Outsourcing IT Support – Co-Managed vs Fully Managed

Outsourcing IT support has become a popular choice for businesses looking to streamline operations, reduce costs, and access specialised expertise. Whether you’re a small start-up or a larger enterprise, outsourcing IT support can offer several benefits:

1. Cost Savings: Outsourcing IT support can be more cost-effective than maintaining an in-house IT department. With outsourcing, you can avoid expenses related to hiring, training, and retaining full-time staff. Additionally, outsourcing providers can offer flexible pricing models, allowing you to pay for only the services you need.
2. Access to Expertise: IT outsourcing firms employ professionals with specialised skills and expertise across various technologies and industries. By partnering with an outsourcing provider, you gain access to a team of experienced IT professionals who can offer strategic guidance, resolve technical issues, and implement best practices to optimise your IT infrastructure.
3. Focus on Core Business Activities: Outsourcing IT support allows you to focus your resources and attention on core business activities rather than managing IT operations. By delegating IT tasks to a reliable provider, you can free up time and resources to concentrate on growing your business, developing new products/services, and serving your customers.
4. Scalability and Flexibility: Outsourcing IT support provides scalability and flexibility to adapt to changing business needs and technology trends. Whether you’re expanding your operations, launching new initiatives, or scaling down due to economic factors, outsourcing allows you to adjust your IT resources accordingly without the hassle of hiring or layoffs.
5. 24/7 Monitoring: Many outsourcing providers offer round-the-clock monitoring services to ensure the continuous availability and performance of your IT systems. This proactive approach helps prevent downtime, minimise disruptions, and address potential issues before they escalate, thereby enhancing the reliability and efficiency of your IT infrastructure.
6. Enhanced Security and Compliance: IT outsourcing firms invest in robust security measures and compliance frameworks to protect your sensitive data and ensure regulatory compliance. By outsourcing IT support, you can leverage advanced security technologies, regular audits, and adherence to industry standards to mitigate cybersecurity risks and safeguard your business against data breaches and regulatory penalties.
7. Improved Service Levels: Outsourcing IT support often comes with service level agreements (SLAs) that define performance metrics, response times, and resolution targets. These SLAs help ensure accountability, transparency, and quality assurance, enabling you to receive timely and reliable support whenever you need it.

Our typical engagement is for a Fully Managed Service. This is where your users would contact our Service Desk for any IT support requirements.

When companies have Internal IT teams, we can provide a Co-Managed Service to work with them collaboratively to enhance their capabilities, address their challenges, and achieve their goals effectively. Here are some strategies to help support clients’ internal IT teams:

1. Understand Their Needs: Begin by gaining a thorough understanding of the client’s internal IT team, including their strengths, weaknesses, goals, and pain points. Conduct interviews, surveys, or assessments to identify their specific needs, priorities, and areas where they require assistance.
2. Provide Expertise and Guidance: Offer your expertise and guidance to help the client’s internal IT team navigate complex technical challenges, adopt best practices, and make informed decisions. Share insights, industry trends, and recommendations based on your experience and knowledge to help them achieve their objectives more efficiently.
3. Training and Development: Offer training and development programs to empower the client’s internal IT team with new skills, knowledge, and certifications. Provide hands-on workshops, online courses, or personalised coaching sessions tailored to their learning objectives and career aspirations.
4. Collaborative Projects: Collaborate on projects and initiatives that leverage the strengths of both your external team and the client’s internal IT team. Encourage open communication, knowledge sharing, and collaboration to foster a productive working relationship and achieve mutual success.
5. Resource Augmentation: Provide resource augmentation services to supplement the client’s internal IT team during peak workloads, special projects, skill gaps or holiday/sickness cover.
6. Continuous Support and Monitoring: Offer ongoing support and monitoring services to the client’s internal IT team to ensure the stability, security, and performance of their IT infrastructure. Provide proactive maintenance, 24/7 monitoring, and rapid response to incidents or emergencies to minimise downtime and disruptions.To provide continuity to your users, we provide a single ticket system for both your Internal IT tickets and Chalkline escalated tickets. Your internal IT team can escalate their tickets to Chalkline’s support desk for us to handle. We can then provide the assistance and resolution and pass the ticket back to them for the insights and fix applied.
7. Regular Reviews and Feedback: Conduct regular reviews and feedback sessions with the client’s internal IT team to assess performance, identify areas for improvement, and gather input on how to enhance support services further. Encourage open dialogue, constructive criticism, and collaboration to foster a culture of continuous improvement.