Elly Yates-Roberts |
This article was originally published in the Autumn 2019 issue of The Record. Subscribe for FREE here to get the next issues delivered directly to your inbox.
Every software-as-a-service vendor is using business productivity and low IT costs as the driving forces behind customer adoption of their offerings. But these promises rely entirely upon enterprise IT teams understanding, managing and delivering the service quality that their end users need in order to adopt new solutions.
Unfortunately, there are several misconceptions preventing enterprise IT teams from reaching their goals, particularly regarding Office 365 deployment.
Many organisations believe that their users will inform them if they have service delivery issues. However, reports by analysis and advisory firm Gartner show that only 16% of users contact their IT provider when an application is slow, preferring instead to make a complaint to their management. As a result, IT departments are left in the dark until business lines are impacted, by which point the productivity of the company has already been jeopardised.
Another misconception facing organisations is that any issues with Office 365 must be caused by a Microsoft fault. Having worked with over 400 large enterprises who use Office 365, we have noticed that issues with performance and service delivery are most commonly found between the end user and the Microsoft data centre. At this point the client is responsible for understanding and fixing the issues.
IT Teams also tend to believe that the success of a Teams deployment can be ensured simply with a network assessment. While these are great, they do not tell the full story of how the onboarding of new users is affecting the end-user experience. The only way to fully understand the relationship is to monitor it during the whole migration.
“I don’t need to follow Microsoft’s recommended route to the cloud,” is another mistake IT teams often make regarding their success. It is difficult for clients to fully understand how critical these recommendations can be, particularly as they have nothing with which to compare the impact of their choice when they do not follow them.
All enterprises need to ensure that they deploy Office 365 properly to see the full benefits of the suite, including protecting the IT and business lines from the operational and financial consequences of unexpected issues.
At GSX Solutions, we are working hand in hand with Microsoft to provide customers with a solution which monitors and reports on the Office 365 end-user experience. By using it, organisations and their IT teams can take control of the service quality they deliver and achieve their goals in business productivity and cost reduction.
Jean-François Piot is the vice president of Microsoft and strategic alliances at GSX Solutions