Managed services is the term for when a company partners with a third-party service provider to handle the complete operations of an aspect or department within the company, in most cases these are IT related services. In the age of exponential growth, the quality of IT infrastructure and IT proficiencies can make or break a business. Managed Services were essentially a response to complex problems that emerged unforeseen in various stages over the lifecycle of evolving systems. Born alongside expanding IT networks and infrastructures, Managed Services bring hard-learnt lessons and global best practices to adopters.
Here we explore some broad aspects of the efficiencies that Managed Services bring to IT:
A complete Product Team in your reach without the management strings to pull:
Managed Services are backed by a team which adopts the Product Team Model – comprising of professionals who are adept at everything that goes into building, deploying and running a product. Members cover the gamut of expertise from Business Analytics (BA), Development, Quality Analysis (QA), DevOps as well as Support & Maintenance.
The client company would usually require considerable resource allocation and possibly face existing workflow disruption in taking up a given endeavor. In these cases, Managed Services comes to the rescue, taking on the project from solution ideation (BA), implementation (Development), testing (QA) and deployment (DevOps) to ongoing support & maintenance.
Proactive Approach to identify and solve potential issues before they arise:
The managed service teams know the product in and out and monitor functions, changes and updates on a day-to-day basis, scouting for any bugs or roadblocks beforehand rather than being resigned to react to issues once they arise.
This saves organization large amounts of downtime and potential revenue and productivity loss, while ensuring optimal experience for the end-customer. Several periodic custom reports ensure that everyone concerned is aware in time of anything that may require their attention, or merits innovation.
With power (ownership) comes responsibility, that is shouldered mightily:
Nurturing a project from initiation to operation and iteration, conveys a sense of ownership to managed service teams, which is answered with empowered innovation. There are no piecemeal fixes, nor ‘it’s not going to be my problem tomorrow’ attitude. The solution doesn’t end at a ticked checklist item, it is about ensuring that desired business, operations and customer goals are met, thresholds raised and continually optimized.
The highly-demanding nature of such asks results in building and deploying of several innovative custom utilities, tools and automation processes to overclock efficiency and simplify tasks. Said utilities then become part and parcel of the IP & working culture of the client, helping in consistently doing more with less.
Flexible, Always-Available, On-Demand Service:
With so much invested in each account, clients are evermore precious for Managed Service providers. Client retention requires catering to ad-hoc requirements with full-fledged zeal and top-notch quality.
For instance, a client may need analysis of Supplies vs. Orders/ Inventory vs. Demand/ Logistics & Distribution route optimization etc. to meet sales targets, reduce costs, extend serviceable geographies or prepare for peak season; at very short notice. Managed Service providers rise up to the challenge of ensuring and demonstrating the ultimate usefulness of their work in such decisive moments, as well as remain flexible to adapting towards evolving business needs.
Automating all that can be automated:
Managed Services in many respects revolve around automating IT and even operational or administrative tasks wherever feasible. Remote Monitoring & Management (RMM) keeps a tab on critical tasks like diagnosis, alerts and performance analysis, controlling and effective reducing future occurrences of bugs and issues. Tools like Auto Fluence help optimize effort expenditure through various intuitive dashboard interfaces like Snapshot, Exceptions & Time Series – revealing various data streams in a single place, bypassing multiple application log-ins. Jmeter is employed for Regression Testing and Performance Testing, to test applications under a given load, besides testing the functionality and workflow. Each time a new functionality or feature is released, Automation Scripts can be run to ensure a seamless release.
Professional Services Automation (PSA) takes the bulk off administrative tasks such as transaction logging, billing, numerous protocols of customer account management and so on. RMM & PSA are often integrated for smooth coupling and further enhancing mutual efficiencies.
These practices help reduce repetitive tasks, reduce costs, eliminate the scope of manual errors and ensure quality, while freeing up your workforce for more challenging and enriching tasks.
In the wake of COVID-19 induced disruptions across all walks of life and work, Managed Services can help you chart a safe course to recovery, by digitizing and automating many aspects of IT, controlling cost & time expenditures and directly or indirectly ensuring better customer experience and retention.
In summary, here are the highlights on what you can expect from Managed IT Services:
- Robust 24/7 IT infrastructure management
- Access to a highly-skilled contingent product team on demand
- Decreased OpEx spending
- Automation and simplification of tasks
- Faster response time for tickets
- Automatic upgrades of IT tools and applications
- Peace of Mind to focus on core competencies
- Seamless Data Management, Back-up & Recovery
- Unified organization-wide data and intelligence
Acuver Consulting offers a host of Managed Services & On-Demand Consultation and Support. If you’d like an expert opinion on what types of services could help you achieve rapid ROI, please get in touch with us today.
