Rethinking your IT asset management strategy

Many businesses waste time, money, and energy trying to manage their hardware, software, and cloud assets. Without an easy way to track these assets, your organization may be paying for outdated software or unused licenses or cloud subscriptions—or struggling to keep up with each asset through its lifecycle.

It’s time to rethink your IT asset management strategy. Consolidating management onto a single platform makes it possible to boost productivity. Complete visibility into your assets, coupled with automation, can help ensure your organization makes the most of its time and resources. 
 

Let’s explore the three R’s of modern IT asset management (ITAM).

Reclaiming and optimizing assets

Having data distributed across systems inhibits visibility and can be costly. According to a study by Anodot, 53% of IT leaders say gaining visibility into cloud usage and costs is their top challenge.

Greater visibility over all of your assets is important for many reasons. Topping the list is ensuring security and assessing the risks that compliance issues pose to your organization.

According to an Enterprise Management Associates asset management survey, beyond simple cost savings or more efficient processes, you can use asset management to improve, integrate, and help mature your organization. That applies to both IT assets and enterprise assets.

End-to-end visibility provided by a single ITAM solution can help ensure optimal use of all your assets, whether they’re software, hardware, or cloud-based. Integrating your systems can also make your organization less susceptible to risks.

Realizing ROI

The lack of a cohesive system for asset management can limit organizations' return on investment (ROI). A report by Spiceworks Ziff Davis found businesses spend the largest portion (30%) of their IT budget on hardware.

Many organizations are paying for legacy systems that can create other risks and threaten success. Updating these outdated systems and incorporating automation into your organization’s workflows can optimize procurement, boost cost savings, and increase ROI.

AI-powered automation can detect patterns in data to help identify the most cost-effective asset purchasing opportunities.

Retiring old assets

Automation can also be used to track asset lifecycles. It can group assets logically by extrapolating data about them.

Automated ITAM with IT asset disposal processes can then formulate prediction models to flag assets that are nearing retirement. This can save the cost of supporting outdated systems and reduce risks of business processes running on outdated or problematic hardware.

Automating the hardware asset lifecycle can boost productivity by preventing the need for tracking assets in disparate systems. There are seven stages of the hardware asset lifecycle that can be automated.

Disposing of or recycling hardware assets also contributes to achieving ESG initiatives. Be sure to track and certify how you dispose of assets and with what company.

Bonus: Reaping rewards

IT teams aren’t the only employees who benefit from ITAM automation. Improving inventory management also makes tasks such as employee onboarding more efficient and can increase employee satisfaction.

Integrating systems and automating processes can simplify asset management, allowing your business to take full advantage of your resources.

Find out more in our ebook: Stand out with a winning IT asset management strategy.

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