Managed services - it’s much more than outsourcing

Managed services… You have already heard about this concept, haven’t you?
Just in one sentence: Good – cheap – fast: You can have two of them

Managed services is a concept implying a form of outsourcing without assets and/or personnel transfer. The value added (a service) is offered for money and the service provider bears the risk and is also responsible for managing of the service. Which means: The buyer does not have to do anything more…

“One size fits all”-mentality cannot be successful in business. However, managed services can be used by all or almost all types of businesses:

• Large companies – as a response for cost pressure,
• International operating companies – to cover global markets,
• Small companies – to gain special know-how and assure 24/7 availability,
• Start-ups – for cost reasons, access to special know-how and focus on core business,
• Agile companies – to manage quick changes and to be able to react for new challenges,
• Conservative companies – also they need special know-how.


One size fits all...
Source: http://endtimesdeception.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/one-size-fi...
“One of the main benefits of switching to a managed services paradigm is the fact that the staff can now focus almost exclusively on improving the way it designs cars instead of worrying about storage management and growth, aside from telling EMC how much capacity the company needs in any given month.”, as Waldemar Klemm of Toyota has summarized the role of managed services in his organization. However, there is much psychology in it: “When I come to BMW saying that I offer outsourcing services, people close the door. However, if I say ‘managed services’ then they start listening to me.”, as one IT provider has expressed it.

How does the concept look like in the practice? Let’s take case study Young & Roubicam in consideration.

The challenges Young & Roubicam had to deal with were as follows: high communications volume, high customer demands regarding flexibility. The plan was to deliver communications functionality to twelve locations centrally, to be able to adapt infrastructure to needs at not extending IT and communications resources. The solution was to establish a central shared service center and a call center managed by third party, to rent hardware and software implementing calculation of port per month method. As the result, high investments could be avoided and the cost level is oriented on actual use.

That’s not bad, isn’t it?

Magdalena Szarafin
http://www.szarafin.info