For any business, a great (and stressful) point in your companies growth is hiring a new employee. You shuffle through thousands of resumes to find some good candidates, conduct phone interviews and with great results, you will have 3-5 candidates come in to meet with you to fill the same position.
Bringing in a new employee can be a hurdle that any owner and/or management team has to face, but all of your hard work will pay off and your candidate will turn into an even better asset than you could have hoped for… or for a more realistic result, they will need some tweaking and training to become the employee YOUR firm needs.
And if that new employee starts under performing or falling behind, you would coach them and try to make strides so they are successful but sometimes it is not a good fit so you make the decision to let them go. Firing an employee is always stressful for both parties, but it wouldn’t be feasible for any company to keep an employee on that wasn’t reaching their goals or performing their basic job duties?
RIGHT? Exactly, there is so much time and capital invested in bringing in a new employee that you have to be sure that your investment is being made wisely to continue your organization’s growth.
Well if that’s the case, why don’t you use the same scale of measurement with your current IT company? They work for you the same way that your employees do that meet in the break-room a few times a day to discuss their weekend plans… they are on your payroll, affect your financials, even help you make decisions to make your business more successful.
Sometimes businesses don’t realize that just because a certain vendor or partner doesn’t punch a time clock or submit vacation requests to you directly, doesn’t mean they don’t work for you and shouldn’t be managed in some form.
Since you give your IT provider so much power over your company, they should be held just as accountable for their actions and performance as someone on your management or administrative team. But sadly IT costs and overall performance is one factor of a company that most businesses put to the wayside and don’t measure.
I mean let’s be honest, most businesses get the monthly or quarterly bill from their IT company and maybe hesitate for a moment at the charges but end up just signing the check because they feel they either have no other options – or have blind trust that their IT firm is doing what they are paying them for.
In a report we recently added to our website, you now have a list of 16 questions that you can use to interview your next IT vendor or even have talking points to review with your current provider.
So even if you have never met with your IT firm or conducted a semi-annual review on their services, it is not too late to start but the results may surprise you.
1) Do they provide detailed invoices and clearly explain what you are paying for?
2) Do they offer guarantees for their services?
3) Do they arrive on time dressed professionally?
4) Do they make calls to other clients while they are working at your office (and on your dime)?
5) Do they answer your questions clearly for you to understand? Or tell you things in “geek speak” so you are unsure of what they’re doing for your network?
And these are just the beginning but as you can see, these are items that no business owner would allow from their employees while in the office (or even when meeting with one of your customers). So why do you let your IT rep get away with it?
Like the late President Truman once said, “The Buck Stops Here!” and that powerful phrase is relevant now more than ever.
Stop letting your IT vendor call the shots on how your business and network will be ran – it is time to take charge of your profits, your financials… but most importantly, YOUR BUSINESS!
Act now to take back control and make sure that your budget for IT services is not only being spent wisely, but what you expect is actually being done.
And if you need help, or a third party to do a health check, we are happy to help. Accram is now offering a $795 network assessment for no charge to help make sure that local businesses are being protected from looming cyber threats.
But this offer is only good for a limited time so act now before you miss out on a no-commitment, unbiased look at your network!
If you are interested in this limited time offer, feel free to email me at croethler@accram.com, or call my office and I will assist you with scheduling an onsite assessment with our expert team.
And remember, a safe network is a happy network – keep your businesses data secured and the rest will fall into place!
Meet Our Blogger!
As the Marketing Director for Accram, Carrie Anne is able to bring her love for writing & technology to our clients in an informative and fun way! In her blogs, we strive to bring you information that can help improve your business in a new way that is not only educational and entertaining way. Enjoy!
