfilling requests on time or are
'learning on the job' to try to support your business — it's time for a change.
Your business has a frequent need for specialized technical expertise so you
hire them as needed. If you find yourself needing to bring in technical
expertise on a regular basis this might be a signal that your existing IT
resources are not adequate. You might be able to contract with an IT service
company on a fixed-fee arrangement to handle your specialized needs and reduce
spikes in expenses due to hiring a specialist.
Reactive to proactive to predictive IT Infrastructure Monitoring and
Management — The right out sourcing partner based on the experience, tools &
technologies will ensure that the total uptime of your IT Infratsructure
improves consistently. Optimisation of the existing IT Infrastructure ensures
that you are able to serve your customer — your business better along with a
better return on investment (ROI) on your IT spend.
You are experiencing more systems outages or down-time than you would like.
This may be an indication there is no one monitoring your machines to warn you
before outages occur. The best IT outsourcing companies have monitoring options
that helps you to be more proactive about system stability to reduce downtime.
You are looking for more ways to make your business competitive and feel your
existing IT resources 'just don't get it'. Sometimes the best hired technical
resources are exceptional at fixing problems with technology, but don't seem to
understand where you are trying to take your business. Improper IT planning for
changes in business strategies can lead to more costly IT problems.
To save money you have given the responsibility to manage the IT resources to
an executive who has other responsibilities. Sometimes a Controller or a person
with additional responsibilities is handed the task of managing the IT
infrastructure. Companies think they are saving money by having one person with
dual roles. In reality, performance in both job functions suffers because more
time is spent on problems in the area that person is weakest an hence
productivity goes down. Hiring an outsourced IT professional improves
productivity because qualified resources can focus on what they do best.
Single Window Approach
The outsourcing approach leads to a single window approach for all your IT
Infrastructure requirements spanning from Data Center management to end user
computing to multi vendor management. This in turn saves effort, time & money in
allocating various resources for each domain thus improving the ROI.
By outsourcing, you reduce the cost of managing infrastructure. This can be
extremely helpful in any stage-setup, maintenance, and of course, expansion.
Aseet Pal Malik, Progressive Infotech