Introduction
The degree to which technology has become a part of everyday life and day-to-day commerce has prompted a change in the way business approaches how they manage the finances, the processes and the assets within an organisation.
As computing becomes more widespread within an organisation and takes a more prominent role within the vital processes of that business, it is necessary to make sure that an appropriate amount of attention is applied to this technology. Technological systems that may have previously been overlooked are now key in the decision making process.
Technology have come a long way during the past few years and are now seen as critical elements of any business. As such, they are allocated grander budgets but must also be able to manage a larger amount of work. There is an eternal race between corporate demands and computing capabilities.
But once you have spent a substantial amount of money on developing an IT system and seen the circumstances of your organisation change, how do you ensure that the IT you are using can keep up with demand? Moreover, how can you achieve this without spending a prohibitive amount of money?
This is the function by IT management software and procedures.
Every organisation and every environment will have different requirements and will present unique problems. To meet these needs there are a number of different technologies and approaches that can be implemented to help control the IT assets of your company.One of these solutions is discussed below.
Software Asset Management
SAM ( Software Asset Management) is built to do exactly what it says on the tin – monitoring and controlling the deployment and usage of software suites within your company. It is a business process rather than a distinct skill and is becoming a more critical part of the modern commercial environment, particularly for businesses operating in the field of Information Technology. Despite the many benefits of SAM, there are still a great many companies that are not utilising it to its full potential.
SAM is not simply a tool for support staff rolling out software across a large company network, but can be a crucial tool to help improve performance at multiple levels of a business. The aims of SAM include monitoring costs of the IT infrastructure within a company, negating legal threats associated with incorrect software license usage and sustaining high levels of productivity by making sure software is up to date and fit for its purpose.
The practice of SAM is often seen as an unnecessary evil due to the abstract nature of what it is designed to deal with, and the financial case for using a SAM solution is not always obvious until a complete of the software infrastructure of a company has been done.
Monetary benefits are still the most driving commercial factor when deciding to use SAM technology within a business. Every company needs to make money after all and profitability is a very measurable figure.
An increasingly large amount of a organisation’s IT budget is spent on software licensing so there is a real need to invest to correctly handle this spending. As organisations grow and spread, their software requirements can change greatly and hardware and software can swiftly become out of date. There is no requirement to spend money to maintain the licenses on this outdated software, which is where SAM really delivers an advantage.
SAM is not limited to simply the technology of your organisation either. As a management cycle it will often involve many of the departments within a organisation, including Finance Human Resources, to ensure that it runs as cost-effectively as possible. It is a process that does not need to follow standard.
Ironically, IT service companies themselves, such as the service reseller Centennial demand equally as much IT management as their customers.
Why follow a SAM Strategy?
Having seen the many benefits of employing a software asset management solution, how do you know that it would be right for your business? Each company is different and has its own unique set of problems and benefits, so any plan you will undertake needs to be catered to these specific characteristics. The benefits of SAM do cover the basic aspects of IT management.
There are more than simply monetary benefits that can be made through the control of licensing and maintenance agreements across a businesses IT system. Productivity can be hugely boosted by ensuring that staff have the newest editions of software available under current licenses held, and communication within the corporation is aided when support staff know exactly what is deployed on every workstation under their control. The benefits of SAM are not confined to the technological hardware of your organisation.
Cost Savings
As discussed previously, perhaps the most convincing reason to utilise software asset management within your company is the potential cost savings that can be made. The profitability of your company is always going to be the bottom line so any plan that can help to increase this profitability by descreasing costs is one that should be considered. Money can be saved in a multitude of ways.
The most immediate way that SAM can help to reduce costs is by targeting any software running on your corporate IT system that is no longer necessary. The software might not be being used any longer, it may be too outdated to be of use or it may be duplicated on your system.
By clearing these items of software that are no longer a benefit to the operation of your organisation you are streamlining a large portion of your IT network. Paying for unnecessary software licenses and maintenance contracts means that more finance can be spent on the essential parts of your IT system. Focusing your attention on these critical components will improve the overall performance of your IT department.
Mitigate Risk Factors
A surprising amount of software that is currently used in the corporate environment is either licensed incorrectly or not licensed at all. Having any amount of uncontrolled software on your IT system is ill advised, because when left unchecked it can become very unpredictable.
Unlicensed software programs can be introduced into an uncontrolled IT environment in a number of ways. Software may have been included when your IT hardware was first bought although the original software licenses may have expired. Without the correct security policies in place, users may also be able to load their own software onto the system.
The risk of running unlicensed software on your network is clear. When something goes wrong with the hardware or software platform supporting your vital processes, how do you recover the situation? Running a complicated software system without the proper support can create a metaphorical minefield when it comes to disaster recovery and can seriously inhibit your responsiveness to unpredictable events. The cost of recovery will forever outweigh the cost of prevention when it comes to data systems.
To plan and carry out a successful SAM strategy, making Centennial distributors high in your list of priorities will be a key factor.
Implementing Software Asset Management in your Organisation
As previously discussed, there are many potential advantages to employing a good SAM strategy within your organisation, both financial and otherwise. It is therefore important to determine which elements of software asset management you should implement first since some benefits will be realised more quickly than others. Some may take a period of years to be fully felt.
The discovery process can be seen as three fundamental stages that have to be undertaken to truly build an informative picture of the usage of software assets within your company. These are:
Inventory
Inventory is the most basic function of the discovery cycle. It is vital that an accurate audit of IT assets within your business is created to aid your IT managers to maintain baselines for your IT network.
Thankfully, this process can now be automated and even the grandest of networks can be searched and analysed in a relatively short period. Inventory should be able to identify your software assets regardless of their geographical location or technological characteristics.
Capture
The second step in the discovery cycle involves the capture of the software license entitlements that concern the software assets identified in the inventory. The capture process should gather entitlements regarding all of the software that exists on your system, even when the software is not currently used.
The element of human error can be mitigated by using automatic tools that are specifically designed to build a library of license entitlements. Tools that are currently employed are very efficient at capturing accurate information. These tools will also maintain databases containing up to date information from IT vendors.
Identification & Validation
The next process is to match up the software inventory to the repository of licensing data that were built in the previous two stages. Errors may have been made anywhere from the original paperwork for software to the most recent audits undertaken on your IT network. These errors can now be rectified.
One crucial factor in the validation step is the ability to combine the license entitlements within your system to your company’s proof of entitlement. This will be vital if any disputes with software resellers arise as a consequence of the discovery cycle.
Once these three steps have been performed you will have created an incredibly detailed picture of how your IT system is delivering software assets to its users. It will be a lot simpler to identify particular trouble spots on your system, or sections of software usage that are no longer of any particular benefit to your activites. This detailed picture can be used for future strategies as well.
You can now begin a period of reconciliation upon your system. You should compare the software packages that are actually installed on your network against the licensing and support entitlements that you are paying for and close any gaps between the two.
The software spread within your network may include many hundreds or perhaps thousands of individual instances, and there are any number of rules that may be associated with the licensing contracts you have in place. It is therefore a necessity to automate the reconciliation stage, utilising one or more tools to apply intelligent rules to the process.
The use SAM within your organisation is a very specific cycle which should be strategised by a good Centennial reseller who should have extra information.
Compliancy and Flexibility with SAM
Many of the basic principles of a modern SAM strategy are based upon the concepts laid out in the Information Technology Infrastructure Library, or ITIL. This library defines a number of ideas and best practices that should be adopted for successful management of IT functions.
This library is a dynamic entity and is often updated with new ideas and policies that reflect the constantly changing IT environment of modern business. A good software asset management strategy should be flexible enough to comply with the guidelines laid out in the ITIL whilst meeting the changing needs of the business within which it is actively utilised. This is an essential requirement of effective software asset management
The International Standard Organisation (ISO) has created a standard that applies directly to SAM practices. This standard, ISO 19770-1, is an incredibly comprehensive set of suggestions that are designed to ensure that SAM is utilised in such a way as to “satisfy corporate governance requirements”.
The ISO standard should certainly be followed when planning a software asset management strategy for your own business, although the level of detail included within can easily become a daunting prospect. It is important to remember that no matter what guidelines you follow when creating a SAM strategy, whatever plan you decide to implement needs to aid your organisation rather than hinder it. Industry standards cannot simply be copied when it comes to applying them to your organisation.
Creating a complete and comprehensive software asset management strategy for your own business may actually never come to fruition. Your plan must be flexible enough to change and mature as your business does, and it must allow for modifications to your daily activities, no matter how small or fundamental they might be.
Conclusion
It is easy to see that as the scope and importance of IT systems within your organisation grow, so does the requirement for correct and effective monitoring of these systems. Gone are the times when an IT branch was a luxury that would occasionally progress the business. IT systems are now vital to the modern company.
As with other branches of any business, a number of different strategies should be evaluated and used in order to ensure the smooth running of daily activities. software asset management should not be the only tool used to manage computing resources within your company, but rather one of a multitude of complimentary techniques used to control the system as a whole. SAM can go a long way toward aiding your business but should be helped by other techniques.
So if you think that your organisation is really suffering from a lack of structured monitoring and management over its IT infrastructure, or that the potential advantages described in this article could provide a critical market advantage over your competitors, then it would be well worth researching how SAM could be employed within your organisation. There may be no time to lose.