The IT department holds a business together. When things aren’t running smoothly, core business functions grind to a halt. Despite this reality, IT is often the unsung hero of an organization since many of its functions are invisible. Let’s make the invisible, visible.

We know that for an IT professional the biggest source of time waste is found in day-to-day tasks. Let’s fix that, so you can start focusing on high value work and mapping out a long-term strategy that makes your IT stand out.

This e-book is designed to help you get started on the path to reducing waste. Focus on these 5 things as a starting point and you’ll be well on your way to minimizing waste in your team.

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1. Make Information Accessible

The first key to efficiency for any successful business is to ensure access to information. You need to be able to provide:

✓ Employees with Secure & Consistent Access To Information

Studies have shown employees spend roughly 20% of their day searching for information

Your Team

It is essential that your staff can access information to help support your organization. You need to consider how you as a business will allow information to be stored and shared amongst your team. When information is accessible by all, it doesn’t matter if someone on your team is away. You’ll be able to pick up where they left off.

• Automate documentation of endpoint data, passwords, and warranty information
• Document your standard operating procedures to ensure process consistency
• Structured, centralized documentation, with intuitive links between information
• No compromises on security

IT Glue gives you all of the above, in one tool.

Your Bosses

As IT increases in strategic importance, you’ll be called upon to not only be a helpdesk, but to provide a proactive approach to strategy as well.

• How you operate within the organization.Having centralized access to the information your IT department uses, gives you the big picture. This enables you to make strategic decisions that optimize how technology supports key business functions.
• Everyone looks good.When information is accessible, an IT department operates smoothly. It’s a win for all parties involved.

2. Standardize Your Processes

No matter what sized team you have, you will find that creating business processes that are efficient is becoming increasingly important for success.

There is an ever-increasing drive to automate processes where possible. The key to efficiency is to standardize procedures across your entire department. For example, standardize the way you monitor networks and manage employee devices with your RMM tool. This can be done by creating a Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for your team to help them follow the same procedure every time they set up a new employee.

Process needs to become part of your core requirements of your staff. Make it a rule for your team to follow and document your processes. Chaos shouldn’t run the department process should.

3. Reduce Onboarding Time

Onboarding staff can be a large source of cost waste for any organization. Think about the amount of time it took you to get your last hire productive and and creating value.

The key here is to document, both your internal procedures and your company environment. New staff no longer have to be mind readers!

If you want new staff to do things in the most efficient way, every time, and the way you prefer, write it down exactly how you want it done.

Then make that information easily accessible to anyone on the team. The key is that the process is written in a way that any employee can follow it. Determine the optimal time for completing a task, then measure how close your team is to meeting this standard. You can then start looking at ways where time waste can be eliminated to reach this optimal time.

Through documentation more routine tasks can be passed on to less expensive or skilled staff members for completion. It also means that you’ll have greater visibility into team member roles, so even if someone’s out of the office, it’s easy to step in and fill the gap. Information doesn’t walk out the door with them, and day-to-day operations are not hindered by their absence.

4. Build sustainable infrastructure

Sustainable infrastructure will allow you to scale to ensure you minimize the waste in your team. Some solutions often work well initially, but as you start to scale can become cumbersome and difficult to maintain and keep up to date.

Faced with a constant struggle for budget, and a revolving door for talent, IT teams today know that automation and efficiency are essential to maintaining uptime, and keeping the organization performing at a high level.

Today there is an increasing demand for compliance and security of information. Therefore when choosing a tool to document your environments and processes, look for one that keeps your information safe and helps you meet compliance standards.

5. How To Choose The Right Documentation Tool

1. Functions as a single source of truth
2. Brings together all your IT information and enables you to see how each piece of your IT infrastructure fits into the whole system
3. Makes individual knowledge shared knowledge, so if a team member is away, things can be picked up where they left off
4. Streamlines workflows to maximize efficiency and reduce time waste
5. Follows security best practices and keeps audit trails so there’s transparency when documentation is updated
6. Enables you to focus on high value work and develop a long-term IT strategy

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