What does IT do?

We have an ongoing dialogue internally about the role of IT organizations within businesses, how that role is changing, and what it might look like in a decade given the continuous impact that developments in networking, hardware, and software have on the landscape. I would conjecture that in certain businesses, the total scope of the IT department is contracting. The strategic importance of IT continues to play an important role in remaining competitive, but skill-sets are shifting towards application architecture, integration, analytics and forecasting, and business processes.

The IT department, whose scope and purpose varies by organization, has traditionally had within its purview management computer networking, desktop hardware, server hardware, desktop applications, server applications, telecommunications, physical security, network security, integration of internal applications, integration with external applications, software selection, hardware selection, application monitoring, software development, compliance, strategy, and more. Developments in networking, hardware, and software have, bit by bit, chiseled away at the need for IT to provide many of these services. We find ourselves and our associates interacting less with internal IT departments and more with managed service and application providers.

Examples where technology-savvy service providers have emerged to motivate a shift in responsibility away from internal IT include:

• Network management: managed network service providers take responsibility for monitoring connectivity and network performance while others provide remote application performance management.
• Network security monitoring: managed security providers handle remote monitoring of intrusion detection and computer virus outbreaks.
• Server management: managed hosting providers take responsibility for running, tuning, and scaling applications hosted outside the corporate firewall.
• Software application management: application service providers provide web-based software that reduces the need for internal IT to manage application software and the hardware running it.
• Telecommunications: trends towards “voice over internet protocol” (VoIP) provide opportunities for managed telephony providers, thus moving technical management of telephony outside the corporate walls.
• Desktop applications: the shift away from client-server to web-based computing reduces the support required of IT. Application service providers provide user support for their applications instead of IT.
• Facilities management: Connecting HVAC systems, access control, and building systems to IP networks provides opportunities for facilities and building management companies to add remote management, monitoring, and application development to their service offering.

Service providers are deepening their expertise within these areas of concentration, making it difficult for understaffed IT groups to offer competitive support and service. As a consumer of IT services, you should be aware that there may be a service provider out there that can provide superior technology, service, and support at a lower cost and higher service level than internal IT. 

Startups today can very quickly provision software, telephony, and other technologies, resulting in a more efficient expense structure. Existing businesses, when evaluating a refresh or adding additional technical capabilities, can rely more so on service providers than internal IT.