Welcome to The Utility View
2010.03 -
Co-Managed IT Services: A New Partnership between Internal and External IT
TUV Feature Story > The feature portion of this month's TUV discusses an emerging technology services model, called co-managed IT services, which provides a virtual IT department resulting in a “win-win” program for both the CFO and IT manager.. Read the full story >
From Our Customers > Many service providers will claim to be managed services providers (MSPs) offering proactive technology support, but most aren't really proactive. Why do YOU need proactive IT services? Our customers explain what the value of true managed services is to them in this month's Success Story >
Over the past decade, managed services has evolved as the preferred model for small businesses (under 50-employees) to consume information technology (IT) service and support. Although many providers today seemingly claim to deliver managed IT services - where technology is monitored and maintained remotely and proactively for a fixed monthly fee - it is estimated that only 10% of small and medium-sized businesses (SMB) are actually supported in this manner. That said, analyst group AMI Partner’s November 2009 study stated that there are approximately 7.26M SMBs with 68M PCs and servers in North America and predicts managed services to grow by 28% annually.
To a large degree, with small businesses, the challenge is educating the budget-holder (usually controller) on true managed services and its benefits. With mid-sized business (50-250 employees), even though the model resonates well with the CFO, managed services has typically been perceived as a threat to internal IT and thus most of these initiatives end up on the “cutting room floor”.
This month we will discuss an emerging model, called co-managed IT services, which provides a virtual IT department resulting in a “win-win” program for both the CFO and IT manager.
What Are Co-Managed IT Services?
In our January 2010 newsletter “Is it Time to Consider a Virtual IT Department” we discussed the importance of technology coupled with its cost, particularly since the recent economic downturn, has resulted in the CFO now “owning” the technology budget and resources. The challenge for most IT managers with traditional managed services is lack of control and inability to effectively manage the managed service provider (MSP) or customize the service program. Co-managed IT services provides IT managers all the benefits of the MSP model (proactive, remote, predictable service and fees), but also delivers control and customization capability, including a fixed or usage-based fee structures.
Co-managed IT services allows internal IT departments to extend their capabilities through a partnership approach leveraging the external MSP to augment the key areas of service and support, ranging from end-user helpdesk to information security to vertical business applications to the network operations center. The key element of this type of arrangement is the transparency (and control) afforded through a shared, co-managed service desk system, including ticketing, service metric, security and performance reporting.
People, Process and Technology
The challenge for most IT managers is the balancing act between business needs vs. the people, process and technology available to deliver against these requirements. Larger enterprises have adopted industry-standards such as the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), to define, align and deliver IT as business services. Most IT departments today, however, have pretty simple marching orders from their CFO – Better Service, at Less Cost, that’s More Secure.
With co-managed IT services, internal IT and external MSP partner across three key areas:
People – Gain access to expertise and scale, while moving to a more “customer-centric” approach supporting your end-users. After all, how many internal IT departments enjoy supporting their end-users? A virtual IT department also provides advanced network and security expertise, on demand.
Process – Why re-invent the wheel, when you can leverage industry best practices and repeatable processes from accredited professionals for quality service, efficiency, information security and regulatory compliance.
Technology – IT managers need to take their own advice when it comes to IT and security management tools – Embrace the Cloud. In this case, leverage the service desk and remote management tools of your MSP in a co-managed model.
Next month’s article entitled “10 Questions to Ask Your (Would-be) MSP” will provide CFO/controllers and IT managers with a checklist of key questions to ask when evaluating managed service providers.
A great deal of IT providers that call themselves Managed Service Providers (MSPs ) may, in fact, use monitoring tools to watch over your valued infrastructure but aren’t truly proactive. Basically they use the remote monitoring and management tools to enable a quicker way to see problems develop and provide a quicker response to them. But a true MSP is proactive – not faster in their reactivity. This means they have automated processes in place and a team in place to make recommendations and institute measures in advance of alerts or issues.
What Does Being Proactive Mean to our Customers?
Put another way, think of your business like your body. Would you prefer to have a doctor scan you regularly and detect a disease in its early stages, or would you prefer to not contract a disease at all? At The Utility Company, we were conceived as a true MSP – with that proactive nature to our service delivery built-in from Day 1. Our customers seem to like that…
I am Mr.Lee Wong; I am a retired provincial head of customs administration in China. I currently own and manage an import/export company; I am married with three children. I have a confidential business proposal for you but I am not sure this is the best medium to transmit my proposal I was educated in the west and understand that this is an un-usual approach to doing business but please give me your consent to send my proposal and we can take things further.To indicate your interest or request more details, please contact me by e-mail
Kind Regard, Mr.Lee Wong.
You may be happy to hear that Mr. Lee Wong is retired and has a nice family. You may even be interested in his confidential business proposal. But how did he reach you in the first place and why did he reach out to you?
Anyone who’s ever owned an email account, especially one without a corporate anti-spam solution, has more than likely seen at least one, if not most of the following email scams in some variation. Email scams are designed as a form of fraud disguised as an unsolicited email that offers the reader some form of a bargain or something for nothing. They are usually fairly detailed, often long in length and strive to throw in language and sometimes imagery to seem official including email and web addresses that very closely mirror those of real companies & people (so at first glance an unsuspecting individual will click and say “oh my bank needs me to log in and then change my username and password”). Some of these scams end up asking for your business directly. Others will strive to entice their victims to visit a website with a more detailed pitch. Many individuals have lost their life savings due to this type of fraud and many companies lose countless hours trying to prevent these attacks or simply weeding through them. With that in mind, we’ll present you with the Top Ten Internet Scams so you can educate your staff about the dangers of clicking blindly…
The Nigerian scam, also known as 419, Nigerian Letter, Nigerian money offer or the Russian/Ukrainian scam - If it’s too good to be true, you know there’s a problem. This infamous scam blames civil wars and oppressive regimes for “trapping the sender’s vast fortunes within the country” and promises large payments from the sender if you, the receiver, can just help them get their money out of the country. Interestingly enough, this scam is the internet age’s version of a 1920s scam that was then called 'The Spanish Prisoner' con.
Pay up-front fees for a guaranteed loan or ‘pre-approved” credit card - Why would a bank ask you for an up-front fee while applying for a “pre-approved” loan or a credit card? And don’t answer, because they are banks. The answer is, they wouldn’t so again, don’t fall into this too-good-to-be-true trap.
Lottery scams – Who doesn’t dream of one day winning the lottery? There are a few problems though if you receive an email telling you that you won. Most lotteries don’t email their winners, especially if you bought a routine ticket at a kiosk and didn’t give anyone your email address (some charitable lotteries do collect some demographic information). There should never be a request for a “processing fee” in order to start collecting your winnings.
Phishing emails and phony web pages – as mentioned in the introduction, phishing occurs when an email directs you to what appears to be a legitimate website, like a banking institution, and asks for you to update your information. If you are ever in doubt, go to your actual bank’s website and contact them – but also look at the web address. Secure transactions at legitimate sites will begin with https:// in your browser’s address bar. Without the “s” the site is NOT SECURE.
Items for sale overpayment scam - This con is a little more involved than the others and particularly nasty. It involves you placing an ad online for an item like your car and then the scammer agrees to pay a great deal MORE than what you asked for it, but you’ll have to take his or her money order and ship the vehicle overseas (hence the extra money for shipping and ‘international fees’). The money order you are sent is often real, but stolen and never authorized so you’re out your vehicle, the shipping costs and the money order deposit amount to the bank.
Employment search overpayment scam – Stooping to new lows this con preys on people who are out of work or searching for a new job. After posting your resume on a legitimate employment site (including some personal information) you receive an offer to become a "financial representative" of an overseas company you have never even heard of before. When you apply, you are providing the scammer with your personal data, such as bank account information, so you can “get paid”. Then say "hello" to identity theft and just plain financial theft…
Disaster relief scams – Katrina, 9-11, Haiti, etc. bring out both the best and the worst in people. The best being those people who want to help any way they can, the worst being people trying to take advantage of their generosity by creating fake charity websites and steal the money donated to the victims of disasters. If the request for a donation came to your inbox, there is a decent chance of it being a phishing attempt. Try to contact a recognized charitable organization directly instead.
Travel scams – You have won a cruise! Or you’re offered amazingly low fares to some exotic destination but you “must book it today”. Usually if you call, you’ll find out the travel is free but the hotel rates are highly overpriced. Some are timeshare demonstrations when you do arrive. Refunds if you do get sucked in, are a black hole. If you’re thinking of travelling somewhere, use a real travel agency or legitimate online booking sites like Travelocity or Expedia.
“Make Money Fast” chain emails – Ah the good old pyramid scheme in web 2.0 guise! There are a lot of variations but essentially in this instance you get an email with a list of names and are asked to send a small amount, like $5 by mail to the person whose name is at the top of the list, then add your own name to the bottom, and forward the updated list to a number of other people. The angle they use is that the more people join the chain, the more money will be in the pot when your name arrives at the top. The trick is the letter is continually updated to keep the scammers name(s) up on top.
"Turn Your Computer Into a Money-Making Machine!" – Perhaps not a full-on scam but you see these all the time now – much like the old infomercial that used to tell you “they can teach you had to make thousands of dollars just by placing tiny ads from the comfort of your own home” you pay for a set of instructions on how to become rich. You will receive instructions on how to download and install software on your computer to turn it into a money-making machine… for the spammers. Generally it will turn your computer into a pay-per-click machine and tie up all your system resources.
So remember, if something sounds too good to be true, it still is – even, or especially, in the digital age.
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