UK businesses in jeopardy due to inadequate IT provision
UK businesses must have the staff and resources in place to avoid IT emergencies concludes K3 Managed Services, the UK’s foremost supplier and maintainer of ERP solutions. In the second of its monthly IT guides, distributed to business owners throughout Britain, K3 highlights the dangers that an under resourced IT department can present to a business.
“IT breakdowns or network problems can prove very costly for businesses. Not only do you suffer lost downtime but in some cases, networks can be down for lengthy amounts of time, resulting in dramatic economic loss. If you have to rely on someone else to restore your system, you could suffer long term damage to your business.”
The increasing importance of IT in business is transforming the role of IT staff significantly. K3 says the responsibility for IT should not and cannot be left to a handful of individuals and neither should the IT department work as a separate entity because it has become an essential component in delivering business strategy.
K3’s guide highlights the cost and complexity of ensuring an IT team is trained properly and equipped to maintain and develop mission-critical business applications as a key concern for companies. IT staff turnover is high, which results in companies facing the on-going threat of losing high paid, trained IT staff once they have gained the knowledge and experience necessary to move up the career ladder. Unless IT delivery is a core activity for a business, it does not make economic sense to keep investing in extra resources to try to stay on top of things. This is where companies can benefit from alternative solutions such as outsourcing.
“By forming a creative relationship between directors and IT staff, a business can keep track of its IT maintenance. Just as IT staff need senior executives to understand how developments like social networking, collaborative IT and a mobile infrastructure can make a business more effective, executives need IT staff to have a clear grasp of their overall business objectives, targets and development plans.”
As businesses move away from in-house developed systems and towards advances in software such as cloud computing, IT staff are able to concentrate on productivity and value adding activities, leaving minor IT problems a thing of the past. However, even then, bigger IT emergencies can cost a business greatly if there is nobody to step into the shoes of the IT Technician. This is where outsourcing IT makes good business sense.
Editorial - Ellen Hoefste, Marketing Manager, K3 Managed Services on 0161 876 4498 or
John Edden, Bridge PR & Media Services on 024 76 520025, or e-mail john@bridgepr.co.uk.
About K3 Managed Services
K3 Managed Services is part of the K3 Group of Companies. As a key UK Microsoft channel partner, the businesses focuses primarily on the retail, manufacturing and distribution sectors, supporting some 3,000 customers in over 20 countries worldwide. Their services include but are not limited to; ERP solutions, business support, on site devices, business continuity, networking and communications and security and compliance.
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