IT Infrastructure Control
Introduction
The extent to which technology has become a part of everyday life and everyday business has seen a change in the way business approaches how they manage the money, the tasks and the systems within a business. Technology becoming an increasing factor in business.
As computing becomes more widespread within an organisation and takes a more prominent vital within the vital functions of that company, it is important to make sure that an appropriate level of attention is applied to this technology.
Technology have come a long way during the past few years and are now seen as essential elements of any organisation. As such, they receive grander budgets but must also be able to manage a greater amount of responsibility. There is an eternal race between corporate demands and computing capabilities.
But after you have spent a large amount of money on developing an IT infrastructure and seen the needs of your business change, how do you make sure that the IT you are using can keep up with demand?
This is the role carried out by IT management software and procedures.
Every business and every situation will have different needs and will offer different problems. To satisfy these requirements there are a number of different technologies and approaches that can be used to help manage the IT network of your business.
Software Asset Management
SAM ( Software Asset Management) is designed to do exactly what it says on the tin - monitoring and managing the deployment and usage of software suites within your organisation. It is a business process rather than a distinct discipline and is becoming a more essential part of the modern business environment, particularly for businesses operating in the field of IT.
SAM is not simply a tool for support staff rolling out software across a large company network, but can be a crucial tool to help improve performance at all levels of a company. The objectives of SAM include managing of the IT infrastructure within a company, negating legal risks associated with incorrect software license usage and sustaining high levels of productivity by making sure software is up to date and fit for its purpose. As IT usage in a company grows, so do the potential benefits of SAM.
The practice of SAM is often viewed as an unnecessary evil due to the abstract nature of what it is designed to deal with, and the business case for employing a SAM solution is not always obvious until a complete of the software infrastructure of a company has been done.
Financial benefits remain the most driving business factor when choosing to use software asset management software within an organisation. Every business needs to make money after all and expenditure is a very measurable figure.
An increasingly large amount of a organisation’s IT bank roll is spent on software licensing so there is a vital need to invest to correctly manage this spending. As organisations grow and spread, their software requirements can change greatly and hardware and software can swiftly become outdated. There is no requirement to spend money to maintain the licenses on this outdated software, which is where SAM really delivers an edge.
software asset management is not restricted to simply the IT department of your company either. As a management cycle it will often involve many of the departments within a company, including Finance Human Resources, to make sure that it runs as efficiently as possible. It is a process that does not need to follow regular.
IT service professionals working for a company called buying solutions IT supplier provide a range of IT management solutions including software asset management tools.
Why follow a SAM Strategy?
Having heard the multiple advantages of utilising a SAM solution, how do you know that it would be appropriate for your company? Each company is different and has its own separate set of challenges and benefits, so any plan you will use needs to be tailored to these specific traits. The benefits of SAM do cover the basic aspects of IT management.
There are more than just monetary benefits that can be made through the control of licensing and maintenance agreements across a companies IT system. Productivity can be hugely boosted by ensuring that staff have the newest versions of software available under current licenses held, and communication inside the business is aided when support staff know exactly what is deployed on every workstation under their control. The benefits of SAM are not confined to the technological hardware of your organisation.
Financial Savings
As discussed previously, perhaps the most persuading reason to implement SAM within your business is the potential financial savings that can be achieved. The profitability of your business is always going to be the bottom line so any strategy that can help to improve this profitability by descreasing costs is one that should be evaluated. Money can be saved in a multitude of ways.
The most immediate way that software asset management can help to lower costs is by targeting any applications running on your corporate network that is no longer necessary. The software might not be being used anymore, it may be too outdated to be of use or it may be duplicated on your system.
By removing these items of software that are no longer a help to the running of your organisation you are streamlining a large portion of your IT infrastructure. Paying for unnecessary software licenses and support and maintenance agreements means that more finance can be spent on the vital parts of your IT system.
Mitigate Risk Factors
A surprising proportion of software that is currently used in the business environment is either licensed incorrectly or not licensed at all. Having any amount of uncontrolled software on your IT system is not advised, because when left unchecked it can become very unpredictable. This is becoming an increasingly frustrating factor for network managers.
Rogue software applications can be introduced into an unmonitored IT system in a number of ways. Software may have been included when your IT hardware was first bought although the initial software licenses may have expired. Without the correct control policies in place, users may also be able to load their own software onto the system.
The danger of running unlicensed software on your network is clear. When something goes wrong with the hardware or software platform behind your vital processes, how do you handle the situation? Operating a complex software system without the proper support can create a metaphorical minefield when it comes to disaster recovery and can critically limit your responsiveness to unforeseen events. The cost of recovery will forever outweigh the cost of prevention when it comes to IT systems.
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Implementing Software Asset Management in your Organisation
As previously mentioned, there are numerous potential benefits to employing a good software asset management strategy within your organisation, both financial and otherwise. It is therefore important to determine which branches of SAM you should implement first since certain benefits will be realised more quickly than others.
The discovery process can be seen as three fundamental phases that have to be performed to really develop an informative picture of the usage of software assets within your business. These are:
Inventory
Inventory is the most fundamental function of the discovery process. It is vital that an accurate audit of IT assets within your business is created to help your IT managers to maintain baselines regarding your IT system.
Fortunately, this process can now be automated and even the largest of networks can be searched and analysed in a relatively short period. Inventory must be able to identify your IT assets regardless of their geographical location or technological characteristics.
Capture
The next step in the discovery cycle involves the capture of the license entitlements that cover the software programs identified in the inventory. The capture process should collect entitlements regarding all of the software that is installed on your system, even when the software is not currently used. Without this information the inventory may be almost useless.
The factor of human error can be mitigated by using automated tools that are specifically created to create a library of license entitlements. Packages that are currently available are incredibly efficient at gathering accurate data.
Identification & Validation
The third step is to match up your software inventory to the repository of licensing information that were built in the last two stages. Errors may have been made anywhere from the original invoices for software to the most recent audits performed on your IT network. These errors can now be rectified.
One critical factor in the validation stage is the ability to combine the license entitlements on your system to your company’s proof of entitlement. This will be essential if any disputes with software vendors arise as a consequence of the discovery process. You want to be as informed as possible in these circumstances.
Once these steps have been performed you will have created an incredibly rich image of how your IT system is delivering software packages to its users. It will be a lot simpler to identify any trouble areas on your network, or areas of software use that are no longer of any practical benefit to your activites. This detailed picture can be used for future strategies as well.
You can now begin a period of reconciliation upon your network. You can compare the software programs that are actually installed on your system against the licensing and support entitlements that you are paying for and bridge any divides between the two.
The software distribution within your network may include many hundreds or even thousands of individual instances, and there are any number of restrictions that may be associated with the licensing agreements you have in place. It is therefore a necessity to automate the reconciliation process, utilising one or more tools to apply intelligent rules to the process.
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Compliancy and Flexibility with SAM
Many of the basic principles of a successful software asset management strategy are based upon the concepts laid out in the Information Technology Infrastructure Library, or ITIL. This library defines a number of ideas and best practices that should be followed for successful management of IT functions.
This library is a dynamic entity and is often updated with new ideas and techniques that cater to the constantly changing IT environment of modern business. A good SAM strategy should be fluid enough to comply with the guidelines laid out in the ITIL whilst meeting the changing needs of the business within which it is actively used. This is an essential requirement of effective SAM
The International Standard Organisation (ISO) has published a standard that applies directly to SAM practices. This standard, ISO 19770-1, is an incredibly comprehensive set of suggestions that are designed to ensure that software asset management is used in such a way as to “satisfy corporate governance requirements”.
The ISO standard should really be followed when designing a SAM strategy for your own organisation, although the level of detail included within can easily become a daunting prospect. It is important to remember that no matter what guidelines you follow when planning a SAM strategy, whatever you decide to employ must aid your business rather than stifle it.
Creating a complete and comprehensive software asset management strategy for your own company might actually never come to fruition. Your plan must be flexible enough to change and mature as your organisation does, and it must allow for updates to your daily tasks, no matter how small or underlying they might be.
Conclusion
It is easy to see that as the scope and importance of computer systems within your organisation grow, so does the need for correct and effective management of these systems. Gone are the times when an IT branch was a bonus that would occasionally progress the business. IT systems are now vital to the modern company. Crucial systems need to be maintained to an appropriate standard.
As with other branches of any company, a number of different plans should be evaluated and utilised in order to ensure the smooth running of daily tasks. software asset management should not be the only tool used to manage technological assets within your company, but rather one of a multitude of complimentary policies used to control the system as a unit.
So if you think that your company is really suffering from a lack of structured monitoring and management over its IT network, or that the possible benefits described in this article could provide a critical market edge over your competitors, then it would be worth investigating how software asset management could be used within your organisation. There may be no time to lose.
