Coming Soon: Review of SAM Managed Service Providers

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Coming Soon: Review of SAM Managed Service Providers

We have the following technology reviews scheduled for publication before the end of 2013 on The ITAM Review:

• Adobe License Management (in progress now)
• SAM Managed Service Providers (July / August – see below)
• Microsoft License Management (September / October)
• Management of Cloud Based IT Assets (November / December)
• Oracle License Management (December 2013 / January 2014)

If you have any questions or suggestions about who should participate in these reviews please give us a shout.

What qualities do you look for when hiring a SAM managed services provider?

SAM Managed Service providers are proving popular. The key difference is that companies are buying into an SLA rather than a tool implementation. It can provide a great way of jump starting your SAM efforts and tapping into complex licensing resource you might not afford on your own (e.g. The Oracle Licensing rocket scientist can look after your Oracle licensing estate as well as a few others).

ITAM Review readers provided some great feedback in the LinkedIn Group regarding qualities to look for when hiring a SAM Managed Services Provider (MSP):

“The ITIL v3 guide to SAM (p139) has a great section with 22 questions to ask on this and its my go to place for questions for tender docs covering your question. I have a modified version I use myself now but its a great place to start. For me, its all about experience and dedicated resources. Do you have someone in house now who is your IBM expert or would you bring someone in? etc.” Chris Morgan

Proven track record has to be key – talk to previous customers and references to make sure the SAM partner delivered what they said they would. Too many companies with little or no track record in SAM have added it to their list of skills, and in some cases, it is added to a larger outsourcing contract as an afterthought, without any vetting of capability etc. Any SAM provider worth their salt would be able to line you up a number of references” Robbie Richmond

Can the Managed SAM Provider work with what I have? I.e. existing discovery/systems management tools. Do they have the ability to perform SAM across heterogeneous environments – desktops, datacentres, development/Test, virtualised/ physical, cloud/SaaS and multiplatform. How do they decipher non-discoverable software usage / consumption – such as in the data centre (these might be Users / CALs, SAP types per account, Oracle Named Users/middleware/DB access, Symantec Back up agents etc…) Can they help me implement SAM policies, processes and procedures?” Aman Kahlon

Having their finger on the pulse in respect of provision of services; so that if budget/licence/usage limitations are being approached, then I am informed of this in sufficient time to make a considered business decision. Standard monthly usage and expenditure reports; and also having one eye on the future – i.e. being ahead of the curve in offering guidance on “end of life” information for software titles. Finally, I would hope that they could provide guidance on licence optimisation. In respect of qualities, honesty has to be top of the list; closely followed by availability/ready access – and sufficient character to deliver bad news with the same candour as the good news.” Rory Canavan

As Chris Morgan suggests above, the ITIL v3 Appendix (‘ITIL V3 Guide to Software Asset Management’, Colin Rudd, Page 139 ISBN 978-0-11-311106-4 Amazon.co.uk) provides a great starting point and will provide the backbone of our assessment criteria for our competitive review and comparison of SAM Managed Service Providers.

However, one key element missing from the V3 guidance is audit defence. Will our SAM service provider stand with us, shoulder to shoulder, in the face of audits or wither sheepishly and just refer to the SLA?

Our assessment criteria are as follows:

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SAM Managed Service Provider (MSP) Competitive Review

Capabilities 

1. Experience with SAM (time in the market, projects, types of projects), proof of methodologies and tools used for SAM, specific licensing expertise (people, qualifications, experience, projects, availability, shared or dedicated resource?)
2. Scope (Geography/Language limitations, license types, environment types, environment size etc)
3. Financial credibility
4. Number of full time SAM specialists, qualifications, license program expertise (Dedicated unit or shared expertise, in-house or contract).

Conflicts of Interest 

1. “Is the organization primarily dependent on a particular manufacturer for most of it’s work” Page 141, SAM ITIL V3. Any notable conflicts of interest?
2. Royalties from tool sales, licensing sales? Used as a ‘loss leader’ for attracting other services?

References

1. Customer references proving quality of service.
2. Sample output / reports from existing customers.
3. Eating one’s own dog food / drink one’s own champagne etc – How well does the provider manage it’s own estate?

Audit Defence

1. Will the provider stand with us, shoulder to shoulder, in the face of an audit
2. Does the provider have experience with audit defence?
3. How will shortfalls / penalties be managed within the SAM SLA?

Deliverables

1. What is in scope, what are the deliverables? what is out of scope? how will we be charged for items out of scope?
2. What are the expectations of the client, what resource / time is anticipated of the customer to uphold their responsbilities
3. How does the client get started / how are publishers prioritised whilst starting? How does the client exit the service contract? what will the client be left with on exit?
4. Continual Service Improvement – what will the service provider do to improve procurement and software management processes?

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What have we missed? is there anything missing from these assessment criteria for assessing the capabilities of SAM Managed Service Providers?

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