Managed IT Services and Why you need them?

Jul 8, 2021

What is Managed Services?

The term MSP or Managed Service Provider is nowadays well established in the ICT Sector.

https://ccs.org.cy/assets/uploads/IDC%20Report/ICT%20CYPRUS%20REPORT%202021.pdf

Based on recent study (see above)The Managed Services in Cyprus market totaled €19.06 million in value in 2020, making it the third-largest primary market in Cyprus, with 16.8% share.

The term managed services refers to the practice of outsourcing business administration and management responsibilities to a third party. You’ll notice that this definition isn’t specific to IT — that’s because managed services can describe anything from supply chain management to marketing strategy to call center operations. That said, managed IT services is the most commonly referred to type of managed service and will be the focus of this article.

The majority of Companies still prefer to keep the management of their on-premises infrastructure and applications in-house.

In conclusion, by using their own resources rather than outsourcing or using managed service providers. This results in high demand for hardware support and maintenance services.

Why do I need Managed Services?

1. Focus on Core Objectives

As your business grows, so will your IT needs. Your IT team may be able to handle some of this increased workload but will most likely find themselves overwhelmed and unable to scale according to your business’ needs, forcing you to assign additional responsibilities to employees who aren’t on the IT team, which can distract from core business objectives.

One of the benefits of managed services is that it not only frees up your employees to focus on the jobs they were hired to do. It also enables you to fill in gaps as needed. A truly qualified managed services partner will offer a flexible service model. It allows you to determine what level of service you require, whether that means just keeping the lights on or outsourcing your company’s entire IT department.

2. Get the Expertise You Need

New technology means new problems — problems your existing IT team might not have the knowledge or experience to solve. Then there’s the issue of management: Regardless whether your systems are in the cloud or on premise, you’ll need a significant number of resources to support your business solutions, which poses an issue if your IT department is really a one-person shop.

One of the key advantages of the managed services model is that it enables you to hire an entire team of IT professionals at a flat monthly rate. Certain Managed Services Providers (MSPs) even take a shared approach to managed services. Meaning you can add or remove specialists from your managed services team as needed depending on the demands of each project. These specialists include technical, functional, architectural, and training consultants who can help you keep your systems up and running, as well as unlock their full potential.

3. Keep Costs Low

One of the clear benefits of managed services is that it lowers labor costs and eliminates the cost of hiring and training new IT staff. The ability to have skills available on a scalable basis is incredibly compelling.

Best of all, since you sign a service-level agreement that’s tailored to your organization’s unique needs, you’ll never have to worry about unexpected service costs. This will enable your organization to shift from a capital expense model to an operating expense model.

4. Scale up or Down as Needed

As your technology needs evolve over time, you’ll need to scale your system either up or down to accommodate them.

In addition, be sure to look for an MSP that not only has hundreds of consultants available (and can bring on more as needed), but also offers advanced services such as proactive monitoring, upgraded services release management, reporting, and more to get the greatest value and scalability out of your partnership.

5. Receive Support Whenever You Need It

With an MSP, you never need to worry about availability. Most MSPs offer 24/7 flexibility, on-call options, and weekend support. When searching for the perfect MSP, look for a global company that can support multiple time zones and offers round-the-clock support, so you can rest assured that help is available whenever you need it.

6. Avoid Expensive Downtime

Another one of the benefits of managed services is that rather than sit and wait for something to go wrong, MSPs take a proactive approach to maintenance. MSPs use remote monitoring and management to identify, diagnose, and troubleshoot potential problems before they ever have a chance to become an issue. If, in the unlikely event that things do go awry, an MSP can provide expert backup and disaster recovery services to get your systems back online.

7. Gain a Reliable Point of Contact

When you partner with an MSP, rather than work with a rotating cast of characters, you’ll eventually get a dedicated team that knows your company and your business solutions inside and out. It will be led by a single customer success manager (CSM). Your CSM will act as a reliable, single point of contact who can serve as a middleman between you and your vendors and triage any issue on your behalf.

8. Get Support for Security & Compliance

Unfortunately, MSPs can’t handle corporate compliance nedds on your behalf. What your MSP can do, is partner up with your legal team to find out which regulations it should be aware of. Ultimately, this is so that it can take precautions to ensure that your systems meet them.