IT made easy (but what does ‘easy’ actually mean?)
Businesses have faced multiple challenges over the past year, not least managing a sudden, distributed workforce. There’s no doubt that IT managed services have kept many businesses productive and agile through the pandemic by enabling the switch to remote working in record time and removing what would otherwise have been a massive burden on IT teams.
Even with mass vaccinations underway, Covid-19 restrictions will likely wax and wane for some time and this is why many organisations are moving to hybrid-office models that accommodate both in-office and remote working.
In this setup, managed service providers (MSPs) once again shine and Everything-as-a-Service (XaaS) forms an integral part of the flexibility that they deliver.
Building your IT estate around managed services ensures your possibilities are unlimited in scope. You can incorporate a plethora of cloud-based services quickly and affordably, and scale up and down at the drop of a hat.
This sounds easy, and it is, but it’s also important to understand what type of ‘easy’ you really want.
- Do you want easy billing?
- Easier IT management?
- A simpler way to grow your IT cost-effectively?
Specifying the most appropriate type of ‘easy’ in line with your business requirements needs careful consideration and this needs to be communicated to your MSP.
The best managed services are delivered as part of a collaborative relationship with both parties agreeing clear objectives at the start and forging an understanding of exactly the level of IT management expected. This will allow the MSP to provide a frictionless path for the business to meet its goals, one which has flexibility and scalability built in.
Above all the agreement must be explicit. IT teams should be empowered, not bogged down by moving to a managed IT service, so this means customers should be realistic about their expectations while MSPs must also be prepared to speak out if the scope of the work starts to creep.
Navigating through difficult times can be challenging, but if companies are candid about where they need help, MSPs can deliver exactly the right combination of technology, services and expertise to help guide them towards future growth.