As startups grow and scale to become big level enterprises, they need different kind of service providers to help them operate on bulk level. Managing five thousand customers with the help of an in-house team may be possible but managing two to three million customers efficiently is not every company’s piece of cake.
Have you ever imagined how incorporations like Apple and Facebook manage their customer base of millions and a billion customer interactions each day? They outsource their operations to reputable managed service providers (MSPs) in order to facilitate the huge customer base.
The shortest and simple explanation is, a managed service is outsourcing practice of business operations. A managed services providing company manage IT assets and handle the operations and tasks for other enterprises on contractual basis, however the IT assets and systems are totally owned by the enterprise itself. Also managed services are not totally bound to the field of information technology as there are other so many categories of managed services for different industries. Although the significant managed services in the information technology area are continuously evolving because innovation in IT is constant and cannot be stopped.
During 1990s, managed services came as a sustainable innovation and alternative to the on-demand outsourcing model of providing business services where the service providers performed tasks on-demand and billed the customers only for the specific task done (just like the Freelancer and Upwork model). The problem with on-demand outsourcing agents is that they work in a nomadic style and are always on the move for more work which results in near to the ground commitment level to your company. However, managed services provided by reputable service companies are always reliable and on contract basis which enables your organization to be strict on deadlines and missed tasks. You are at least able to threaten the service provider about discontinuing the contract if they are not performing up to your standards.
The most meaningful benefit of using managed services is that the service providers need long term contracts and to accomplish this, they usually work with full commitment on your operations. Whether you work with a service provider on contract basis or subscription based model, your overall business and systems are always under your sight and service providers only perform and deliver the managed services you have asked for. You are also able to discuss the quality standards and specific metrics that you use for measuring success of any particular task or your overall business.
Adopting managed services reflect a great management style that knows how to plan and execute their operations while being cost-effective and efficient. Building an in-house team always result in higher costs and increased staff expenses. Also implementing managed services is a resourceful approach in order to stay up to date on technology and industry wide innovations.
