{"id":15062,"date":"2015-11-11T15:00:06","date_gmt":"2015-11-11T20:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/?p=15062"},"modified":"2015-11-11T15:48:56","modified_gmt":"2015-11-11T20:48:56","slug":"between-the-lines-managed-services-like-rock-and-roll-is-here-to-stay-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/the-week-in-imaging-twii\/editors-blog\/2015\/11\/between-the-lines-managed-services-like-rock-and-roll-is-here-to-stay-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Between the Lines: Managed Services Like Rock and Roll is Here to Stay"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-15011\" src=\"http:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/rock-and-roll-is-here-to-stay-300x154.png\" alt=\"rock and roll is here to stay\" width=\"300\" height=\"154\" \/>I keep hearing, reading, and writing about Managed Services and the crazy great opportunity it presents for the traditional office technology dealer. You\u2019re probably hearing and reading about the same thing.<\/p>\n<p>Are you buying it?<\/p>\n<p>I understand the need to tread carefully into this arena. I\u2019m also aware that there are various ways to enter the business, some more suitable than others depending on the dealership and a slew of other factors.<\/p>\n<p>I interviewed someone from the industry recently and he shared a few things off the record that are worth repeating even if I can\u2019t give this person the proper attribution. \u201cThe industry has gotten so preoccupied with IT being the savior; it has shades of the early days of MPS. That scares me because I think IT is an opportunity, but people who failed at MPS are probably not the best people to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ouch!<\/p>\n<p>Could he be talking about you? If so, those words should give you something to think about although on a cheerier note, we can all learn from our past mistakes.<\/p>\n<p>The other comment he shared with me was that MPS has all the same principles that a reseller needs to build upon and that the dealer community has the skill set and tools to do it, but they are still more comfortable with a transaction-based business model.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you\u2019re running your business that way it\u2019s hard to be account focused,\u201d he emphasized. IT will probably force them into doing that. If it does and it helps them expand their [MPS business] that\u2019s golden.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He fully believes that dealers looking to transition into Managed Services, that aren\u2019t fully investing themselves and trying to learn it as they go probably won\u2019t be successful.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019ll get frustrated and turn away from it much like they did with MPS,\u201d he opined. \u201cNow, MPS is defensive as opposed to proactive. And they should be focused on MPS, but in lieu of not getting into MPS at least get into IT the correct way.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe width=\"960\" height=\"720\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/jXq8oQ5DNbQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s the correct way?<\/p>\n<p>One prevailing school of thought is that partnering with an organization such as GreatAmerica\u2019s Collabrance or Continuum is the best option as opposed to growing a Managed Services practice organically or acquiring a Managed Services company.<\/p>\n<p>Before we agree to disagree on that school of thought, I can tell you that later this month we\u2019ll be presenting more information about the former option so you can decide for yourself whether or not it\u2019s the correct way for you. It\u2019s likely too that we\u2019ll be writing about those other two options as well because Managed Services like rock and roll is here to stay.<\/p>\n<p>Thanks for reading.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I keep hearing, reading, and writing about Managed Services and the crazy great opportunity it presents for the traditional office technology dealer. You\u2019re probably hearing and reading about the same thing. Are you buying it? I understand the need to tread carefully into this arena. I\u2019m also aware that there are various ways to enter the business, some more suitable than others depending on the dealership and a slew of other factors. I interviewed someone from the industry recently and he shared a few things off the record that are worth repeating even if I can\u2019t give this person the proper attribution. \u201cThe industry has gotten so preoccupied with IT being the savior; it has shades of the early days of MPS. That scares me because I think IT is an opportunity, but people who failed at MPS are probably not the best people to do this.\u201d Ouch! Could he be talking about you? If so, those words should give you something to think about although on a cheerier note, we can all learn from our past mistakes. The other comment he shared with me was that MPS has all the same principles that a reseller needs to build upon and that the dealer community has the skill set and tools to do it, but they are still more comfortable with a transaction-based business model. \u201cIf you\u2019re running your business that way it\u2019s hard to be account focused,\u201d he emphasized. IT will probably force them into doing that. If it does and it helps them expand their [MPS business] that\u2019s golden.\u201d He fully believes that dealers looking to transition into Managed Services, that aren\u2019t fully investing themselves and trying to learn it as they go probably won\u2019t be successful. \u201cThey\u2019ll get frustrated and turn away from it much like they did with MPS,\u201d he opined. \u201cNow, MPS is defensive as opposed to proactive. And they should be focused on MPS, but in lieu of not getting into MPS at least get into IT the correct way.\u201d What\u2019s the correct way? One prevailing school of thought is that partnering with an organization such as GreatAmerica\u2019s Collabrance or Continuum is the best option as opposed to growing a Managed Services practice organically or acquiring a Managed Services company. Before we agree to disagree on that school of thought, I can tell you that later this month we\u2019ll be presenting more information about the former option so you can decide for yourself whether or not it\u2019s the correct way for you. It\u2019s likely too that we\u2019ll be writing about those other two options as well because Managed Services like rock and roll is here to stay. Thanks for reading.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[80,1638],"tags":[2499,2497,2498],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15062"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15062"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15065,"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15062\/revisions\/15065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.enxmag.com\/twii\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}