You’re considering outsourcing IT services. How do you know which provider is right for your business?

Be very selective in choosing the provider, get offers and compare the top 3 in your region. Seek market feedback by asking for customer experience. Most importantly, upon signing the agreement, cover all risks with financial clauses/penalties (i.e. for delayed response time etc...)

Before considering outsourcing and selecting a provider, ensure that your organization is ready for outsourcing. If your delivery model, operating and project processes are not mature enough, any outsourcing initiative will simply fail to deliver the desired outcomes. Ensure that you have the required knowledge, expertise, and staffing across all functions of your organization to provide the required levels of strategic direction, execution guidance, and incident or problem analytics. Regardless of the extent of outsourcing or managed services, the organization must at all times be able to maintain full accountability for IT service levels and related business results. Accountability is decision making and taking actions to task.

First and foremost, really determine what skills/capabilities are the MOST important to keep within the organization. Obvious ones are Strategy, Architecture, Vendor Management, Cost Management. Of the remaining capabilities, determine which ones you'd be willing to have flexibility of smoothness to the business. ie if Service Desk has bumps in the road, is that recoverable from and IT reputation perspective. Once you've resolved what IT capabilities are best to outsource, to either save costs, or simple to redirect your time/energy from monotonous distractions, then evaluate vendors on who closest aligns to your culture (assuming they meet the listed requirements and pricing). Mutual culture will be the BIGGEST factor of success.

First of all, make sure that the service you intend to outsource really makes sense for the company, both from an operational point of view and from the budget allocated for it.

My suggestion is to look at the different phases of your IT portfolio, and determine which area(s) you are looking to have the outsource partner support. For example, if you are looking to free up internal resources to focus on "Grow" or "Transform" activities, identifying the "Run" operations that can be moved to a provider makes sense - detailing what 'keep the lights on' elements they can handle, and what service levels are required to have the move be considered successful. As your relationship with the provider evolves and grows, consider adding some "Grow" or "Transform" elements (supplemental staffing for projects, so you can scale up operations temporarily during the course of those engagements), with an established partner.

Make sure that the suppliers researched can really meet the company's expectations, that they have skills and forms of resolution that you do not have internally and that hiring them makes sense for the Operation.

I think this is an area never given enough time. It is completely natual that once you have a shortlist one vendor will seem to jump out as a favourite. But, take the time to assess all three. A weighted scorecard will help a lot as it is an objective tool when assessing their capability. One reference call is never enough. At least 3 per vendor is needed to get some level of real feedback. Look at the effort they put into the response as well. Is it a cut and paste with no real specific answers to your specific requirements, or was it "custom built, a good indicator of capability, and interest.

Além disso, acredito que uma boa reputação é construída através de relações transparentes e éticas. Portanto, um provedor que valoriza a honestidade, respeita prazos e está sempre pronto para apoiar seus clientes na resolução de problemas é, sem dúvida, um diferencial competitivo no mercado. Finalmente, ao escolher um provedor com uma reputação sólida, estamos também investindo na segurança e na continuidade dos nossos negócios. Isso reflete diretamente na confiança que nossos próprios clientes depositam em nós. Portanto, a pesquisa de reputação não é apenas uma etapa na escolha de um fornecedor de TI; é uma parte crucial da gestão de riscos em qualquer parceria empresarial.

As difficult as it might seem, there are two key scenarios you need to consider. Firstly the “messy exit” scenario- how will you bring things back in-house if it all goes horribly wrong? Secondly how will you stop the organisation deciding to bring it back in-house in a few years time because “it’s being going really well but we could do it ourselves more cheaply?”

After narrowing down your list of potential IT service providers, it's essential to conduct thorough background research to assess their reputation, experience, and qualifications. This involves examining their website for an overview of their services, scrutinizing their portfolio for relevant projects, and reading through testimonials and reviews for insights into client satisfaction. Additionally, recognitions such as awards and certifications can further validate their expertise and reliability in the field. Reaching out to the providers for references from their past or current clients provides an opportunity to directly inquire about the provider's performance, communication effectiveness, and ability to address challenges.

First you should check the providers dealing this will give you a glue and easy way to get what you really want .Provider may be capable of providing IT service in networking but maybe you would like the one who can provide both.

Evaluating a provider's technological capabilities, resources, and operational processes is crucial in ensuring they can meet your IT service needs effectively and securely. When assessing potential providers, request demonstrations of their technical proficiency, including the tools and methodologies they employ. This helps gauge their ability to manage projects that are complex, require dynamic solutions, and can scale according to your business needs. Additionally, understanding the provider's team composition in terms of size, expertise, and availability is important, as is learning about the company culture to ensure a good fit.

Bei der Wahl eines Anbieters ist es ratsam, jemanden zu konsultieren, der mehrere Lösungen anbietet und nicht ausschließlich an den Verkauf seines eigenen Produkts interessiert ist. Dies gewährleistet, dass die Lösung, die am besten zu Ihren Bedürfnissen passt, gefunden wird, anstatt einfach das Produkt des Anbieters zu kaufen.

Comparar o Provedor e Fornecedor é uma abordagem não apenas que a ajuda a entender o valor agregado de cada serviço, mas também a identificar quais provedores podem realmente apoiar nossos objetivos de crescimento e inovação a longo prazo. Uma sugestão que gostaria de adicionar é a importância de considerar também a escalabilidade e a flexibilidade dos serviços oferecidos. À medida que nossas empresas crescem, nossas necessidades de TI também evoluem. Por isso, é crucial escolher um provedor que não apenas atenda às nossas necessidades atuais, mas que também possa se adaptar e crescer conosco. Isso inclui a capacidade de escalar serviços para cima ou para baixo conforme necessário, sem comprometer a qualidade ou a eficiência.

Begin with a baseline of your core services and service delivery maturity assessed against current state and the desired future state that you will expect from the managed service provider. Use that as a benchmark to assess their capabilities - augment with procurement advisory services to get independent advice and sourcing support to conduct these assessments. Ensure that these capabilities are also future-proofed against major capability investments in the future like digital/IT transformation, enterprise automation, etc. These generational shifts in capability will considerably shift capability baselines and your managed service provider needs to be ready for tomorrow, not just today.

Negotiating contracts terms is key for successful execution of services from a partner, always ensure the measurable KPI's are clearly defined in the contracts and define the specific review period for these KPIs and payment are tied to achieved KPI, service credit is important to be aligned prior of entering in contracts signing.

Make sure to also involve your purchasing and legal department during this phase. Adding them as an afterthought will hurt the quality of the process. Also they will bring in another perspective. Maybe the criteria you used to select the preferred partner are not as objective as you thought. Also make sure to involve all relevant stakeholders during the process. Outsourcing might not be loved by everyone on your company or Team. So you have to get buy-in and the best way to get this is by involving them early on in the process.

Negotiating the contract terms is a critical step in establishing a successful IT outsourcing relationship. The contract should meticulously outline the scope of services, deliverables, and milestones, alongside a clear payment schedule and conditions for termination. It's important to define the roles and responsibilities of both you and the provider to avoid any confusion or misunderstandings. Communication protocols, including channels, frequency, and formats for progress and performance reporting, should be agreed upon to ensure transparency and accountability throughout the project duration.

Es ist wichtig, beim Einkauf oder bei der Inanspruchnahme von Dienstleistungen zu verhandeln und Preise zu vergleichen. Jedoch sollte man bedenken, dass gute Leistung ihren Preis hat. Es ist besser, sich für die beste passende Leistung zu entscheiden, anstatt einfach nach dem Günstigsten zu gehen. Oftmals endet der Kauf des Billigsten damit, dass man letztendlich doppelt bezahlt und am Ende mehr ausgibt.

Lots of good stuff here, so I'll just add a couple of lessons learnt from helping clients with these contracts. 1. While it is easy to create runaway requirements in excruciating detail, it is vitally important to allow for the service delivery model to evolve. Rather than focus on volumetric service level agreements which are so common, consider the outcomes shaping work product, service delivery and sustained performance. 2. Ensure that if your enterprise architecture and/or operating model need to change over time that there is a defined process for uplifting/separating/transitioning partners over time.

A good fit starts with alignment to the firm’s trategic direction and high cultural compatibility. Once these are present, the next considerations would be architectural fit and capabilities of the service providers. If you are convinced that the provider has compatibility in all these respects, and has the depth of skill and infrastructure, you need to consider the risk the service provider poses, as an extension of your firm, by performing a due diligence that considers the sustainability of a provider as a going concern, the integrity and credentials of its staff, and the fit to your supplier, cyber and other third-party policies. Finally, when all the above considerations have been met, it comes down to price negotiations.

Regular and objective performance reviews are essential in ensuring your IT outsourcing partner is aligning with your goals and standards. By employing specific metrics and indicators—like customer satisfaction, error rates, productivity, cost savings, and innovation—you can quantitatively measure the quality, efficiency, and overall value of the outsourced IT services. Gathering feedback from both internal and external stakeholders, as well as the provider’s team, will offer qualitative insights into the strengths and areas for improvement within the outsourcing partnership.

Things to take into consideration to outsource IT service within an organisation: 1- Vendor portfolio and reputation 2- Vendor previously dealing with clients from same sector 3- Vendor investing in understanding the business processes, structure, and culture. This would help align expectations between both client/vendor 4- Vendor must have multiple technical resources serving the client (avoid single point of failure and insuring continuity) 5- Approve of the Vendor internal company culture, and ethics 6- Vendor adding value from training, partnership with tech vendors, cost saving when applicable. 7- On-site availability These are some points to be considered as a start.

Provider diversity and sustainability/ESG alignment with your company’s values and directions. Make sure that you influence supplier selection process through assessing their Diversity and Inclusion approaches and push towards a more equitable organization and future!

In this era of Digital Privacy and Protection, the choice of a vendor must provide requisite attestation or demonstrate capacity and capability to ensure privacy and protection is guaranteed throughout the service life cycle.

I alluded to this in a previous response, but a transition to an IT managed service partner is never straightforward or easy to unravel over time. Whether the rationale for outsourcing is based on lowered cost of service, higher service delivery level or something else, any MSP will become deeply intertwined with technology operations. Over time, this only gets deeper; unless there is a clarity of purpose, defined service catalogue level differentiation and clear, ongoing performance management, any divergence from expectations will usually be met with high levels of the classic sunk cost fallacy (investment bias) from the highest levels of management. So, be twice as sure about why and thrice as sure about how/when to leverage outsourcing!

Do not underestimate the effort it takes to manage your outsourcing partner! To have a successful relationship you have to work on that constantly. Also make sure there are clear ways for the partner to communicate with the necessary Teams within your company. Often this is not easy as Outsourcing might not be seen as a good way to go by a lot of people fearing for their job. Good Change management before and during the implementation is absolutely mandatory.