What are the different types of managed IT support?
Managed IT service providers assist with a wide range of technology needs. Here are some common support services offered through these engagements.
Break/fix support
Once the standard for IT support, this model involves monitoring IT infrastructure for issues, and then responding to resolve them. It’s typically a reactive approach to addressing IT issues but provides basic-level peace of mind for your presence in the cloud.
Based on your requirements and the MSP’s capabilities, break/fix support might be provided only during working hours or 24/7/365. You can negotiate terms with the managed service provider, defining expectations through operational-level agreements (OLAs) and service-level agreements (SLAs).
Cost/usage optimisation
Working with an MSP that supports your financial operations will help you to identify and incorporate best practices for optimising and reducing spending, e.g. through right-sizing or implementing best practices. It will also help you to understand the value of every dollar you spend in the cloud – giving you insights and clarity into how your IT utilisation contributes to business profits and growth.
Security
A managed service partner can offer a range of services to keep your business secure in the cloud. These can include:
- Multiple layers of protection to safeguard your infrastructure from cyberattacks and security failures
- 24/7 monitoring and alerting for your systems
- Rapid response services to defend and restore compromised systems, and minimise data losses and downtime
- Close coordination and real-time collaboration with your in-house security teams
Using advanced automation and artificial intelligence, a managed service provider can integrate many different data sources from across your organisation to proactively monitor activity in your IT environment. This can help you to detect and resolve most potential cyberattacks and other security vulnerabilities in near-real time.
Backup and disaster recovery
Engaging a managed service provider for backup and disaster recovery gives you access to modern and cloud-ready levels of data protection. It's also a good way to gain fine-grained control over your backup and recovery efforts, and to meet regulatory and compliance requirements. With the right partner, you can enhance your RTO (recovery time objective) and RPO (recovery point objective), which can help you reduce or prevent backup failures and speed up recovery after an outage.
Fully managed services
With an outsourced provider offering a full set of managed services for your cloud infrastructure, your organisation can access support wherever and whenever it’s needed. You can turn to the MSP for additional expertise in any aspect of IT management – in effect, it can become a full partner to your internal team as your infrastructure requirements change.
There’s a lot of flexibility in such arrangements. Using a responsibility assignment (RACI) matrix, you can work with the MSP to define who is responsible for what. And, as your needs evolve, your working relationship with the managed service provider can be adapted to those new requirements.