1. Initial meeting
A meeting is held with client's senior management to learn about the business. The process looks at the high level aspects of the business. The process usually lasts between 1 and 2 hours.
The meeting at minimum discusses the following:
- Understanding the business goals.
- Profit centers.
- Understanding the core business model and key processes to generate profit.
- Competitive advantage analysis.
- Use of technology to generate profit.
- Use of technology by customers, consultants and vendors to interact with the company.
- Potential new profit centers using technology.
- Potential methods to reduce expenses using technology.
2. Evaluation of client's company
After the initial meeting is complete, a framework is in place to learn more about the finer details of how the company operates.
- Current hardware and software installed on the network and on workstations.
- Use of technology by users, consultants vendors on the network.
- Remote access to the network.
- Security of network and data.
- Security policy.
- Complete hardware and software audit.
- Back up systems and disaster recovery.
- Current data organization.
3. The plan
After all the initial data has been collected, a plan is assembled that covers the following areas:
- Security and policies.
- Backup and disaster recovery management.
- Data management.
- Remote access and collaboration systems.
- Upgrades to hardware and software to meet business growth, objectives and process improvements.
- Maximize the use of existing technology.
- Implementation plan.
- Budget to reach the objectives.
4. Implementation
- 48 hours notice before any outage takes place.
- Outages that affect users are done after regular business hours, either after 6:00 PM or over weekends.
- Tracked budget, in order to track the actual costs versus the budgeted costs.
- Easy contact fort any support and implementation questions.
- Key aspects of the network documented.
