IT Manager's Handbook: Getting Your New Job Done (46 page)

1.
Seek involvement of your user community at the outset. If you're considering outsourcing the maintenance of your
HRIS
application, for example, make sure that representatives from HR are involved at the very beginning to participate in the evaluation of outsourcers and buy in to the decision.

2.
Carefully articulate to the outsourcer as much detail as you can about the environment and your expectations. The more information you can give your outsourcer, the better they'll be able to understand the requirements and to provide a more accurate proposal. For example, in the earlier example of outsourcing printer maintenance, you would want the outsourcer to know:

a.
How many printers of each model you have

b.
The physical layout (separate buildings across town, a campus environment, or in a single building)

c.
Space you can provide for stocking parts

d.
What your expectations are for response and resolution times

e.
Requirements to provide loaner equipment if a printer can't be repaired in a defined amount of time

f.
Requirements to provide updates on outstanding items

g.
Reporting requirements

h.
Requirements for any certifications of the outsourcer's staff or operations

i.
Integration with, or use of, your internal call-tracking system

j.
Executive requirements (for escalated service levels)

3.
Determine your own costs for currently executing this function (otherwise, it will be difficult to know if outsourcing will save you money). These costs can include:

a.
Labor (salaries, contractors, training, benefits, recruiting, etc.)

b.
Office space for employees

c.
Related hardware and software (purchase, maintenance, depreciation)

d.
Third-party costs (for suppliers, vendors, partners)

e.
Connectivity/network costs

4.
Understand the specifics of the outsourcer's terms. For example,

a.
Are they operating 24/7 or 8 AM to 5 PM?

b.
What about holidays? Which holidays?

c.
What happens if you have occasional special requirements for off-hours work? What are the costs?

d.
What are the specific service-level agreements and what metrics are used to determine if those SLAs are being met?

e.
What happens if an SLA isn't met? Do you get a credit?

f.
What about less quantifiable items, such as “quality of work,” “professionalism and courtesy,” and “language skills—written and oral” (these areas have been cited as the downfall of many offshoring arrangements)?

g.
What is your say in determining which of the outsourcer's staff is assigned to your organization? You probably don't want the outsourcer rotating people through your organization, but if one of them gets into an altercation with a VIP, you want to be sure that you won't be seeing that person again.

h.
Are you responsible for providing the outsourcer with anything? Seating space? Phones? Computers? Network connectivity?

i.
If your outsourcer is going to be involved directly with your organization's partners and suppliers, who will be signing those contracts and who is responsible for those obligations? What happens if those relationships begin to deteriorate as a result?

j.
What are the outsourcer's responsibilities regarding confidentiality, security, and regulatory requirements?

k.
If there are hardware/software requirements involved, who will be responsible for the purchases and support contracts? Will the hardware and licenses be purchased in your name or the outsourcer's?

5.
Carefully check the outsourcer's references.

a.
Speak to their customers who are similar to you (industry, size, requirements, etc.).

b.
Understand what things they would have done differently. What were the good and bad learnings?

6.
Make sure you factor in the effort to transition to an outsourcer, as well as what's involved in ending the arrangement (either at contract's end or earlier).

a.
There will certainly be a start-up period in transitioning responsibilities to the outsourcer as their team begins to understand your environment. Is this factored into the proposal and the costs?

b.
During a start-up period you may need the outsourcer to have a project manager assigned to ensure a smooth transition and to provide reports and updates on the transition's progress.

c.
Your staff will probably be upset about having to do their regular work, as well as train what may very well turn out to be their own replacements. Are you prepared for the upheaval if key members of your team start to leave?

d.
What happens if the transition is not meeting your expectations? Can you back out?

e.
When the outsourcing arrangement comes to an end, regardless of the reason, the outsourcer may not be as responsive or eager to assist in transitioning those functions back to you or to another outsourcer.

These days there is an equally important factor: the political consideration.

The Political Consideration

Outsourcing when jobs are scarce is a very controversial idea: outsourcing
and
offshoring can be downright dangerous. Backlash against companies sending domestic jobs overseas is often visible and embarrassing; be aware that even
investigating
the idea of offshoring can be politically sensitive.

Conclusion

As you can see, digging into this topic is not easy and can take some time. It's not unheard of for large outsourcing deals to take 6 to 12 months or longer to be evaluated and put in place. However, armed with all this information, you should be able to start doing a benefits analysis to determine if outsourcing makes sense and what the risks and benefits are. Of course, it's unlikely you'll be deciding this alone. You can expect your management to be involved, as well as Legal, Finance, HR, and, as mentioned at the very beginning, the users.

Remember, outsourcing generally doesn't eliminate headaches, it often only swaps one type of headache for another. Instead of the headaches of managing that function directly, you now have the headache of managing the outsourcer—to say nothing of handling the negative PR.

6.8 Further References

Websites

www.aicpa.org
. [American Institute of Certified Public Accounts].

www.fasb.org
. [Financial Accounting Standards Board].

www.megameeting.com
. [Web conferencing solution].

www.microsoft.com/livemeeting
. [Web conferencing solution].

www.polycom.com
. [videoconferencing solution].

www.tandberg.com
. [videoconferencing solution].

www.webex.com
. [Web conferencing solution].

Books and Articles

Barrow C, (2008).
Practical Financial Management: A Guide to Budgets
. [Kogan Page, Balance Sheets and Business Finance].

Beulen E, Ribbers P, Roos J, (2010).
Managing IT Outsourcing
. Routledge.

Bulkeley B, (2011). The Budget Conversation.
CIO Magazine
. [June 15].

Cone E, (2009). Managing Through Tough Times.
CIO Insight
. [January/February].

Droms WG, Wright JO, (2010).
Finance and Accounting for Nonfinancial Managers: All the Basics You Need to Know (Finance & Accounting for Nonfinancial Managers)
. Basic Books.

Garland P, (2011).
The CIO Imperative: Do More
. [Spend Less, Baseline Magazine July/August].

Hirschheim R, Heinzl A, Dibbern J, (2009).
Information Systems Outsourcing: Enduring Themes, Global Challenges, and Process Opportunities
. Springer.

Kimball G, (2010).
Outsourcing Agreements: A Practical Guide
. Oxford University Press.

Lewis B, (2011).
Outsourcing Debunked: What's real and what's baloney in IT's longest-running controversy
. Amazon Digital Services.

Nash K, (2009).
The Complexity of Reduction
. CIO Magazine [April].

Perkins B, (2009). Take Advantage of the Recession.
Computerworld
. [March 9].

Pratt MK, (2009). 5 Recession Survival Skills.
Computerworld
. [March 2].

Ramsden P, (2010).
Finance for Non-Financial Managers (Teach Yourself Business Skills)
. Hodder & Stoughton.

Rustad M, (2010).
Software Licensing: Principles and Practical Strategies
. Oxford University Press.

Stedman C, (2009). Hard Times Hard Decisions for IT.
Computerworld
. [March 9].

Tollen D, (2011).
The Tech Contracts Handbook: Software Licenses and Technology Services Agreements for Lawyers and Businesspeople
. American Bar Association.

Chapter 7

Getting Started with the Technical Environment

The most successful people are those who are good at Plan B.

James Yorke, Mathematician

Chapter table of contents

7.1
The Technical Environment

7.2
Understanding the User Environment

7.3
TCO and Asset Management: What Are They?

7.4
Standards

7.5
Technology Refreshing

7.6
Further References

In IT, it is too easy to be distracted by the exciting developments in hardware, security, networking, mobile devices, and apps. However, as a manager, you also have to keep your eyes on those areas that aren't quite as alluring. While activities like tracking your total cost of ownership (TCO) and inventorying your environment may be items you're tempted to put off, you must not do this. In fact, taking a formal inventory can be one of the activities that gives you an excellent understanding of what's in your environment, and how it operates—and is particularly valuable if your move to management came with a change in companies. A first-hand knowledge of the IT environment, its history, the users, and operation can help you to better define needs and future plans, as well as avoid repeating mistakes that were made in the past.

7.1 The Technical Environment

What Do We Have Here?

You probably have more technology in your environment than you realize. And it can be very difficult to get a handle on it all. The value of carefully determining everything you are responsible for, however, cannot be overestimated. Not only does it help you figure out your role, but it helps you understand the amount of resources you have. In addition, an inventory gives you a sense of scale about the environment, and a feeling for whether resources are under- or overutilized—although you're likely to find it's a combination of both.

Completing an inventory not only provides you with a frame of reference for what you've become responsible for, but it is excellent information to include in a disaster recovery plan. (For more details on developing a disaster recovery plan, see
Chapter 9, Disaster Recovery
on
page 247
.)

Don't be surprised if the existing infrastructure documentation is out of date (or nonexistent), with the latest version in the minds of your staff. Your promotion is as good a reason as any for getting current with documentation.

Making sure there is a complete inventory can be a very valuable tool for a wide range of different projects. For example, when it's time to do budgeting, and you need to determine how much to budget for support and maintenance, a complete inventory can be very valuable. Similarly, when it's time to do something like an upgrade of an operating system, an inventory will let you see the range of hardware and applications you need to test it with.