What is a Managed Service?
A Managed Service means you’d employ an external team to manage an IT service for you. They would provide support for some, or all, of your IT systems and infrastructure. This happens when a business introduces a new, or enhanced, IT system. It may be your company is moving from in-house infrastructure to the cloud, for example. Your business may be implementing a corporate-wide move to Microsoft Office 365, to enhance agility and collaboration. It would be practical and cost-effective to have a support and maintenance team who are experienced with the new technology.
Let’s have a look at what you should take into account when considering an external Managed Services team.
Costs
An immediate cost benefit of outsourcing your IT Managed Services is you don’t have to employ staff yourself. A professional IT Company managing your services will have a well-trained, industry-experienced team with the relevant expertise to provide support for your business. Your finance department will love the fact you agreed to a fixed monthly fee for Managed Services. Not only will you have reduced IT resourcing costs; you will have made budgeting and forecasting for IT very straightforward.
IT Security
A professional IT company will already have a wealth of experience in the provision of a Managed Service. They will have protocols and processes in place for security. They will have considered risks and have planned risk mitigation. Employees of a modern, connected business will access systems from anywhere. They will use a variety of devices such as smartphones, tablets and laptops. Your experienced, professional Managed Service provider will put security in place to cover these devices plus your network and the cloud. They may also provide you with ID and Access management, guiding your employees with their personal and data security.
Practicalities
Having a professional IT Managed Services provider will free up your in-house IT team. They will be able to concentrate on internal projects and your corporate strategies. You will be able to schedule internal IT tasks without the risk to your schedule of your employees having to also monitor and support your IT system.
An experienced and professional Managed Service provider will be proactive and seamlessly maintain your system. They will have established methodologies to ensure your IT systems have no outages. System backups will be scheduled. Software updates and security patches will be routinely deployed. Where necessary, your ongoing compliance with any industry-specific government regulations will be assured.
Outsourcing your IT support to a professional Managed Services provider will free you to concentrate on conducting your regular business and planning future company strategy.
The Service
Your own employees expect evenings and weekends away from work. Your Managed Service provider will be available to you 24 hours a day, every day of the year. A great service provider will be based in Australia. They will get to understand your business. They may identify a Service Delivery Manager giving you, and your employees, a single point of contact. You should only ever consider outsourcing your IT management to an experienced, professional and proven Service Management provider. It would be a bad and risky business decision to entrust your IT systems and infrastructure to a poorly performing Service provider.
Starboard IT Managed Services
Starboard IT have been monitoring and supporting businesses like yours for years. They have an experienced, well-trained team of professionals, with a helpdesk based in Australia. For a fixed monthly cost they will provide the support your company needs. Proven experience in monitoring and managing systems with 24-hour support and with a Service Delivery Manager available for you. Starboard IT tick all the boxes and are the professionals that you can trust with your IT Service Management. Get in touch today to discuss how we can work with you.!
If you’re looking for consultancy services on your company’s security policy, contact Starboard IT to find out what we can do for you.
