Large enterprises recognize the importance of effective IT asset management, yet they often struggle to maintain accurate data across the asset lifecycle. There are several reasons:
- Different systems are used to track and manage different types of assets, and there’s no correlation between those systems and the asset management database (CMDB).
- Data isn’t captured and validated at various touchpoints across the asset lifecycle, including initial purchase details, installation details, help desk calls and break/fix service.
- Endpoints are problematic because they move from place to place and user to user. It’s easy to lose control of these assets, particularly with remote and hybrid work models.
- Most organizations promptly turn off access when an employee leaves the company but don’t always recover the IT assets assigned to that employee.
These challenges have significant financial ramifications. If an asset isn’t recovered promptly, the organization cannot redeploy it to another user or recover some value by selling it in the marketplace. The organization buys an asset for a new user because the existing equipment wasn’t recovered, instead of providing a used asset to the user from an asset pool.
These costs increase with leased assets. Organizations that can’t find leased assets keep paying month to month until they finally find the asset or buy out the lease on the asset. In addition to the extra lease payments, they wind up paying current market value for assets they can’t find.
Improving Asset Management Accuracy
Organizations can improve the accuracy of their IT asset data by recognizing that every touchpoint represents an opportunity to capture and validate asset management data. It’s also critical to ensure that the various processes and systems for managing these touchpoints can communicate with one another.
KST Data has developed a systematic approach to operationalizing the IT asset lifecycle. We spend time with customers to understand their asset management processes and the tools that support them.
Many customers manage PCs with tools such as Microsoft Endpoint Manager (MEM) or Jamf and some add third-party tools to enhance the tracking and usage of software licenses. Some clients will add specialized analytics tools that look at asset performance to help with proactive refresh activities. KST Data can help customers correlate these systems and use the data to build a dashboard providing more insight into the environment. Customers also use the dashboard to identify and resolve discrepancies, assist with patch management or provide better insights to their asset portfolio.
KST helps customers assess and optimize their data validation processes. Are needed asset details capture at acquisition? Did the correct information get collected during the install process? Do help desk personnel log user details for each call to the help desk? Is that data properly recorded within the help system and updated within the asset management database? How you are assets managed at end of life?
We help ensure that customers are capturing the appropriate metrics across their different systems throughout the asset’s lifecycle. We also help ensure that assets are recovered so they can be reused or properly disposed of, capturing the value of the asset of end of life.
Maximizing Value
At KST Data, we also help our customers maximize the value of their existing assets. We can maintain a pool of used assets and deploy them to new employees, contractors, consultants or other personnel according to the company’s policies. If the asset is at end-of-life we can dispose of it and generate some value for the company.
In addition, we’re working with customers to ensure that assets for remote employees are recovered when they leave the company. Customers simply open a ticket and we’ll send the employee a box and return label. The employee pops the equipment into that box, puts the label on the box and ships it to our integration center. We can then manage that asset based upon the company’s policies.
Organizations that don’t have rigorous processes across the IT asset lifecycle often struggle with inaccurate and incomplete asset management data, resulting in poor operational and financial control of the IT investments. Endpoints are often lost or unused for months, causing companies to lose the value of those assets. KST Data helps customers incorporate an operational mindset into their asset lifecycle processes to help ensure that their asset data is accurate.