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In today’s business world, smoothly running IT devices are the foundation you need to perform almost all of your tasks. You totally rely on their functioning and need 24/7 device service availability. The bigger and more international your business gets, the more challenging it will become to provide all your employees in all your entities worldwide with the same standard device configurations. You also need to keep up with changing technology in this field. Let’s have a look at the most common challenges you face if you have a non-standardized IT infrastructure:
In order to supply all your employees at all or your company locations with the devices they need, you have to pay not only for the devices themselves but also for procurement, deployment and 24/7 servicing. A non-standardized IT infrastructure means that you deal with several vendors with different billing systems. Given that the lifecycle costs can overshadow the initial acquisitions costs, software and hardware often have a seemingly never-ending series of upgrade costs.1 Costs also increase when you order single replacement devices instead of upgrading all your devices at the same time. Purchasing brand-new devices instead of refurbished and perfectly working ones has an unnecessary negative impact on your finances as well.
If you have several workplace IT suppliers with systems that function differently, you will see yourself wasting time while trying to get the right devices to the right location as quickly as possible. Your employees might have to wait for a broken device to be replaced or for an update to be made due to the complexity that the non-standardized device supply brings. Next business day delivery is almost impossible relying on such a system.
While trying to keep up with checking on several vendors that take care of various types of hardware, which are supplied to different locations, it’s easy to lose track. You need to check several device management tools and communicate with responsible people for different parts of the process. Without a streamlined IT management, you lose time and the overview of all ongoing processes. And according to Reed, almost all quality improvement comes via simplification of design, manufacturing, layout, processes and procedures.2
You won a new project and need more people to work on it? Naturally, these people need to receive their IT equipment as fast as possible to start off. If your IT infrastructure is not standardized, it’s inflexible towards rapidly changing requirements. New employees will need to wait for their equipment to be deployed and set up and if somebody leaves the company, their devices might not be in use for a while and thus represent wasted money.
In the digital age, protecting your business also means protecting your IT infrastructure. Cyber criminals tend to attack businesses trying to steal personal data, financial and operational information or, for example, the company’s IP address. Non-standardized IT infrastructures are more complex and thus harder to manage and control from a security standpoint. The more standardized your IT infrastructure – the safer it is in terms of cyber security.
After pointing out common challenges, it’s time to think about the solution: a standardized global IT infrastructure. See for yourself that streamlining your IT procurement, deployment and servicing will save you money, speed things up, and make it easier for you to keep an overview. A capable partner that can tackle all these challenges and more will enable you to focus on your core business only. Here’s what your next steps should look like:
Reach out to a partner that can free your IT department from all these worries now.
References
1 The Procurement School. “IT procurement challenges.” the procurement school, 27 Jan. 2023, theprocurementschool.com/it-procurement-challenges-tps/.
2 “4 ways to streamline your supply chain.” Reed, 27 Jan. 2023, www.reed.com/articles/4-ways-to-streamline-your-supply-chain.