Why do I need managed IT services? This is an important question to ask when you have a business full of computers, servers and employees.

What will I get with managed services that I couldn’t get with a break-fix solution?

 

Information technology (IT) systems are expected to meet high standards of operation, while offering 24/7 availability, security, and performance. In today’s environment, you have to keep pace with the constant changes in IT, performance demands, and pressure to deliver competitive IT functionality. To meet these challenges, many organisations consider outsourcing their IT activities. A Managed Services Provider (MSP) lets you delegate specific IT operations to them.

 

The MSP is then responsible for monitoring, managing and/or problem resolution for your IT systems and functions as well as automate the mundane tasks that users can and should do, but often overlook. This includes virus updates, software updates and patches, backups, monitoring and inventory, auditing and control. Basic services often start with a monitoring service, the MSP will notify you of problems, but you have to resolve them on your own. More intensive services cover everything from alerts through to problem resolution.

 

What’s important to keep in mind with managed services is that it is preventative maintenance, not preventative breakage. While managed services can perform automated tasks, such as alerting when a backup has failed, pushing out patches, monitoring systems and generally optimising the working environment, no amount of preventative maintenance can avoid hardware failures, database corruption, software crashes, or some virus/spyware intrusions.

 

Managed services is about shifting the odds against a catastrophic failure into a more favourable position, so when a catastrophe does occur, backups will be verified and current, an inventory of the systems can be referenced, and repair time and data loss can be limited.

 

MSPs act as an extension of your IT department, taking care of routine IT infrastructure monitoring and management around the clock and freeing up your staff to focus on more important projects. An MSP proactively monitors and maintains your systems in order to help you avoid problems and downtime.

 

Outsourcing IT is not like outsourcing other services. You maintain control. You decide what you want your provider to take care of and what you want to handle yourself. In addition, the MSP subscription model gives you more budget predictability. MSPs have become an attractive option for many organisations and should be an integral part of your overall business strategy, involving senior executives and key IT staff