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5 Ways Organizations can Reduce IT Costs through ITAM 2.0 | Lansweeper
5 Ways Lansweeper Helps with IT Cost Reductions
This article was originally published by LOGON’s partner Lansweeper. Click here to view the original article.
As organizations adopt new technologies and assets to support digital transformation initiatives, and as technology spending increases, ITAM 2.0 solutions can offer significant and measurable IT cost reductions. Organizations can reduce waste, and identify and eliminate hidden costs — all while increasing IT performance and security with an advanced IT discovery and inventory solution as the foundation.
In our previous blogpost on IT Cost Optimizations strategies, we talked about the benefits of having a single system of record that keeps an accurate, up-to-date inventory of all of the IT assets — software, hardware, mobile devices, virtual machines, servers and more — that comprise the entire IT estate.
In the ITAM 2.0 approach, all of the necessary data to support any IT scenario is readily available to deliver IT cost reductions for multiple business scenarios. This holistic approach to ITAM leads to substantial IT cost savings, while enabling IT teams to more quickly and efficiently address any problem, since all of the IT inventory data is already there.
To put this theory into practice, we have gathered 5 ways Lansweeper can help optimize strategies for IT cost reductions, each time illustrated by a real-life customer case.
1. Eliminate Manual Processes
Historically, the process of tracking IT assets has been mostly manual, involving extensive spreadsheets with outdated network information and mapping. Manual processes lead to inaccurate reporting on device-specific hardware and unmanaged software, which not only complicates spend management, but can be disastrous to an organization’s productivity, compliance and, ultimately, their bottom line. A dedicated ITAM 2.0 solution can eliminate costly manual processes with automatic scanning, alerting and reporting features to increase accuracy and productivity.
Frank De Bree, Central Head of IT at Brothers of Charity estimated his IT staff spent half a workday, on average, entering asset information in proprietary tracking software manually. Lack of visibility and no unified IT asset inventory meant that the team had to do everything by hand – from inputting serial numbers, MAC addresses, device locations and more.
2. Strengthen Cyber Security
With more than 5 billion records compromised last year, data breaches cost US organizations more than $1.2 trillion in 2019 alone. Lansweeper’s credo for cyber security is: You can’t protect what you can’t see. Forgotten or missed assets may be running outdated software or even malware, creating security vulnerabilities that can lead to huge financial losses and compromised data.
To combat this risk, Herman Miller implemented Lansweeper for cyber security, which increased visibility into its complex IT environment. The IT organization benefits from more than 100 custom Lansweeper reports that they use to keep the CIO informed at all times. Learn how they do it.
“Lansweeper delivers detailed information about a security incident in minutes, providing incredible time savings and helping us to minimize or eliminate potential damage.”
Kristopher Russo, Information Security Analyst Architect, Herman Miller
3. Streamline Reporting
Lansweeper’s ability to easily access relevant data reduces reporting hassles and eliminates human error, as well. Time spent on compiling detailed reports for business units or regulatory bodies, and retrieving data for security investigations is drastically reduced, giving IT staff more time to spend on other mission-critical activities.
Lansweeper has proved to be a very convenient source of information for the Chamber of Commerce of North Rhine-Westphalia, simplifying day-to-day tasks, such as accessing user login details or network topology information, through our easy-to-use reporting tools.
4. Be Prepared For Audits
To maximize ROI from enterprise software agreements, knowing exactly how many licenses you are using is essential for reporting — otherwise, you may end up paying for unused licenses. On the flipside, Lansweeper can also uncover if you’re missing licenses and help mitigate the risk of incurring fines and predict the costs of becoming fully compliant.
What’s more, in the wake of Covid-19, software publishers will likely increase audit activities to make up for lost revenue, according to many industry analysts. Being prepared in advance by maintaining an up-to-date inventory will save time and money in the event of a surprise audit.
Lansweeper helped this Fortune 500 automotive retailer improve reporting for Microsoft License audits and other license reporting requests. They installed Lansweeper and in no time saw all 26,000+ devices in their network.
5. Maximize Infrastructure Visibility
Tracking the lifecycle of IT assets provides CIOs and IT professionals with critical data for financial, inventory, contractual and risk-management strategies. A solution that has ITAM as a core functionality can automatically and accurately update IT Inventories which, in turn, helps decision-makers understand workflows and determine which assets need to be purchased, redistributed or discontinued. It also allows system administrators more time for high-level analysis, and helps identify and reduce the impact of fraud, as ITAM tools keep track of each transaction and the networks, devices and users involved.
Cerner Corporation uses Lansweeper to gain insight into not only the number of assets in the environments they manage, but required patches, updates, fixes and other necessary maintenance tasks, helping to better allocate staffing and control costs.
Done right, ITAM offers insights and strategies for improving inefficiencies and productivity across an organization. Interested in learning what ROI an ITAM 2.0 solution like Lansweeper can deliver for your organization? Check out our ROI calculator.