Voice and Data Cabling: 3 Tips for Outsourced IT Consultants

If you are an IT consultant designing total small business solutions, choosing the right kind of voice and data cabling for your network application, installing it properly and verifying compliance with the necessary standards is the key to ensuring your clients get the most out of their technology investment.

If you take a casual attitude towards the design or installation, you could cost your clients unnecessary money and waste time with unnecessary long-term troubleshooting issues and devastating downtime.

When it comes to laying the proper foundation for a reliable network, voice and data cabling is as important as pouring a solid foundation for a building construction project.

But how can you ensure you give your small business clients the best voice and data cabling options that fit in with your overall solution ... especially if you are coordinating services with an outside vendor and acting as their outsourced IT manager or virtual CIO?

Consider the following 3 tips that can help you be a great “go-between” for your clients and ensure your technology solutions work well for them, even if you are working with outside vendors for voice and data cabling services.

1. Map Out All the Parts of the Project and How They Fit Together. First, you need to know how to get from Point A to Point B. But you also need to know all the intricacies of the steps along the way, even if they are not being carried out by you personally. You have to know exactly what Point A and Point B are. Then you have to figure out how the overall project can be broken down into phases and who will be doing what, including which outside vendors you will be using and what you will be able to do in-house. To be a real virtual CIO, create a technology roadmap for your clients and be in total control of how it is executed. And be sure to communicate regularly with any outside vendors you use throughout the course of any project so you are all on the same page.

2. Allow Ample Time for Voice and Data Cabling Projects. Smooth IT projects do not happen magically. Major systems upgrades are generally carried out over the course of several weeks and sometimes even several months. And when you are coordinating voice and data cabling with outside vendors, you have to do a lot of advanced planning and pay close attention to a lot of interrelated details. You also have to understand that while you might have a specific timeline in mind for completing a project, you can’t always expect that other vendors will have the same exact idea, or that your timeline will even be reasonable for them. As an effective virtual CIO, you need to be realistic about timelines and work with all members of your team to develop a definite plan before the start of the project.

3. Prepare for Potential Problems with Conservative Time and Money Budgets. Seasoned virtual CIO's and project managers learn to spot potential problems before they evolve into major catastrophes that can drastically increase budget and time spent. When you are working with other companies that provide voice and data cabling, you need to make sure any outside companies you use are doing their jobs in the agreed-upon amount of time and for the agreed-upon cost. If you are watchful of every component of a big project, even those pieces you are not doing yourself, you can handle most unexpected problems efficiently and expediently.

In this article, we discussed how you can work more effectively with outside vendors to oversee major network infrastructure projects, such as voice and data cabling. Learn more about how to provide great voice and data cabling options to better serve your steady, high-paying clients now at the attached link.

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