Brian Sherman Posts

“Entrepreneurs innovate. Innovation is the specific instrument of entrepreneurship. It is the act that endows resources with a new capacity to create wealth.” That quote from the celebrated management theorist Peter Drucker illustrates not only the business opportunities available for manufacturers (such as IT vendors), but emphasizes that a distinct process is needed for solution providers, distributors and other professionals to get the most out of their creativity.You don’t have to invent the ...

Until recently, the cloud for solution providers was a lot like an NFL draft prospect to their future team: a lot of discussion and tremendous potential, but no tangible results. But it’s really more than just a “buzz word” bandied about by the tech community to confuse end-users and reduce channel margin. Cloud services are finally becoming a significant source of revenue and business growth for solution providers and vendors. It’s become readily apparent over the past few years that there’s a ...

There’s nothing like spending a week meeting face-to-face with some of the brightest minds in the IT services industry to get a firmer grasp on the biggest challenges facing solution providers. Despite what some say, there is no better way to connect and share valuable information than live personal interaction. That same principle applies to clients and prospects, but due to cost and time constraints, that kind of type of contact isn’t always possible.Of course, the next best thing to an in-per ...

Believe it or not, some solution providers scoff at the opportunity to support their clients’ printers and copiers, seeing it as more of a distraction than a true business opportunity. In a world filled with distractions, they’d rather keep their eyes focused on the networks, computers, servers and applications with which they’re more comfortable. The print functions are a forbidden fruit that many solution providers would rather leave to the “dealers.”Of course, over the past few years that “ot ...

Spam and virus aren’t going away, nor are hacking and other threats to your clients’ systems and data. Much like malaria and other illnesses that mankind attempts to control, IT security concerns may typically be managed but never fully resolved. Despite significant advances in technology to deal with the more traditional threats to a business’ systems and data, new and more complex security issues are introduced on an almost daily basis.How can solution providers deal with the ever-changing thr ...

Both the speakers and audience at this morning’s MSP Partners Community meeting during CompTIA’s Annual Member Meeting kept coming back to a common pain point that many IT solution providers experience. Despite the high level of automation and remote processes followed by many industry experts, others continue to struggle to improve their organizations’ business and process efficiencies. As the company grows, what was once a small issue can snowball into a much greater problem that gets harder t ...

IT is everywhere… that reality will help ensure successful futures for the IT solution provider community, as well as the many companies with a role in the IT channel. CompTIA CEO Todd Thibodeaux kicked off the 2012 Annual Member Meeting (AMM) yesterday by touching on where the industry has been over the past few years, and then stressing some of the most lucrative opportunities that lie ahead.The economy has affected the industry tremendously over the past few years, just now getting back to th ...

One highlight of today’s IT Services and Support Community gathering during the CompTIA Annual Member Meetinghttp://www.comptia.org/amm (AMM) was the presentation by IT Services Marketing Association President and CEO David Munn. Starting out with a review of Google results for “solutions,” he demonstrated how generic the term has become. With millions of hits across a variety of different categories, the descriptor is clearly favored by businesses throughout the world.According to Munn, today’s ...

Business technology isn’t what it once was. A little more than a decade ago, the system infrastructure consisted of servers, work stations, network components and the software manually loaded in each machine. The support process was primarily on site, with the occasional call center to walk users or the company’s IT staff through some primary diagnostics and repair steps.A lot has changed, with the new business system environment encompassing extensive cloud platforms, a wealth of mobile devices ...

Dell is on a tear this week, scooping up Wyse Technologies and Clerity Solutions and adding thin client and even more cloud solutions to their ever-expanding portfolio. The former hardware-centric vendor obviously has a plan to transform its business model, rapidly expanding into areas formerly supported by channel organizations. The moves help the company continue to reduce its reliance on hardware, shifting to more profitable and higher growth segments of the IT industry.But Dell’s strategy is ...