Does your business have strategic IT support?
Small businesses often hire an MSP (managed service provider) for IT services. It makes sense because most businesses need a little extra help in the technology department.
After all, you specialize in something, but it’s probably not IT infrastructure. Hiring IT services allows you to focus on running your business with dependable technology that works.
It’s one thing to have IT support, and a whole other thing to have a top quality IT firm that gives strategic support to carry you to success. When your business’s technology runs smoothly, you can focus on operations and growth. Your attention goes to the tasks and projects that really matter.
Here are three things a great strategic IT support provider will do for you.
1. Benchmarks & key performance indicators
A good IT firm will always use benchmark standards and key performance indicators (KPIs) to let you know how your technological infrastructure performs. That’s standard practice for strategic IT support.
KPIs may be different for certain types of businesses depending on your technology needs. Good ones to look for may include the percentage of “uptime,” support expense analysis, and the number of issues resolved by the IT team.
Without these important data points, you are really just flying blind and trusting your IT support provider without having any real knowledge of how they are helping you.
2. Flexible & agile
Of course, an IT firm will need to have standard operating procedures. But any great IT support firm will also be flexible enough to meet your specific needs.
If an IT team is not flexible, they may be using out-of-the-box products that don’t really help your business as well as they could. A great, strategic IT support provider will be open to trying new things, even bending usual practices to fit your business’s needs—within reason, of course.
IT firms also need to be agile. Being flexible is a part of this, but agile also means quick-witted and able to adapt to change. Certain industries have ever-changing regulations or needs that pop up with little-to-no warning.
Agile IT support teams can come up with actionable plans and implement them in a timely manner.
3. Detailed plans
A strategic IT support provider will always lay out detailed plans for system improvements and upgrades.
These plans are more than just a timeline of when changes will be implemented. They should also include the estimated cost and hours the IT firm will be spending on it, as well as a prioritized list of tasks that go along with the project.
They should give you updates on the execution of the project so you are never wondering about the status. And there should be regular progress reports, too, so you always know how projects are coming along. If something does not go as planned, they should be open and honest, giving a detailed explanation of how things will get back on track.
Your strategic IT support
Pro OnCall is a top IT firm with more than 80 years of experience. We follow a five-step process to ensure that our clients get the best strategic managed IT solutions possible. If you’re looking for strategic IT support, contact us to find out how we can help.
