Introduction
The degree to which technology has become a part of everyday life and day-to-day commerce has forced a change in the way business approaches how they manage the finances, the tasks and the systems within a business.
As technology becomes more widely used within a company and takes a more prominent critical within the critical processes of that business, it is important to make sure that an appropriate level of attention is applied to this computing.
Technology have come a long way during the past few years and are now seen as essential elements of any business. As such, they receive greater budgets but must also be able to handle a greater amount of responsibility. There is an eternal race between business needs and IT capabilities.
But once you have spent a large amount of your budget on developing your IT network and seen the requirements of your company change, how do you make sure that the IT you are using can keep up with demand?
This is the role undertaken by IT management software and procedures.
Every organisation and every environment will have different specifications and will offer unique issues. To satisfy these requirements there are a range of different solutions and approaches that can be implemented to help manage the IT network of your business.One of these options is discussed below.
Software Asset Management
SAM ( Software Asset Management) is designed to do exactly what it says on the tin – monitoring and controlling the deployment and usage of software suites within your organisation. It is a business process rather than a distinct area of expertise and is becoming a more critical part of the modern commercial environment, particularly for companies operating in the field of Information Technology.
SAM is not simply a program for technicians installing software across a large company network, but can be a crucial tool to help improve performance at multiple levels of a organisation. The goals of SAM include managing of the IT infrastructure within a business, negating legal risks associated with incorrect software license usage and maintaining high levels of productivity by making sure software is up to date and fit for its purpose. As IT usage in an organisation grows, so do the potential benefits of SAM.
The practice of SAM is often thought of as an unnecessary evil due to the intangible nature of what it is designed to deal with, and the commercial case for going with a SAM solution is not always obvious until a broad audit of the software infrastructure of a company has been carried out.
Financial benefits remain the most motivating commercial factor when deciding to operate SAM technology within an organisation. Every corporation needs to make profit after all and expenditure is a very measurable figure. The financial benefits of software asset management do certainly exist however.
An increasingly large amount of a organisation’s IT bank roll is spent on software licensing so there is a vital need to invest to correctly monitor this spending. As businesses expand and spread, their software requirements can change greatly and equipment and programs can quickly become outdated. There is no requirement to spend money to maintain the licenses on this outdated software, which is where SAM really delivers an edge.
software asset management is not limited to simply the technology of your business either. As a management cycle it will often include many of the branches within a business, including Finance Human Resources, to make sure that it runs as efficiently as possible. It is a process that does not need to follow standard.
IT service professionals working for a company named softcat supply a range of IT management solutions including software asset management tools. See their website.
Why follow a SAM Strategy?
Having seen the many advantages of employing a software asset management solution, how do you know that it would be appropriate for your business? Each business is different and has its own separate set of challenges and benefits, so any plan you will use needs to be catered to these specific traits.
There are more than just financial benefits that can be gained through the management of licensing and maintenance agreements across an organisations IT system. Productivity can be greatly by ensuring that employees have the latest versions of software available under current licenses held, and communication inside the company is aided when support staff know exactly what is in use on every computer under their control. The benefits of SAM are not confined to the technological hardware of your organisation.
Financial Savings
As discussed before, perhaps the most convincing reason to implement software asset management within your business 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 improve this profitability by lowering expenses is one that should be evaluated. Money can be saved in a number of ways.
The most direct way that SAM can help to reduce costs is by targeting any applications running on your corporate IT system that is no longer necessary. The software might not be being used any longer, it may be very outdated to be of use or it may be duplicated on your system. SAM can be used to remove this unnecessary overhead.
By clearing these items of software that are no longer a benefit to the operation of your company you are streamlining a large chunk of your IT network. Paying for unneeded software licenses and support and maintenance agreements means that more money can be spent on the vital sections of your IT system.
Mitigate Risk Factors
A surprising amount of software that is currently used in the business environment is either licensed incorrectly or not licensed at all. Running any amount of unmonitored software on your IT network is not advised, because when left unchecked it can become incredibly unpredictable. This is becoming an increasingly annoying factor for IT managers.
Rogue software applications can be introduced into an unmonitored IT system in a number of ways. Software may have been included when your IT hardware was originally purchased although the original software licenses may have expired. Without the correct control policies in place, users may also be able to load their own software onto the network.
The danger of running unlicensed software on your system is clear. When something goes wrong with the hardware or software platform behind your vital processes, how do you handle the situation? Operating a complicated software system without the correct support can create a metaphorical minefield when it comes to disaster recovery and can critically inhibit your responsiveness to unpredictable events. The cost of recovery will forever outweigh the cost of mitigation when it comes to IT systems.
To plan and carry out a successful software asset management strategy, keeping Centennial distributors top of your list of priorities will be a key factor.
Implementing Software Asset Management in your Organisation
As previously mentioned, there are many potential advantages to utilising a good software asset management strategy within your business, both financial and otherwise. It is vitally important to determine which branches of SAM you should implement first since some benefits will be achieved more speedily than others. Some may take a period of years to be fully felt.
The discovery process can be seen as three fundamental phases that have to be undertaken to really build an accurate picture of the deployment of IT assets within your company. These are:
Inventory
Inventory is the most fundamental stage of the discovery cycle. It is important that an accurate inventory of software assets within your organisation is created to help your IT department to maintain baselines for your IT system. This inventory process must be performed before continuing with discovery.
Thankfully, this process can now be made automatic and even the grandest of networks can be searched and analysed in a reasonably short period. Inventory should be able to identify your IT assets regardless of their geographical location or technological characteristics. Modern inventory processes are capable of this.
Capture
The next step in the discovery cycle is the capture of the license entitlements that concern the software assets discovered in the inventory. The capture process should collect entitlements for all of the software that is installed on your system, even when the software is not currently in use.
The risk of human error can be avoided by using automatic tools that are specifically created to build a library of license entitlements. Tools that are currently employed are incredibly efficient at gathering accurate information.
Identification & Validation
The next process is to match up the software inventory to the repository of licensing information that were built in the previous two stages. Errors may have occurred anywhere from the original paperwork for software to the latest audits undertaken on your IT system. These errors can now be rectified.
One critical factor in the validation step is the ability to link the license entitlements on your system to your company’s proof of entitlement. This will be essential if any arguments with software vendors arise as a consequence of the discovery process.
After these steps have been performed you will have created an incredibly detailed picture of how your IT system is serving software packages to its users. It will be much simpler to identify particular trouble spots on your network, or areas of software usage that are no longer of any practical benefit to your operations. This detailed picture can be used for future reference as well.
You can now start a period of reconciliation on your network. You should compare the software programs that are actually installed on your system against the licensing and support entitlements that you are paying for and close any gaps between the two.
The software distribution in your system may include many hundreds or even thousands of individual instances, and there are any number of rules that may be involved with the licensing contracts you have in place. It is therefore essential to automate the reconciliation stage, utilising one or more programs to apply smart rules to the process. These rules can be catered to the specific needs of your organisation.
More about deploying software asset management within your business is accessible through Centennial vendors who can be found across the country.
Compliancy and Flexibility with Software Asset Management
Many of the basic practices of a modern SAM strategy are based upon the principles set out in the Information Technology Infrastructure Library, or ITIL. This library defines a number of principles and best practices that should be followed for successful management of IT operations. The ITIL can be found online.
This library is a dynamic entity and is often updated with new concepts and techniques that cater to the ever changing IT environment of modern business. A good software asset management strategy should be fluid enough to comply with the guidelines laid out in the ITIL whilst meeting the changing requirements of the company within which it is actively utilised.
The International Standard Organisation (ISO) has created a standard that applies directly to software asset management practices. This standard, ISO 19770-1, is an exceptionally comprehensive collection of suggestions that are built 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 organisation, although the level of detail covered within can easily become a daunting prospect. It is important to remember that no matter what guidelines you follow when designing a SAM strategy, whatever plan you decide to implement needs to aid your business rather than hinder it. Industry standards cannot simply be copied when it comes to applying them to your organisation.
Designing a full and comprehensive software asset management strategy for your own company may actually never come to fruition. Your strategy must be flexible to adapt and mature as your business does, and it must allow for updates to your daily tasks, no matter how trivial or underlying they might be. This really is the key to a worthwhile SAM strategy.
Conclusion
It is clear to see that as the scope and importance of IT systems within your company grow, so does the need for good and efficient monitoring of these systems. Gone are the times when an IT branch was a bonus that would occasionally progress the business. IT systems are now critical to the modern company. Crucial systems need to be maintained to an appropriate level.
As with other parts of any business, a number of different strategies should be considered and utilised in order to ensure the smooth running of day to day tasks. software asset management should not be the only tool used to manage computing resources within your organisation, but rather one of a number of complimentary techniques used to manage the system as a unit. software asset management can go a long way toward helping your company but should be helped by other techniques.
So if you feel that your company is currently suffering from a lack of structured monitoring and management over its IT network, or that the possible advantages described in this article could manufacture a critical market edge over your competitors, then it would be well worth investigating how software asset management could be used within your business. There might be no time to spare.