3 First Steps To A Comprehensive Telecom Strategy

By Nick Enger, Senior Telecom Consultant, ATC

The challenge of telecommunications — like many technology-driven markets — is keeping up with the pace of change. Most IT departments have many fish to fry, and nowadays most are increasingly focused on their customers and the end-user experience. A focus on telecom comes and goes with the flow of internal IT priorities.

Often, over the course of time as companies grow, change, and evolve, telecom services are bolted on. Services become disparate and outdated. The result: infrastructure is not optimized and communications costs have escalated. So what should you advise your clients to do now? Here’s a three-step roadmap to get you on your way:

1. Get a firm understanding of the current services. (Do an audit, part 1). If there is a multi-location network, be sure to inventory all sites for all services. Compare all services with current invoices and contracts for discrepancies. If there is a relatively complex network, you will likely find services your client is paying for, but doesn’t have. Get a bandwidth utilization report for each location and conduct a performance and capacity review. Identify any billing mistakes, overlapping services, and over/under used services.

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