Mini-Series Parts 9&10: 10 Important Questions to Ask Your IT Partner

There’s more to choosing an IT partner than just searching for a solution that meets your technical requirements. Your partner will become an extension of your team, so it’s important to take the time to find the right fit, and asking the right questions is the first step in creating a trusting and lasting relationship. In this mini-series we’ll explore the most important questions we’d want you to ask someone like us! 

Questions 9&10: Are your services as proactive as they could be and who is responsible for system review?

How can you ensure that risks are mitigated before becoming a problem that negatively impact your business? Your IT partner’s products and services are working hard to protect your data but it’s also the teams behind the solution that should be proactively working to identify potential threats before you experience them. Did you know the top four business outages are due to hardware and software failures, loss of power and security breaches?

Unplanned downtime affects your profitability and when choosing an IT partner, you’ll want to consider your own in-house IT specialists, available resources, risks and the subsequent financial losses you may face so you can determine what level of support you need.

Top Sources of Financial Loss

• Downtime: The most common type of downtime is due to hardware failure, followed by software crashes, natural disasters and human errors, which can cause companies to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars.
• Re-allocation of resources: In the event of a disaster your resources are no longer being used towards your daily operations and instead will go towards restoring assets.
• Damage to reputation: If your employees and clients lose confidence in your business and abilities they may start looking elsewhere. Three ways your reputation is at risk is because of issues related to ethical lapses, environmental sustainability and security.

It’s also important to check if monitoring is a service provided by your IT partner. If it is, then you’ll want to know if it’s an included service or if you’ll need to request it separately. You’ll also want to know where the responsibility lies when it comes to reviewing systems, and if you don’t have the man-power to manage that yourself you’ll need to make sure your IT partner has that capability.

At Whipcord our comprehensive Network Operations Centre (NOC) is the hub for all things IT, customer support and architecting customer solutions. With a high-touch approach to service, we support our customers 24x7 and our team expands beyond our dedicated technical experts to sales, marketing and customer success as we work with you to solve your unique problems.

Stay One Step Ahead

The first step in choosing an IT Partner is asking the right questions that help you find the best fit for your business. At the end of the day, you put a lot of trust into your partner so it’s important that they’re not only knowledgeable, but a good fit for your company.

Want to ask us this question? Schedule a meeting with one of our regional sales managers! Otherwise, keep an eye out for the next question in our mini-series or access the downloadable PDF below.