Environmental Non-Profit Overcomes IT Challenges and Achieves Success

Introduction:

The Environmental Non-Profit faced several IT challenges with its previous vendor, resulting in minimal proactive consulting and contradictory recommendations. The non-profit organization sought a more efficient managed service provider to help with helpdesk support, security, infrastructure management, and strategy, focusing on not overwhelming their internal staff with IT responsibilities. They partnered with Framework IT to address these challenges and improve their IT management and operations, resulting in reduced support hours per employee, decreased resolution time, and a 25% reduction in managed IT expenses.

Business Challenge:

The non-profit organization faced several challenges with its existing IT vendor. Initially, the vendor provided quarterly strategy meetings, but these meetings ceased after the first renewal, resulting in minimal proactive consulting. Following this unexpected shift, the organization faced mounting challenges with its managed service provider. 

Recommendations from the IT vendor became less proactive and sometimes contradictory. At worst, the recommendations disregarded the non-profit organizations’ requests. Quotes and renewal estimates were discussed at the last minute. Through audits, the organization discovered that its MSP continued to charge for managing numerous laptops no longer in use. The Environmental Non-Profit wanted to adopt SharePoint to replace its file server. Still, when it brought the request to the MSP, the partner advised against it and was unwilling to support the project. The organization implemented it independently, without expert assistance, unsure whether it was faulty and may cause issues. One year later, the organization’s managed service provider recommended pivoting the file server to SharePoint, not realizing they had previously advised against it and that it was already in place.

While the non-profit organization pressed its managed IT provider for proactive cybersecurity solutions, its managed service provider waited until the organization experienced a 365-account breach to suggest 2FA/MFA.

The client’s primary point of contact within their organization, who did not have a professional IT background, had to spend significant time on IT projects and support because the MSP’s help desk was unresponsive. The staff encountered situations where the MSP’s help desk technicians appeared reluctant to answer basic questions and were not always helpful in their approach.

The non-profit organization sought a fearless partner to provide proactive suggestions and regularly engage in proactive strategy conversations. They sought a more efficient MSP to help with helpdesk support, security, infrastructure management, and strategy, focusing on not overwhelming their internal staff with IT responsibilities.

 

Framework IT Solution:

The organization partnered with Framework IT to address its IT challenges. The team implemented several solutions to improve the organization’s infrastructure, security, and collaboration capabilities.

First, the Framework team migrated the organization to Azure Active Directory in the cloud. This centralized hub efficiently manages user groups and assets acquired from other companies, enabling previously unmanageable infrastructure and user group decentralization. 

Framework IT implemented Mimecast Email security to strengthen the agency’s email services, offering more reliable protection, visibility, and control against potential spear-phishing and other email attacks.

To improve the office connection speed and reliability, Framework IT worked with the organization to implement dedicated fiber internet for improved speed and reliability. Framework IT also deployed a new cloud-managed firewall with a comprehensive security bundle. It upgraded to cloud-managed Ubiquiti switches to separate traffic between devices with different security and bandwidth priority levels.

The upgrade also included:

• Premier security licensing.
• Providing an added layer of security for the environment.
• 24×7 support.
• Hardware warranty.
• Better monitoring tools for potential troubleshooting cases.

Framework IT introduced missing foundational cybersecurity tools, like multi-factor authentication, email security, and security awareness training to prevent cyber threats. They have migrated the remaining on-premises servers, storage, and applications to Microsoft Azure cloud, eliminating remote access challenges for overseas staff and improving their experience. Once the cloud migration project is complete, the company’s file shares will be moved to SharePoint. With these initiatives and the organization’s IT challenges effectively addressed, the Environmental Non-Profit Organization can continue to thrive and scale.

 

Results:

The organization significantly improved its IT management and operations by partnering with Framework IT. As a result, the headcount grew by 20%, indicating the organization’s growth and success. The organization reduced support hours per employee by 44%, from 1.1 to 0.62 hours monthly. Framework IT’s streamlined processes allowed the organization to decrease resolution time by 36%, from 6.7 hours per ticket to only 4.3 hours per ticket.

As the organization adopted Framework IT’s best practices, it moved from Framework IT’s Level 4 Optimization pricing to Level 1 Optimization pricing, resulting in a 25% reduction in managed IT expenses for the business. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of Framework IT’s solutions in reducing issues, enhancing productivity, and enabling cost-effective IT management.

Conclusion:

The success of partnering with Framework IT for the environmental non-profit demonstrates the importance of having a reliable and proactive managed service provider to address IT challenges. By adopting Framework IT’s best practices, the non-profit was able to reduce issues, enhance productivity, and achieve cost-effective IT management. The solutions implemented by Framework IT, such as Azure Active Directory, Mimecast Email security, and dedicated fiber internet, helped improve the organization’s infrastructure, cybersecurity, and collaboration capabilities. The non-profit can continue to thrive and scale confidently, knowing they have a fearless partner in Framework IT.