5 Most Critical MSP Metrics Series: Exception Management

The key principle behind ConnectSMART’s methodology is not just having visibility to important metrics but managing exceptions as they occur. An exception is a crack in your path to success where things get lost – including profitability! An easy example of an exception would be tickets not responded. Any ticket that hasn’t been responded to can be an indicator of a future problem if not managed correctly and can end up negatively affecting your average response time. Then, the domino effect begins.

In a typical PSA or RMM implementation, the data that is connected is not only hidden or difficult to find, it is presented in mass, making it impossible to focus in your key performance indicators. To leverage the 5-10 pieces of data that are critical, you must maneuver around everything else involved in connecting all aspects of our business. The impact is not only felt at the company level, but also with the individuals that make your company work. Putting the metrics on the walls of your office only gets you part of the way there. How do you integrate it into your workflow and ensure that every employee is aligned with the company’s critical success factors and focused on delivering the right way for customers every day? The short answer is you can’t, at least not at the speed of an MSP.

While having complete access to the data is one thing, making it actionable is another. Reporting options are included in the native applications, but it is often not easily accessible and difficult to manage through 3rd party applications like Excel and SQL. More importantly, reporting is a reactive approach that tells us what happened after the fact. In a service provider business, minutes can compound quickly and be the difference in monthly churn. We don’t want to find out about a problem after the damage is done, but while it can still be prevented. We need the ability to gauge and grade our business everyday, to identify problems before they occur, and to quickly and easily get to resolution. We have SLA and response time commitments to manage and need a way to track compliance and react to changes real time.

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