Deliver outcomes with a people-centric approach to managed services

It’s time to rethink everything you know about managed services

As organizations look to strengthen IT capabilities, drive innovation, and improve operational efficiencies, business leaders often feel they must make a choice: either invest significantly more to build and sustain in-house expertise to keep up with technology complexity or take a managed services approach and risk losing their best people with institutional knowledge. 

But the dilemma presents a false choice. There is a viable alternative that satisfies both organizational and employee needs—a people-centric model for strategic managed IT services that blends the best of both worlds.

A people-centric model that puts people first allows an organization to elevate its IT delivery by tapping the expertise and reach of a managed services provider’s (MSP) resources, processes, and technical capabilities. At the same time, it safeguards institutional memory by incorporating current IT staff, creating a carefully structured rotation that settles on the right blend of legacy and new resources, and providing opportunities to incumbent staff according to their skills and interests.

This managed services model can serve as a catalyst for technology transformation, unlocking new business value. Organizations gain access to advanced IT leadership, robust security and compliance, and a strategic vision to guide their digital roadmap. 

What is a people-centric managed services model?

At its core, people-centricity involves the managed services provider assuming responsibility for managing and employing a client's existing IT team as part of the outsourcing engagement. However, this approach goes beyond simply a "lift and shift" of IT workloads—it's a values-based approach to the transition of people. 

Transferring employees to an external partner can be sensitive and challenging. A compassionate approach focuses on clear communication, support, and respect for impacted employees. It integrates the incoming talent into an environment tailor-made for building and evolving technology and business skill sets. An experienced MSP should be able to demonstrate how compensation, tenure, and seniority are harmonized in the new model to ensure that transitioning staff are positioned for future growth and opportunity.

A thoughtful strategy for integrating incumbent IT staff mitigates a host of risks. It conveys a clear message about the company's values and commitment to the technology team and the broader organization. 

At the same time, a people-centric model fully leverages capabilities the MSP brings to the mix: cost-effectively establishing senior IT leadership and process rigor that would be challenging to achieve independently. This may include roles ranging from enterprise architects and security domain experts to executive capacities such as the Chief Information Officer, Chief Data or Digital Officer, and Chief Information Security Officer, in addition to other management functions such as a Security Operations Center (SOC) that offers 24/7 support at scale. 

The right model is achieved through informed expertise: a skilled MSP partner will utilize various accelerators and cost optimization measures—proprietary know-how—to streamline service delivery. By committing to a sufficient duration and gradually integrating labor cost optimization through a global delivery model over time, the economics can be cost-neutral for the client compared to their previous in-house spend.

Bringing new opportunities to IT staff

Just as importantly, the people-centric model opens new professional growth opportunities for employees. Rather than being limited to the needs of a single organization's IT environment, legacy professionals can explore new technology domains and gain exposure to projects across multiple industries as part of a larger IT services provider.

Joining a global leader in technology services opens doors to training and upskilling programs, certifications and mentorships, rotations across industries, roles, and types of clients, and hands-on experience with the latest tools and methodologies. Employees previously exposed to the requirements of just one company can lend their talents to a variety of client engagements.

Top performers take on strategic roles and leadership responsibilities within and beyond the current IT team—with carefully planned rotations or promotions that provide accelerated career growth while protecting the fundamentals.

Addressing common concerns

Changing how technology services are contracted and delivered will also impact morale across the broader organization if handled without proper care and attention. Who can forget the early days of outsourcing that required outgoing technologists to train their successors? Employees in other departments eyed these cost control-focused measures with unease, which led to increased attrition.

Even scenarios involving selective re-badging of incumbent staff may result in the best and brightest taking their cues and heading for safer ground. Tensions may arise if only a subset of the team transitions while others stay back. 

Talent is an MSP’s strongest asset. As in any good acquisition, the MSP will focus on change management, transparent communication, and other initiatives to smooth the onboarding process and offer the right assurances to sustain a stable and capable team. The same attention will be paid to integrating IT processes, tools, and knowledge to preserve the right blend of a client’s practices while incorporating decades of experience-tested methodologies and collaboration into a detailed and thoughtfully executed transition plan. 

Case in point: putting the people-centric approach into practice

A mid-sized nonprofit with a capable IT organization but limited ability to scale needed more from its technology investment. Although the team could be counted on to step up and deliver time and again, the organization required seasoned leadership to manage and evolve its technology suite. 

Security was top of mind, particularly ongoing protection of customer data. The CEO recognized a need to scale the level of support, security, and strategic capabilities to meet growing digital demand, yet remained mindful of the value of vital institutional knowledge. 

CGI offered a range of solutions, including advanced IT governance and management and a cost-neutral, people-centric managed services model. After conducting a third-party compensation analysis to ensure equitable onboarding, CGI extended an offer to every incumbent employee and all but one accepted. 

Over the next year, a third of incumbent employees transitioned into other CGI work aligned with their skill sets and interests. The transitioned employees now have access to CGI's full training curriculum, mentorship opportunities, and the ability to explore diverse career paths across CGI's various practice areas. Some accepted new roles previously unavailable in the client organization, such as positions in product management and cloud service reliability engineering. 

The incumbent staff, now CGI employees, continue to use their historical knowledge and mastery of the client’s complex business to gather requirements and design solutions. 

By absorbing these employees into its ranks, CGI protected the client's institutional IT knowledge and quickly implemented its proven processes, tooling, and governance models required to scale. 

At the same time, CGI cost-effectively established a team of transformational IT leaders for the nonprofit that guides end-to-end technology and security functions. This leadership team would have been impractical for the client to independently hire and retain. 

This client’s IT investment is going further and doing more to secure, sustain, and grow the business.

Making it a success

Ultimately, the success of a people-centric model depends on establishing a genuine strategic partnership mindset between the client and provider organization rather than a transactional vendor relationship aimed exclusively at driving costs out of the business. Above all, the partnership requires alignment on priorities, a commitment to transparency, and a willingness to dive deep into the details together to execute the transition successfully.

Collaborating effectively requires the right cultural fit to sustain a long-term commitment. A company and its strategic technology partner must share common values that put employees first and create an environment where everyone can thrive.

Want to learn more about CGI’s success in executing managed services partnerships? Watch our webinar with Circle K on CIO.com, read our viewpoint, An executive’s guide to managed services or contact us.