What’s The Key To Successful IT Services Onboarding?

The Key To Successful IT Services Onboarding

Like any other transition, onboarding from one IT services company to another comes with its own set of challenges. There is a secret to pulling off a successful migration that gives your business exactly what you need out of your new technology services. The key is to make sure you know exactly what you’re getting into before you start.

Changing from one provider to another — whether IT or otherwise — should never be made impulsively. Taking the time to figure out the specifics well ahead of time will:

• Eliminate added complications and costs
• Make the entire process much smoother

In plainer terms, your business should have a very clear idea of why you’re making the move in the first place. You should know how that move will impact your day-to-day operations. And lastly, you should know what you intend to get from your new IT services.

Regardless of what the reason is, you don’t want to be hasty about the change…

What Should You Look For In An Onboarding Process?

When evaluating your potential options, you always want to be sure to inquire about how the IT services provider will manage the transition process.

The worst-case scenario is that they don’t have any sort of plan in place whatsoever. This is more common than you may think. The new provider will simply come in for a single meeting, find out what you’re looking for, take stock of your local IT environment, and that’s about it. If nothing goes wrong, and there’s nothing to install, you may never see them again.

Does that sound like the right approach to you?

The problem is that this process is based on a lot of assumptions. Namely, it assumes that everything you’re currently using IT-wise is optimized (not likely, given that you’re changing IT providers). It also assumes that there’s no room for improvement (also unlikely, given how quickly technology changes and improves).

What Should Onboarding Include?

The bottom line is that a truly effective onboarding process needs to be based on a plan. That’s why Colorado Computer Support follows a comprehensive and detailed onboarding process:

• We equip you with the right tools and software
• We extensively document all Admin usernames and passwords
• We collect IP Addresses throughout your IT environment
• We develop network maps and floor-plans of IT systems
• We document network closets and server rooms with photos and documentation
• We gather critical information on each and every vendor you work with
• We document each and every business process you have, including imaging to employee on-boarding/off-boarding, network start-up/shutdown and account creation
• We audit your technology’s health to make sure all hardware and software are up to date and optimized

The bottom line is that you don’t want to rush this process, or you may end up with the same issues that led you to seek alternative services in the first place. Colorado Computer Support takes pride in our work from the very beginning, following an onboarding process that you can believe in.