The Inovis Blog

Contrary to what you may have been told, not all managed services are exactly alike. When choosing which managed service to go with, making a sound and educated decision will land you a more advantageous service that will maximize profit and cut out needless expenses. Once your company has made the decision to outsource, it’s time to look at two options.

• The first alternative is a cut and paste method of sorts. This service takes exactly what your people are already doing and uses their company’s people to do the exact same thing. Next, they take the exact implementation of the products and services that you are currently using, and install them in their outsource facility in the same arrangement your company currently has them in. This method initially meets those requirements you’re looking for to know that the burden of responsibility has been given to someone else.

• The second type of service takes the requirements and functions you are trying to meet and deploys them in a structured environment where the systems, people, and processes are optimized to fulfill your goals and needs. Resources are leveraged across a much broader base.

While both options sound pretty good for giving you what you want, only one of these choices is oriented for future growth and success.

With the first option, your ability to scale and grow your business is no different than the ability you had internally. you have n number of people doing a particular job. You have n number of so much investment in the platforms you need. You have the same kind of level of reliability (if that) as you have inside your shop because your instance is your instance. You’re going to stay focused to do it in the same way you were doing it, only someone else is going to do it. It doesn’t really lend any particular value proposition to you other than the fact that it’s not an immediate headache, and you don’t have to go hire people because someone else hired them.

You don’t really have scalability, and you don’t really have efficiencies. You have added risk to your process because someone else is doing it, you really can’t control it, and they can’t really leverage much because it was kind of the same way you were doing it to begin with. So, it’s questionable whether this form of service actually gets you where you want to be. Is it really, truly adding value for you or is it just something that you don’t have to worry about and are letting someone else worry about?

On the other hand, if you use a service that is built to handle multiple entities (a multi-tenant arrangement) with specialists that have their own processes, controls, and procedures, a few things can happen.

1. You’re in a situation where that platform handles not just you, but a whole bunch of customers. It will continue to function properly and most likely has the reliability, stability, and the kind of solid foundation that companies are looking for.
2. Adopting their processes, controls, procedures, and using what they know professionally creates a more efficient process, more value, and gives it much more flexibility from a price stand point.
3. You would most likely get it at a lower price, not because it’s a lesser service, but because it’s a more efficient service, and you’re not having to pay for every license and all of the costs you would noramlly incur. They’re able to leverage and divide it across all of the different customers that are using it.

The cut and paste method doesn’t have much advantage to it. It does get it off your desk, but the risk profile goes up because they’re probably going to be doing the job about as good as you’re doing it. If you go to a place that truly has a multi-tenant, scalable platform with ITIL processes and controls in place, then you’re going to be in a position where you probably can get a better price for it, you can sleep better at night because that’s what they’re doing for a living, and their systems and processes are built for that.

What is my strategy for choosing between the two? Option two, because it’s the better one.