“Using a provider that is both global and local is a huge benefit when ensuring you have the best service, so choose a vendor that is available for onsite support. If your employees are fighting with technology, they can’t get their jobs done. There are situations where the chosen service provider must be available to provide fast answers to technology questions and use remote access to resolve issues quickly."
3. Monitoring and proactive maintenance
While quick reactions to unexpected incidents and troubleshooting with sophisticated remote access tools are crucial, the real added value lies in the
managed service provider's ability to operate in a proactive manner, that is, to repair and maintain MTR in a way that the customer hardly recognises.
"The key to successful proactive maintenance lies in the ability to monitor the entire room and its setup. This makes it possible to recognise individual devices that have gone down, and to get those devices up and running overnight without the customer even noticing. Gathering and analysing data from the room also makes it possible to see when devices are nearing the end of their life cycles and replacing them before they break down."
4. Third-party technology vendor partnerships
While many consider this area self-evident, it takes plenty of in-depth technology expertise to control and understand the wide and diverse fleet of devices and platforms in a modern virtual collaboration environment. A key advantage of using a MSP is that they can handle technology vendors for you, saving you time in tracking down multiple vendors for service and support.
When evaluating a provider, look at who they
partner with and make sure they have expertise in the tools you actually use. Information security is also an integral part of network management and the MSP must also consider security issues when it comes to outsourced solutions.
Especially when it comes to specific lines of business, such as public service, banking and utilities, organisations have other service platforms in addition to Teams at their disposal. These platforms are often designed to ensure business continuity and security also in critical situations and typically run on cloud-based private networks. The MSP must understand the services and technologies these networks require and have the capabilities required to find the best virtual collaboration tools and standardised solutions in this regard.
"A well-functioning managed service provider understands not only the entire virtual collaboration platform but also the requirements of both the Teams environment and any old technology that is being used in the background. Seasoned MSP’s often have certificates to prove their expertise. At Elisa Videra, our business operations are built using an ISO9001 model with global certification across all of our countries. We also hold the ISO27001 standard for security."
Helping IT departments make the most of Microsoft Teams Rooms
A trustworthy MSP helps the organisation achieve an increased ROI on the investment and makes it a priority to stay at the forefront of development.
"At Elisa Videra, we want to ensure maximum usability and efficient use of capabilities for our customers," Owe Ekman says. He concludes: "This means raising the bar continuously for ourselves as well. Being able to continuously improve our performance for the benefit of our customers is the best way to ensure the best possible outcome for them in the long run."
A managed service solution can add value to the organisation's IT department in many ways. Expert technicians are always available to help, efficiency improves as the burden on the internal team lightens and user experience gets better thanks to an easy-to-use platform. Reliability increases as everything is monitored in a proactive manner to identify and remedy issues before they become critical. This helps reduce uncertainty regarding unfamiliar platforms, hardware faults and connectivity issues.