Tag Archive for: managed services

Over the past week, I’ve spoken to a number of customers and partners who are adjusting to the ever-evolving reality of life during COVID-19. Beyond the many ways it has affected their personal lives and families, we’ve also discussed how it has impacted their jobs, and the role of analytics in the success of their organizations.

During these conversations, a few consistent themes have emerged from the people responsible for delivering reporting and analytics to their user communities:

  • Reliability: Continuing to deliver business as usual content despite a suddenly remote workforce
  • Resiliency: Hardening existing systems and processes to ensure continuity and security
  • Efficiency: Delivering maximum value even in the midst of a short-term business downturn
  • Innovation: Finding new ways to leverage data to address emerging challenges in areas such as supply chain, customer service, pricing optimization, marketing, and others.

While none of these topics are new to those of us in analytics, the new reality brought on by COVID-19 has made it even more important for us to succeed in every area. In an excellent Forbes article, Alteryx CEO Dean Stoecker discusses the importance and relevance of analytics professionals in driving success for their organizations in these trying times.

As he correctly concludes,

“If anyone is prepared to tackle the world’s most complex business and societal challenges—in this case, a global pandemic—it is the analytic community.”

We’re all in this together.

At Ironside, we’re taking that challenge to heart and looking at how we, too, can refocus our talents to better help our customers. Our upcoming series, Strategies for Success During Uncertain Times, will cover the steps we’re taking to help our partners weather this storm.

As of today, we’re:

  • Holding on-demand “Coffee Breaks” with some of our most experienced SMEs
  • Increasing remote trainings on key technologies
  • Rolling out short-term hosted platforms to accelerate model development, especially for predictive analytics
  • Expanding our managed-services capabilities for platforms and applications, even for short-term demand
  • Increasing our investment in off-shore capabilities to reduce costs and expand coverage models and other areas, too

Additionally, we are offering more short-term staffing options to our customers. Read Depend on Ironside for your data and analytics bench for short- and long-term success for more about these services.

We’re here to help.

At Ironside, we agree that the analytics community is uniquely-positioned to help our organizations weather the COVID-19 storm, and we’re committed to making our customers and partners as successful as possible.

We look forward to speaking with you about your immediate needs, and continuing the conversation on these and other timely topics.

Contact us today at: Here2Help@IronsideGroup.com

As you can see from the title, there are a lot of “as-a-Services” floating around in the modern marketplace. New vendors appear every day offering software, platforms, and infrastructure over the cloud. In the midst of this wild west-style atmosphere, how can you be sure that the type of solution you choose will be right for you and will consistently perform in the way you expect? Read more

On May 12th, Ironside hosted an IBM PureData for Analytics (Netezza) in the Cloud vs. DashDB webinar, during which our industry experts provided their insights into these two powerful information management solutions. Read more

Powering business analytics evolution through targeted infrastructure support

Did you know there are over 326 million trillion gallons of water on Earth? Yes, you read that number right. It’s hard to even fathom (no pun intended) a number that large, let alone try and quantify it into consumable, actionable business analyses. Watts Water Technologies deals with the enormity of this vast natural resource every day, improving the global community’s comfort, safety, and quality of life through their industry-leading water regulation, purification, and reuse equipment solutions. Read more

On April 14th, Ironside hosted a What to Expect for Your Cognos Environment webinar, where Ironside’s Technical Services Manager presented on how your Cognos environment should behave along with tips and tricks for making any necessary improvements. Read more

Thanks to the widespread availability of the cloud and the rampant growth of the remote options it enables, these days it feels like everyone is looking for a Managed Services Provider (MSP) to help manage different aspects of their environment. Whether they provide firewalls, antivirus solutions, or business analytics platforms, MSPs abound. There are many ways to assess what these providers bring the table, but what are the most important characteristics to look for? As a provider and consumer of these services, I know what I strive to offer and what I look for from my vendors. In this article, I’ll illuminate my thought process for you in the hopes that it can set you on the road to successful, rewarding MSP relationships. Read more

Netezza on cloudIronside is excited to announce a ground breaking new solution for organizations wanting to leverage their analytics workload-optimized PureData for Analytics / Netezza appliance in conjunction with rest of their virtualized private cloud analytics architecture. Ironside’s IBM PureData for Analytics (PDA) for Cloud offering solves all of the major hurdles for connecting your physical big data appliance with your virtual cloud infrastructure: management and communications bandwidth and latency. Ironside is now uniquely able to provide hosting and management of your appliance in conjunction with direct, private, and secure network connectivity back to IBM SoftLayer or other major cloud providers. This means you can host your entire analytics architecture in the cloud and still take advantage of the massive benefits that a physical appliance provides in this application. Read more

Award-winning IBM Partner celebrating 15 years re-launches as comprehensive business-focused analytics solution provider

Lexington, MA (May 16, 2014) – The Ironside Group, the award-winning North American business analytics consultancy founded in 1999, today re-launched their organization as simply Ironside. This change is both a reflection of their celebrated 15 year history, as well as a representation of their shift towards providing comprehensive solutions for organizations that are seeking to fundamentally improve performance by harnessing the power of information. The new Ironside will move toward being a one-stop shop for end-to-end analytics solutions, supporting clients from the planning phases all the way through full-scale implementations. Read more

Ironside is proud to announce the creation of the Ironside Solution Center; a dedicated on-shore team providing services to support our clients’ strategic development initiatives. In addition to client development initiatives, the Solution Center will spearhead the research and development of Ironside Solutions products. A full-time core team of skilled consultants staff the Solution Center from our Lexington, MA office and business vertical and subject matter experts from within our organization augment the team when needed to rapidly scale and meet client project needs.

Service Offerings

Ironside provides two key services through the Ironside Solution Center: a project-based offering and an enhanced managed services offering.

– The project based offering is a time and material model where the hours and costs are determined by the scope of the project and skills required.
– The enhanced managed services offering allows the client to purchase blocks of time on a periodic basis, e.g. annually or quarterly, and consume those blocks within a predefined timeframe.

Engagement Model

The Ironside Solution Center Manager is a dedicated resource involved in all services that the core team provides, reviewing specifications, work plans, deliverables, and time tables with an onsite Ironside project manager or client project manager. The Solution Center Manager engages Solution Center resources as needed on a per-project basis.

Communication is paramount in this model, and the Solution Center Manager tracks project plans, provides status updates, and ensures quality of work to guarantee the timely delivery of cost-effective solutions to Ironside clients.

Considerations for Ironside Solution Center Engagements

If any of the following considerations are a priority for your company, the Solutions Center could be of great benefit to you:

– Large scale development or upgrades
– Bulk QA or report remediation
– Budget constraints for travel and expenses
– High quality deliverables without the expense of multiple boutique consultant resources
– Dedicated resources for your hosted / managed environments

Solution Center Benefits

A number of crucial advantages come along with engaging the Ironside Solution Center. Below are some highlights:

– Flexibility and predictability in budgeting based upon engagement model
– Local in-house development environment managed by a senior dedicated resource
– Lower travel and expense costs
– Potential to expand expertise / skills / footprint as projects evolve
– Wealth of knowledge from the entire Ironside Consulting Services organization
– Project management tools, templates, processes and methodology

Meet the Team

All members of the core team are IBM Certified in various skillsets and are based out of our corporate headquarters in Lexington, MA.

Solution Center Manager – De Hsieh

de hsiehDe is a senior consultant for Ironside, and is an ideal fit for leading the Solution Center team. He has an unmatched insight into the complexities, challenges, and best practices associated with a vast array of different industries and functional areas. During his six year tenure with Ironside, De has used his in-depth expertise with every aspect of the IBM Cognos suite to quickly and effectively devise and deploy solutions for clients, even in the most complex enterprise environments. With an impressive history of diverse, dynamic projects under his belt, De can speak the language of end users and stakeholders of all types and transform goals and requirements into usable, actionable, and productive results that put companies on the cutting edge of their sector.

Solution Center Core Team: Technical Consultants

The Ironside Solution Center team is a group of driven, innovative, and highly knowledgeable consultants who will do everything possible to make your organization’s key projects successful. Each member below brings a unique set of capabilities to the table that they are proud to leverage in service of Ironside’s clients.

Pankti Shah

Pankti Shah

Aimee Carvalho

aimee carvalho

Katie Ketcham

katie ketcham

Bernadette Kennedy-Cox

bernadette kennedy-cox

Sagarr Kanoje

Sagarr Kanoje

 Conclusion

The Ironside Solution Center provides our clients with the benefits of a cost-effective, flexible project delivery model that guarantees the security of their data within a US based development center. In addition, the Solution Center grants our clients the confidence and peace of mind necessary to execute on key strategic deliverables that help them stay competitive in a modern, information-focused business environment. If you’d like to learn more about the team and what they can offer your organization, check out the Solution Center team page.

 

Ironside is proud to announce the launch of its innovation center with a number of exciting new packaged Ironside solutions built on the IBM Business Analytics and Information Management portfolio. These solutions are designed to accelerate and multiply client return on investment and address specific functional and industry business problems. Be sure to contact us or stop by our booth at IBM Information on Demand next week to speak to our industry and functional solution experts in person. Read more

Tag Archive for: managed services