A wireless network promises to bring several benefits to a business. However, its management is too complicated for organizations to handle on their own. The complications arise from the complexity to the wireless technology and the lack of adequate knowledge. Let’s look at how organizations can manage their wireless assets.

• Needs analysis: A business should know its telecommunication needs at any point of time. It is important to keep analyzing its needs regularly. It also needs to understand its growing needs and make future plans accordingly.
• Procurement management: It is important for organizations to understand that not all plans or wireless vendors can suit their needs. A business should compare different vendors and their services, find their pros and cons, and negotiate with them before procuring the wireless service.
• Audit: A business should organize an audit at regular intervals to look into the wireless plans, costs, usage, and expenses. A wireless audit will help realize savings for the business.
• Inventory management: At any point in time, an organization should be aware of each and every device and asset in its wireless inventory. A business should make sure that its inventory remains organized. A proper record of the assets helps plan growth of the organization.

More often than not, organizations are not equipped with the expertise to handle the wireless network. This is where a professional wireless management team should be brought in. It will not only help manage the network but also help reap maximum benefits of the wireless services.

Telecom management is important for any organization that uses telecom services extensively. Yet, there is some sort of complacency when it comes to going for professional telecom management. Let’s look at why telecom management is important.

• It reviews telecom needs. How would you supply for something when you are not aware of the demand? Telecom management identifies the telecom needs of an organization and once that is done, it strives to align its procurement plans and management to align with those needs.
• It helps procure the most suitable telecom service. Telecom management compares different telecom vendors and recommends the best ones to the organization after making sure they align with the needs.
• It recovers costs. One of the key focus areas of telecom management is the billing and accounting area. It scrutinizes past and current bills to understand the service plans and the usage; it tracks down the errors in billing, helping you recover money from the telecom vendors. Telecom management ensures that you make absolutely no unnecessary payments.
• It monitors the usage. Telecom management looks at the usage patterns across departments and locations of the organization, analyzing them in terms of needs. It helps identify instances of overuse, misuse, and abuse of the telecom services.
• It helps streamline invoice processing. Telecom management automates invoicing, making it easier for the organization to manage its telecom services.
• It helps organize the inventory better. Telecom management restructures the inventory, ensuring it can be utilized to the fullest.
• It monitors the performance of the telecom network. Telecom management monitors the services regularly and ensures smooth function. It provides expert troubleshooting any time there is a problem.

Not all organizations are equipped to handle the management of their telecom services on their own. A professional telecom management is ideal if you are looking to cut costs and increase the efficiency of your telecom network.

Many businesses realize the importance of outsourcing telecom management but they find it too difficult to find the right consultants. Looking for a telecom management company is far from being easy given the number of such companies mushrooming everywhere (Google returns more than 21 million results when you look for ‘telecom management company’!). In today’s post, we’ll share with you some tips to help you choose the right telecom consultants.

• Make sure that the services based on recovering costs, such as Telecom Expense Management (TEM), are charged on a contingency basis. This means that you pay from the savings that the company helps you realize. The contingency plan works for savings-based services.
• Choose a company that does not sell products. If the company owns telecom products, their interests will supersede your business’ needs. Such a company will try to sell its products to you, irrespective of what your business needs are.
• Make sure that the company does not broker for someone. If it does, it will recommend the products made by the third-party it is being paid by, possibly ignoring what your business really need.
• Find out if the company has shown cost-savings in the past, and if such savings have been in tune with what the company promises. The company should be able to show savings in value, not just on paper. Remember that the reason behind hiring the services of a telecom management company is to realize monetary benefits.
• Find out about the company’s past performances and check its recommendations. Look for a recommendation from a business that is in the same league as yours.

We hope that these tips helped. Drop in a line if you would like to learn anything specific about telecom management.

Even though businesses are adopting the advancements in telecommunications, they are wary of the complexity involved in managing the new technologies. A business is typically not well-equipped to handle the telecom management internally, and it doesn’t want to hire the services of an external company because of its perception of the outside vendors being impersonal and insensitive to the needs of the business. Telecom experts will tell you that these fears are misplaced and businesses should go for professional telecom management.

Let’s look at how outsourcing the management of your telecom network will help your business.

A telecom management team will bring a fresh, unbiased perspective to how you look at your telecom network. It will help you understand the current infrastructure, the possibility of scalability, and the opportunities of optimization.

Professional telecom management will help you understand the telecom needs of your business, and recommend solutions that align with those needs. A good telecom management company will not force you into getting a particular telecom service but recommends the best to you and lets you make an informed decision.

What worries businesses most is the perception that an outside company will start making decisions on your behalf. You will be surprised to learn that a good telecom management believes in keeping the control with the client. So, the final decision always lies with you.

Another important thing outsourcing helps is an analysis of current needs to project future needs. Telecom consultants help you strategize for these future needs. Thus, they not only help you reap the maximize benefits of what you have now but also draws a plan of what benefits you should get in the future and how you should go about getting them.

Wireless technology is convenient; its management, however, is not. The complexity of the wireless network makes business look outward for its management. Let us look at what makes wireless management so challenging.

• The network’s complexity is not easily understood. In a conventional wired network, one has to deal with hardware and certain software. A wireless network adds another level of complexity by using various network protocols and topologies. Most businesses cannot make sense of the network, thereby unable to handle its management.
• A wireless network is difficult to modify. Accommodating changes based on the changing telecom needs of a business is something the business cannot handle.
• Given the number of devices and users in a wireless network, it is difficult to track all the devices and the usage.
• The optimization of a wireless network is difficult. If any wired system has problems, you can check all the connections and make it work as per your expectations. However, in a wireless system, ‘connections’ are not the only factors affecting its performance. Certain environmental factors can also impact a wireless network’s performance. Businesses, thus, fail to reap optimum benefits of the network.

In the technologically-savvy business world of today, wireless services are critical to the success of a business. However, the idea of monitoring and maintaining the services make businesses wary of them. Hiring the services of telecom consultants will not only help you get rid of the complex management but also help you reap the maximum benefits of the wireless services.

Many concepts invade the managerial and technological words but only a few get world-wide acceptance. Telecom lifecycle management (TLM) is one such business concept that has become essential for any organization looking to handle its telecom services.

What is Telecom Lifecycle Management?

Telecom lifecycle management, or TLM, refers to the management of the entire lifecycle of the telecom services of an organization. It combines the management of the technical aspect of the telecom network and the management of costs and expenses, thereby offering a complete solution to businesses.

How Does it Differ from Telecom Expense Management?

Telecom Expense Management (TEM) refers to the management of costs and expenses, focusing on saving money for a business. TLM, on the other hand, offers control and understanding of the telecom network, in addition to saving costs.

What are the Elements of TLM?

TLM encompasses the following phases of the telecom lifecycle:

• Procurement and contract negotiation
• Inventory Maintenance
• Invoice Processing
• Audits and Analysis
• Reporting and Documentation

TLM strives to optimize the telecom network in terms of performance and cost-savings. TLM is the ideal way to go about telecom management as it provides an end-to-end solution to the telecom needs of a business. It helps you get better visibility of your telecommunication network.

TLM makes use of the best practices of the industry, the most-effective software, and expert knowledge to deliver comprehensive management of voice, data, and wireless services to a business. The term is often not explicitly used but most consulting companies offer telecom management on the lines of TLM.

Keep watching this space for more information from the world of telecommunications.

From our earlier posts, you have gathered that professional telecom management is important. In today’s post, we’ll tell you how a telecom consulting company helps your business.

• It helps procure the right service. The consultant provides you information about different vendors, their plans, and their tariffs to help you pick the best offer.
• It helps you understand the contract and sign the best deal. It makes sure you understand the fine print in the contract so that you make an informed decision.
• It keeps track of your inventory in order to get maximum benefits. It organizes your telecom inventory better and tells you if you need to make changes to it to use it effectively.
• It monitors the services’ performance. A professional team ensures that the telecom services function without a hindrance. It offers troubleshooting support if there is a problem. It also keeps track of all the downtimes so that you do not get billed for the times when you don’t use the service.
• It makes sure there are no errors in billing. It analyzes invoices and bills and ensures that you don’t pay money you don’t owe to the telecom vendor.
• It looks at utilizing the services effectively to meet your business’ telecom needs. The consultant makes sure that you are getting the optimum benefits of your chosen services.
• It helps analyze future needs and makes strategic planning. The consulting company helps draw a future plan of what your business’ telecom needs are and how it should go about meeting those needs.

If you are concerned about procuring and managing telecom services, hire the services of a professional telecom management team.

Many individuals I know spend a lot of time researching on different telephone plans or broadband plans for their homes before zeroing in on the ones that suit them. However, once a plan has been selected, they turn a blind eye to the items in the monthly bills and pay the total sum. They rarely review their needs and the plans to see if they align with each other. The same attitude is carried to a business where the business does not bother analyzing its telecom service after its deployment.

It is, however, important that the business looks into the telecommunication services. Learning about the service will help it reduce costs and reap maximum benefit of the services. Let’s find out what a business should know.

• It should find out what its telecom needs are.
• It should know if the current telecom plans meets its needs.
• It should know what the current status of its inventory is.
• It should know how the telecom services are being used, and if there is any misuse.
• It should know if there are any changes to the charges and the plans being reflected in the bills.
• It should know if it is being billed by any service not being used.
• It should find out if there are any errors in billing and accounting.
• It should be aware of problems in the telecom services and find out the frequency of downtimes, if any.

Typically, a business is not equipped with the knowledge to understand its telecom services. A professional telecom management team can help find the information and recommend ways to optimize the benefits.

The biggest benefit that businesses look at is profit. And as profits are inversely proportional to costs and expenses, businesses will imperatively look at reducing costs. A significant area that is ignored in terms of cost-reduction is telecommunications. This is because organizations presume that they are paying only for what they are using. This notion is far from being true. Let’s find out why.

• More often than not, a business takes the services of a telecom vendor without comparing it with others. The business, therefore, may not have chosen the best service for its telecom needs.
• Once a telecom vendor has been selected – with or without comparative analysis – the business signs the telecom contract almost blindly. Businesses often do not understand the technicalities of the contract and do not even bother seeking an explanation on them.
• Once the contract has been signed, the business starts paying for the telecom services as and when it is sent bills. It does not analyze the bills and trusts the vendor for keeping them accurate. While vendors may not necessarily cheat, it is possible that they may err in billing. By not analyzing the bills, businesses are also at the risk of being charged of services that they never use.
• Businesses often don’t feel the need to look at the usage of the telecom services. They assume that the usage is as per the needs. However, there are chances of the telecom services being overused and misused.
• A business keeps renewing the telecom contract without analyzing its needs and thus, it fails to align the services with the needs.

If a business were to look at its telecom needs closely and spend more time choosing the right telecom vendor and reviewing the contract, it will save a considerable amount of money. The internal management, with its lack of domain expertise, cannot handle the deployment and management of telecom services. What the business needs is professional telecom management team.

Come back tomorrow for some more information on telecom management.

Your business uses telecommunication services extensively, and now you feel that the internal team is not equipped to manage the services efficiently. You have decided to hire the services of a telecom management company. Great! Now what? Do you choose the first company you come across or do you take time to make the decision?

Today, while surfing the Internet, I came across a post by Noel Huelsenbeck. Though a 10-month old post, it contains some concrete pointers on choosing the right telecom auditing firm. The post corroborates the guidelines provided by the Center for Communications Management Information (CCMI). Apart from presenting CCMi’s criteria that includes value, reorting, support, and flexbility, Huelsenbeck suggests software delivery, use of automation, and overseas outsourcing as pointers for choosing the right telecom auditing company.

The post also mentions that seeking examples of problems that were resolved by the company will give a better idea of the company’s capabilities. The writer presents CCMI’s list of areas where the telecom management companies can make savings.

Apart from looking at what the company has to offer to your business, find out if the company meets ethical standards in serving you. Let us look at how you can figure this out.

• Find out if the company sells or brokers products for another company. If it does, do not go for its services.
• Find out if the company has shown real savings in the past. If it hasn’t, it is not worth hiring.
• Find out if the company realizes its payment before it realizes savings for the business. If it does, avoid such a company.

You need to spend a considerable amount of time in choosing the right telecom management company. Do not make the decision in haste.