How to Maintain A Reliable and Skillful IT Department

it department

A successful business relies on a dependable and proficient IT department to support and maintain your company’s infrastructure. Having an IT team who are mentally and/or physically exhausted or dissatisfied can result in issues with your operations that can cause technological emergencies. Maintaining a dedicated IT team is essential to ensure your network operates at its maximal performance.

Continue reading to find the three best practices you can do in order to have a successful and fulfilled IT department.

Fill Open IT Positions ASAP

Although there might be some job positions within the organization that does not necessarily need to be filled immediately, filling any openings within the IT department as quickly as possible is a must. 

If a member of your IT department leaves the company, the rest of the group must carry the load. While the remaining team members may work more hours to help fill the gap, it is your responsibility to take the extra time needed to find an appropriate replacement. If the rest of the department feels like the hiring process is moving slowly in order to save money, they will have ill will towards the company, and their work will show precisely how they feel. If filling in the open position takes longer than anticipated, try to pay your IT staff a little more for the extra time and hard work they have been putting in.

Negotiate for Your IT Budget

Just like in any other position, the right tools are required to do a job properly. This is also true for the department of IT. Unfortunately, when it comes to creating a budget, the administration can cut the funding for IT or not allocate more money to the department. If your employees in IT see other departments growing while they feel overworked and exhausted, they will become burnt out and may eventually leave the company.

It is important to remember that the more complete an IT department is, the more willing employees will be to keep the company’s IT infrastructure as secure as possible. IT funding should be incorporated into the budget as a priority because IT can help increase productivity and efficiency. 

Outsource Short-Term Projects and Routine IT Maintenance 

Often if your IT team gets overwhelmed with short-term projects or routine IT maintenance, there might not be enough time spent on improving the company’s network operations. Distributing these tasks to another company, also known as co-managed IT services, can free up your IT team and allow them to focus on meaningful IT projects that can improve the productivity and efficiency of the department. 

At WheelHouse IT, our team can help assist your IT department by remotely taking care of your routine IT maintenance and any short-term projects your organization may encounter. For more information, contact us today at 954.474.2204.

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Is a Managed Service Provider Model Better for IT Support?

it msp

Managing technology for your business requires you to have IT support in place to help you navigate repairs when they inevitably occur. The level of support you receive from a managed service provider support model can make a difference in ensuring your business stays up and running with quality tech. 

Break-fix IT support can be a costly option for technology management. It can result in a lot of downtimes, which just pile on the costs and loses customer loyalty. Managing your IT doesn’t have to be done last minute when it breaks down. You can manage your tech through a managed service provider without breaking the budget. 

What is managed service provider for IT support, and how is it better than the traditional break-fix model? 

Why Break-Fix IT is Not Sustainable

Break-fix IT is an option for many businesses because it seems to be a more affordable option. There may not be a budget to have in-house IT support, and break-fix companies will often work hourly. The problem with break-fix IT support is that general upkeep is not an option, and downtime can be spread out over longer periods. 

When your business can no longer access the tech needed to operate, downtime occurs, and your business loses productivity and costly downtime. Your customers will have to wait for services which can increase your losses and damage customer loyalty and reputation. Proactively managing your technology can be better than simply waiting until the last minute to make repairs or replace your tech. 

What is a Managed Service Provider?

A managed service provider is an IT management model that was created to address the challenges of managing tech with a break-fix model. Managed service providers, or MSPs, are a proactive technology management option providing companies with services to help care for and manage their tech. They focus on proactive prevention and real-time maintenance and support.

Managed service providers can provide support plans to fit each company’s needs and unique challenges. They can provide helpdesk support and 24/7 monitoring to protect your network, manage risk and compliance, system and software maintenance, and manage server configuration and management. The way the maintenance is set up with a service level agreement allows each company to pick a level of service. This enables you to get what you need without having to worry about the expensive upfront costs that come with break-fix IT support.

If your company has an IT department, managed service providers can still provide value by providing additional support, upkeep, and maintenance. It allows your IT team to focus on other projects and provides you with a piece of mind knowing your tech is well cared for all around. 

Choosing which IT support model works best for your business can be a challenge, but it doesn’t have to be. Proactively caring for your technology can save you more money and prevent issues down the line. WheelHouse IT helps businesses flourish no matter the level of IT needs. To learn more, reach out to us at 954.474.2204. 

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Achieve More With the Right IT Services

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We talk a lot about the individual ways that managed IT services can help your organization save time and money. Still, today we thought we’d take a look at some of the baseline numbers associated with partnering with a capable managed IT service provider.

You Gain Productivity

When people tell you something pays for itself, what they mean is that you will likely recoup the expenses over a period of time that will effectively pay for a service you use.

How is this possible, you ask?

Well, by increasing uptime, your staff can be more productive, and that additional productivity turns into additional revenue. The more money you make, the better position you will be to invest your profits into your business, effectively improving operational productivity. With everything a Managed Service Provider (MSP) does to keep your technology running as intended, the additional productivity will quickly pay for itself. That rapid ROI is something that every person holding the purse strings in an organization is looking for out of every investment.

Do More with Technology

Having the right IT services provider will bring with it access to the immense amount of knowledge and experience that certified technicians bring, without the massive price tag that typically comes along with hiring someone with that level of expertise. With managed IT services, you get expert technical minds that know how to maximize the value of your IT investments and have a dedicated plan to make that IT work best for your staff.

Shrink Your Initial Technology Investments

One of the top benefits of managed IT services is the way that they can keep your infrastructure costs down. Not only do the IT experts help you structure your onsite IT investments in the most consolidated manner possible, but they can also help you shrink your capital expenses by suggesting tools that are easier to budget, such as cloud-based infrastructure and software. By arranging your IT in a more budget-friendly way, you can do more to improve your business with the capital you have on hand.

Comprehensive Security

Nowadays, the threat landscape can be pretty arduous. With expert technicians looking after your organization’s IT and infrastructure, you benefit from enhanced IT security. Any MSP worth it is salt will feature around-the-clock monitoring as well as the integration of security tools and policies that will do wonders for your IT security. From the 24/7, 365 help desk to the training resources, data backup and disaster recovery, and of course the integration of aforementioned tools, your network and infrastructure will be more secure than ever.

Reliably Consistent Pricing

One often overlooked benefit of managed IT services is the ability to know what your IT support costs are going to look like from one month to the next. By having a budget for your operational expenses, you can easily plan for new technology investments, projects you normally wouldn’t have taken on, or invest more into your operations.

Easy Scaling

In the same vein as reliable pricing, if your business needs to add or subtract IT resources, the managed IT service provider can help you scale up and back quickly, and when we say quickly, we mean it. All it takes is having a conversation with your consultant, and you can get the additional technology you need to achieve your goals or lose some if you’ve completed a project and are looking to scale back.

Now that we have gone through many benefits that make managed IT services perfect for the modern small and mid-sized business, let’s look at the percentage you can save with managed IT. For smaller businesses that don’t benefit from hiring a dedicated IT administrator, a business can save up to 30 percent. That takes into account downtime, costs to get technology fixed when it malfunctions, and overall productivity. For medium-sized businesses that may already have an IT resource in place, a co-managed service can save you nearly 20 percent while freeing up your onsite IT administrator to work on projects designed to make your business even more efficient and productive.

In fact, according to a poll conducted by the Computing Technology Industry Association, partnering with an MSP is almost certain to save your organization money on its technology expenses. 96 percent of businesses that use an MSP today pay less for and get more out of their technology than they did previously.

If your business is having trouble growing because of inconsistent IT expenses or from dealing with crippling system downtime, it’s time that you called the IT professionals at WheelHouse IT. We can complete an assessment and get you the IT services and tools you need to increase revenue and be more productive. Give us a call at (877) 771-2384 today to learn more.

5 Ways Managed IT Services Boosts Your Business Growth

More businesses are discovering that managed IT offers an effective alternative to keeping a robust IT department on staff. Even better, business owners have come to realize that using an MSP’s IT services boosts their company’s growth. Take a look at five of the ways that using managed IT services can go the extra mile and improve your business’s outcomes.

What Type of Business Needs Managed IT?

Simply put, small, medium, and large businesses can benefit from managed IT services. Of course, small and medium teams tend to need managed services the most because they have the biggest gaps in IT knowledge on their teams while simultaneously having the smallest budgets to work with to achieve their goals.

Any business that needs specialized outcomes over a short or medium time should seek managed IT services.

How Do I Know My Business Needs Managed IT Services?

The symptoms of a business that needs managed IT services are easy to spot. Consider each of these signs that your company could benefit from an MSP’s services:

  • Your IT workers lack knowledge in an area that is needed for a short-term project (adding servers, configuring security, developing the company website)
  • You can’t count on your hardware to function all the time
  • Your business loses significant amounts of work time due to IT failures
  • You have a short-term IT project to complete that does not necessitate hiring a new team member

These are some of the most prominent signs that your business needs to invest in managed IT services. MSPs that provide IT services give you the flexibility and scalability you need to fix up your existing system or prepare for valuable expansions.

How Managed IT Services Can Boost Business Growth

Using a managed IT provider to help your business is not just about stemming the tide and keeping your head above water for another quarter. These services are an integral tool for helping boost your business’s growth. Here’s how it works.

  1. Faster Response Times

When you have a sudden problem appear in your workplace, you need workers that are familiar with your systems and ready to go at a moment’s notice. Partnering with an MSP for IT provides you with a team of professionals that can act as a disaster response team to get your workplace back to normal.

  1. Instant Scalability

Did you underestimate your manpower needs for a project? No problem. Managed IT services can help you scale up for a short-term project or add more team members when a project starts to get out of hand. When the work is done, so is the billing.

  1. Freeing Up Resources

Do you need your core workers focused on a new internal project rather than typical maintenance and answering Help Desk questions? Then you can bring in the MSP professionals to handle your day-to-day work and free up your team members to work on something new.

  1. Lower Costs in IT Allows for Increases Elsewhere

Why should you hire another worker for IT when you only need a month or two worth of work completed? It’s much simpler and cheaper to bring in a temporary reinforcement so that your business can allocate the rest of their potential salary into another department.

  1. Future-Proof Your Business

Not all workers continue to learn after they settle into a business setting. That attitude can lead to stagnation. If you need IT members to come in and teach your workers some new tricks, then you can simply leverage the MSP workers that stay on the cutting edge.

Each of these reasons can help you see why managed IT services are so important to consider for businesses today.

Now that you know how managed IT services can help your business, you probably want to see how they can help your particular company. Contact us today with a quick call or email, and let us show you how our experts can make an impact on your business.

Our IT professionals can help your business reach the next level and stay competitive no matter the size of your company!