We at Rezitech pride ourselves on the disambigous nature of our concise communication with current and prospective clients.  However, due to the specifically technical nature of our industry there are some common (often misunderstood) abbreviations and acronyms which are used as a shorthand for framing general IT discussion.  As such, this esoteric second language can become quite impenetrable without a key or guide.  Today, I’ll be referencing and defining a few of these common terms towards the goal of enhancing your understanding of the general concepts therein related.

• NOC = Network Operations Center
  • A Network Operations Center is one or more off-site or remote locations from which control is exercised over a computer network. Essentially, a NOC operates like your in-house IT department; only it performs (often automated) maintenance and implementation tasks remotely via the internet. A NOC is typically responsible for: updating and maintaining server and desktop operating systems to keep them at peek operational trouble-free performance, supervising backups, handling systems administration tasks such as user supervisionand file access, and monitoring the security and stability of the network and all connected systems and equipment. Due to the nature of our global economy, this term has of late become somewhat synonymous with Asian (read Indian) network maintenance/monitoring outsource providers, but this is not always the case.

• VAR = Value Added Reseller
  • A Value Added Reseller is a business entity that adds features or services to an existing product, then resells it (usually to end-users) as an integrated product or complete “turn-key” solution. For example, Rezitech is a VAR for Microsoft products – when we sell a license for a Microsoft Server product; we package it with our knowledge and expertise to configure that product and deploy it effectively to suit the needs and wants of our customer. The added value can also come from our other professional services such as integrating, customizing, consulting, training and implementation.

• MSP = Managed Services Provider
  • A Managed Services Provider is an IT solutions provider, who manages and assumes responsibility for providing a defined set of services to their clients either proactively or as they and/or the client determine that suchservices are needed. Most MSPs bill an upfront setup or transition and an ongoing flat or near-fixed monthly fee, which benefits their clients by providing them with predictable IT support costs while ensuring that their business systems will remain reliably operational. At Rezitech, we provide a full compliment of managed services including email and web hosting, systems backup, IT systems oversight, phone systems, and turn-key total information systems supervision and maintenance responsibility. In short – we are your IT department, helpdesk, and web services host.

• SLA = Service Level Agreement
  • A Service Level Agreement is a part of a service contract where the level of service, scope, and price are formally defined.  This agreement is formalized and documented as agreed to by both parties,provider and client. At Rezitech, when we on-board a client for Managed Services; we contractually define the scope and cost of these services via an SLA.

• HaaS/SaaS = Hardware as a Service/Software as a Service
  • Hardware as a Service is a procurement process similar to licensing. Generally speaking, anMSP (such as Rezitech) monitors and administers hardware on a client’s site on a subscription basis. In order to standardize on best practices and current technology, we as MSP also provide on-site hardware and software for our clients and build its cost into their fees.  For example – when a client needs a new server; instead of investing the capital required to purchase the hardware and software outright, we procure the hardware and the software licensing and provide it to the customer for a monthly contractedfee. This reduces the total cost of ownership and ensures current technology will always be deployed. Our HaaS contracts generally include a schedule for replacing and upgrading the hardware and software; usually every few years. This ensures that our customer’s IT infrastructure never falls into obsolescence.

I certainly hope this brief enumeration has enhanced your understanding of how we frame the discussion for providing our many excellent services to our customers. In my next post, I’ll be tackling: just what exactly is “the cloud” and “cloud computing”?

Until then,

Kent

Recently, the Rezitech team was honored to spearhead the deployment of a new computer classroom at the Delancey Street Foundation residential treatment program in Los Angeles.  The Delancey Street Foundation is a non-profit rehabilitation program run entirely by its residents, many of them severely and hopelessly addicted substance abusers with extensive criminal histories.  It features a 2-year intensive behavior modification treatment protocol which has one of the best long-term success rates in the country.  Sponsored by the Cornerstone Project this computer classroom will provide a state-of-the-art place of learning where the residents will prepare for their GED exams, develop resumes to seek gainful employment,  and hone the highly marketable computer skills and literacy which are essential to compete in today’s technology driven marketplace.  The entire Rezitech team was supremely gratified to shepherd such a worthwhile project from inception to completion.

Upon learning of the alleged actions of Mr. Harwell, Rezitech took immediate and aggressive action to ensure that Mr. Harwell’s access to all customer systems and data was eliminated.  Rezitech has fully cooperated and will continue to cooperate with law enforcement in an effort to assist them in their investigation of this matter.  To Rezitech’s knowledge, Mr. Harwell did not commit any of the alleged offenses while performing work on behalf of Rezitech or while working on Rezitech computers or the computers of Rezitech customers.  Rezitech fully understands the gravity of the charges brought against Mr. Harwell and greatly sympathizes with those who Mr. Harwell is alleged to have victimized.

For further information, please contact:
Travis Austin
714-784-0334
firstname.lastname@rezitech.com

When the advice is sought by one of our active business customers, it’s quite straightforward to remind them that their PC is actively maintained by our engineers. This means that we’re already performing the necessary maintenance tasks across their infrastructure so that they don’t need to worry about installing and running any of these utilities.

The challenge comes when the advice is sought for a computer which we don’t maintain (a customer’s home computer, for instance). In this case, we have to look into the software and give our best recommendation on how to proceed.

Today, I was asked to look into a list of the “Top 10 Cool, Useful, Fun Freebies of 2010.” As I drafted my response, it seemed smart to share this with our customers and friends.

So…

Here’s my response to each of the 10 titles presented to me today:

1. Abine TACO. This utility claims to help protect a user’s browsing habits online and prevent unknown participation in Google’s “behavioral ad targeting” and other similar advertising methods from other advertisers. A quick search online reveals a number of users who are unhappy with Abine (the company who purchased TACO from its original author), and the software seems a bit bloated to me. Instead of TACO, my recommendation is that users download and install AdBlock Plus to remove unwanted advertising from their web experience.
2. SlimComputer. New consumer computers often come pre-loaded with a ton of unwanted software, which can slow down the system, annoy the user, and reduce the usability of the new computer. SlimComputer is similar to my personal choice in program removal, The PC Decrapifier, but SlimComputer also takes advantage of live feedback from other users. Whereas PC Decrapifier only knows about software that the authors of PC Decrapifier add to their database, SlimComputer relies on the combined community knowledge of all their users to understand which software is generally consider “unwanted”. Either program will likely do a fine job of cleaning up a new computer.
3. Microsoft Security Essentials. Anti-virus software has been around a long time, and there are many options to choose from. My personal favorite has always been Avast Home Edition, but Microsoft’s newly released Security Essentials seems promising. There is rarely a need for multiple anti-virus software applications on one system, so I’d recommend removing any competing products as soon as Security Essentials is installed, but I’d say that users should feel free to try this new title from Microsoft.
4. Identity Finder. Claiming to protect your identity by removing sensitive information from a computer, this software seems to cater to the paranoid user. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of protecting personal information, but shredding personal information stored on one’s own computer seems a bit much. For users who do want to keep their PC sanitized, this seems like a good choice of software. For me, I’ll stick with keeping my info on my computer but keeping my PC safe from exploits.
5. Hulu Desktop. Watch TV on your personal computer. Rad.
6. Microsoft Fix It Center. Nothing replaces the value of a knowledge person to correct problems on a PC, but Microsoft Fix It Center is a great start for the simpler problems faced by everyday users. Got a problem on your PC? This is a great place to start.
7. AVG Rescue CD. This downloadable CD image is a great tool for someone knowledgable in PC maintenance, but it’s not for the faint of heart. It’s a great way to clean up a virus-ridden PC, but should be used with care by someone who knows what they’re doing.
8. Duplicate Cleaner. Searching an entire hard disk for files that are the same, this software will offer to remove anything it finds to be redundant. The biggest benefit for this software is disk-space savings. This is a good tool for a particular use-case, but it’s a bit unnecessary for regular day-to-day use of a computer. Use it to free up some space on a full hard disk. Otherwise, I wouldn’t waste the time.
9. Speccy. From the makers of CCleaner (which I highly recommend), this tool will take an inventory of a system and share the details of the hardware. It’s a bit useless as an every day tool, but will prove indispensable when trying to identify hardware for some reason.
10. Secunia. Another tool for the technically minded, this tool will help to identify software which needs to be updated on your personal computer. Not a bad idea to run this one every month or two.

I’m quite surprised at the technical nature of most of these programs. Many of these are far from useful on an everyday basis, and a couple of them are more technical than many people will be comfortable using. That said, none of these (except maybe Abine TACO) seem to be inherently dangerous.

Install away!

The topic being discussed was the upcoming release of Windows Phone 7. For the uninitiated, Microsoft is launching their next mobile phone platform at the end of the year. It’s a relaunch of their platform in many ways, and could be summarized as an effort to refocus the brand toward the consumer-space (i.e. compete against the iPhone).

One of the guests postulated that Windows Phone could still sell well in the business market, because all business’s care about are things like remote-wipe, VPN-connectivity, etc. This really struck as as shortsighted, as it completely misses what’s happening to business technology use.

Technology is becoming more and more a part of our lives. Smartphone use continues to rise, notebook sales continue to rise, etc — technology, as it relates to business, is becoming less about the machines you use at the office and more about what you have around nearly every waking minute of the day.

As a specific example, it wasn’t surprising to see the iPhone take corporate networks by storm over the last couple years. People want to use the technology they like, and they’re not especially excited about taking what their IT support give them. Even as corporate network policies stated “NO UNAUTHORIZED DEVICES ALLOWED”, executives continued to buy the devices they actually wanted to use. In the end, the proliferation of these “consumer” devices caused many network policies to change.

It’s the job of IT support personnel to find solutions that their clients want. Just focusing on traditional “business” platforms will leave clients unhappy, and have them seeking nice/cooler/sleeker options elsewhere. I’d rather sell someone an iPhone that they’ll use and love, than a “business” BlackBerry that they’ll use for their e-mail only. And naturally, that’s better business strategy — making clients happy will help you keep those clients and earn some recommendations for new ones.

(P.S. I don’t mean to praise/pick on Apple/RIM too much specifically, but I wanted to use some current examples– the mobile phone market changes quickly and it’s anyone’s guess what the next hot thing will be).

I spent some time today pondering why I’d consider the service “excellent”, and I realized it all has to do with predictability.

The staff always steps aside as I pass them in the hallway. The alarm clock is always turned toward the bed during the evening turn down. The hotel staff always greets me when I pass the lobby. I’m sure there are a million other things they do to make my stay spectacular, and I’ll never notice even a small fraction of them.

How can your business be predictably excellent?

Of course, I could simply do everything myself. I could run the entire business with no outside help, removing any opportunity for business growth or diversity. If you want something done right, do it yourself, right? But this would just be silly. My entire team knows how much of a bottleneck I can be to our processes since I have so much going on. Thinking that things would better if it were just me is ludicrous. For instance, next week I’ll be in Las Vegas, and the week after I’ll be in Dallas. There’s no way I can do everything myself. And I don’t want to.

So, how do I keep quality high within our organization but also not get roped into doing everything myself? Simply put, I teach my team how I think instead of telling them what to do. It’s something I call “pre-emptive questioning”.

Here’s what I mean by that.

Instead of me making every decision within our organization, my goal is to empower our team by helping them understand how I think so that they can make decisions without requiring constant input from me.

This mindset is most critical early on in any decision-making process.

Many problems arise which ultimately require my approval but most of the research will be done by another member of the team. When these situations arise, it is my job to set the stage for this decision to be made. If I simply ask my teammate to research the situation and then come back with a recommendation, it is very likely that I will have more questions when he comes back the first few times. This creates a long and drawn out period of back and forth questions which can be frustrating to he and me both.

The other option is that I provide my teammate with the questions that I will need answered in order to make a final decision, and then ask him to research the situation and bring back a recommendation. By pre-emptively questioning him about the situation, I am increasing the likelihood that he return with all the information I will need to then make a final decision.

For example…

Just last week we had a problem in our data center which required us to make a purchase. We could decide to fix the issue with a cheap but possibly short-term fix, or we could use this as an opportunity to fix it long-term with an upgrade.

I brought our lead systems engineer up to speed on the issue to get his input and insight (I truly did want his opinion on what to do). He suggested a particular fix, and we disagreed a little on the exact implementation of this fix. As we went back and forth, I came to a realization: I could remain very hands-on to this situation, and allow it to slow down other initiatives in the organization, or I could empower my colleague to handle the situation while I remained focused on my other responsibilities.

I wanted to empower him. But how?

Instead of telling him I wanted it done my way and sending him on his way, I explained what criteria I wanted him to use when making a decision. His instructions were not “go buy a new server”. Instead, I articulated what things I wanted him to look into, what dollar amounts I wanted him to be sure he knew, and what specifications and calculations I wanted to be sure he had uncovered before making a purchase. With this information, I sent him on his way.

Now, the situation is “owned” by him. He hopefully has an understanding of the parameters within which I want a decision to be made, and he’s now been empowered to make the decisions he needs to make within these parameters.

Although he’ll need to check in with me to actually make the final purchase, he now knows what things I’ll want to understand before I’m comfortable giving the go ahead. And he has the information he needs to present me a complete and coherent recommendation, being sure to address all the items that I’ll need addressed.

Hopefully, we’ve reduced the number of times I need to interact with this situation to two: first, to explain how I want the decision made, and then, second, to give a final once-over to the final decision.

As a service provider, I find it important to develop the Rezitech and MSPintegrations brands, and to be sure that our customers think of us often. To accomplish this, we need our SWAG to be memorable or useful – or both. This is a difficult feat to accomplish with so many options available, and I simply don’t have the time to keep up on what’s available. I’m also not the creative guy around here, and my ideas are probably only going to be memorable as my staff laughs at me for ordering yet another box of monitor squeegies that we’ll never be able to give away.

With this in mind, I was quite excited to join Kyle Kalma of Clear Media for lunch yesterday (we met at one of my favorite Fullerton restaraunts, The Olde Ship). Kyle is the local SWAG genius (oh, SWAG stands for Stuff We All Get, in case you were wondering) and I used my lunch opportunity to learn more about Clear Media, their products, and a little bit about what makes Kyle tick.

The thing that stands out to me about Kyle is his desire to create a long lasting relationship with his customers. The SWAG industry is filled with one-shot sales guys who want to sell whatever they can and then move on. Kyle, on the other hand, would rather talk me out of a poor purchase so that he can continue to earn my long-term business. He definately understands the value of relationships and building long-lasting business partnerships and I value that about him. He strives to understand our business and customers so that he can make some great recommendations (he came up with a killer idea to follow up to our recent StickerTrav campaign — it’s going to be hilarious).

I’m thrilled to consider Clear Media our partner thanks to Kyle’s excellent work.

I just did the math, and from January to April, 2010, I went on 21 trips to 16 different places and I was gone a total of 43 days. Over the course of these four months, 36% of my days were spent on the road. Many of trips were back-to-back (I had several trips which were comprised of 3-4 destinations back-to-back without going home in between).

All this travel meant I gave up on many of my daily and weekly disciplines: I went to gym only twice in those 4 months, I gave up on healthy eating, I spent little to no time to myself, I let my personal bills get behind, and my house get quite messy. Now, it’s May, and I find my life quite out of balance.

If the first 4 moths of the year were defined by my travel schedule, I hope to make the next few months defined by my lack of travel. I will go to the gym regularly, to focus on eating more healthily, to not work constantly, and to keep up with my personal affairs. I will spend many days quietly in my office working quietly by myself, with my phone on do-not-disturb and my Outlook closed (I’ll check these a few times a day). If the first 4 months of the year could be described as crazy and unpredictable, the next few months will be defined as regimented and predictable.

I like change, a lot… but now it’s time to change my pace and slow down, a lot. Just for a little while, though. It will soon be time to travel again, but, in the meantime, I am going to enjoy some normalcy and predictability in my life.

Immediately following Karl Palachuk’s Pre-Day seminar (pre-day for Autotask CommunITy Live), join me for dinner and some great hands-on Autotask fun:  “Learn from a Pro: Pumping up the Auto in Autotask”

Date: April 17, 2010
Time: 6:00 PM to 8:30 PM
Includes Dinner!

Except From Karl’s blog… (Link):

Register for the Travis Austin Dinner and Autotask Super-User Seminar for only $29! Register Now.

When Autotask expert Travis Austin isn’t answering questions on the Autotask CommunITy website, he’s either developing innovative Autotask-centric integrations, or he’s flying around the country to consult with other Autotask customers to help fine tune their use of the Autotask platform.
Watch and learn as Travis shares a number of tips, tricks, and best practices which will surely supercharge the power of Autotask within your own company. He’ll cover basic Service Desk configuration, share some awesome workflow ideas, and describe ways which Autotask talks to third party products and platforms to save you time and increase your effectiveness as an IT service provider.

Topics

• Service Desk Configuration.
  How to use Queues, Statuses, Priorities,  and Issue Types to best manage the ticket lifecycle.
• Workflow Rules.
  Define and develop a few integral workflow rules to automate ticket flow and score points with customers.
• Ticketing Integrations.
  Learn how third party products can integrate with Autotask to automate ticket generation, modification, and escalation.
• Billing Integrations.
  Learn how to automate parts of billing, contract adjustments, and marketing strategies.

Register now for this GREAT event!

Add the Travis Austin Dinner and Autotask Super-User Seminar for only $29! Register Now.

Sign up now for Travis’ Seminar . . . Get dinner and amazing information on top of Karl’s all-day seminar!

The best deal in the SMB Space!

Register for the Travis Austin Dinner and Autotask Super-User Seminar for only $29! Register Now.