“What is Managed IT Services?”

Does anyone really know what Managed IT Services are anymore?  They have certainly evolved over time, but let’s clear up what they are and are NOT.

First, slapping a bunch of monitoring agents on your computers and then charging hourly to resolve issues that pop up is NOT managed services.  That is the worst of all worlds!  As the end user you are PAYING for a group to constantly monitor your environment for issues with no reason for them to ever figure out how to make them stop because then their hourly fee stops!  So this is NOT Managed IT Services, however it IS an automated cash drain on your business.

What about all the managed firewalls, backups and security services?  Potentially all very helpful to your business, but these are typically point solutions that do not have the ROI a comprehensive Managed IT Service plan would have.  Sure my firewall is managed by my telecom provider, but then who is watching what’s going on with the computers?  Doesn’t really make sense to have just “part” of your environment managed.

As a business, Managed IT Services should mean that you are outsourcing the majority of your daily IT support, management, and monitoring activities to a single group that is responsible for the overall health of your business IT.  This is performed on a fixed fee (not buckets of monthly hours) that allows your business to TRANSFER the risk of running your IT environment to your partner.

Is it fixed price?  Does it transfer the risk?  Then it’s probably a managed service!

Written by: Edward Stringfellow