Don’t let this be you on the curb…
Downtime cost analysis is a numbers game. The objective is simple – to find the magic number….the point at which the costs of downtime exceed the costs of prevention and mitigation.
What Everyone Knows but Doesn’t Fully Understand…
Everyone knows that downtime is costly. Everyone also knows that downtime is preventable (to a certain extent), and certainly, what cannot be prevented, can be managed and mitigated. But this knowledge alone may not move anyone to act, largely because “action” is also costly. It takes time, money and staff resources to analyze needs and develop working solutions. And, above all, expenses have to be justified.
To play the game, IT staffers must be able to quantify the costs of downtime in real business terms …. moving downtime from the realm of complaint into “costs and consequences”.
To achieve this goal, the following questions must be addressed:
What is downtime?
“Downtime” is hard to define. The meaning will vary by organization, person, system and event. On a big picture level, downtime occurs whenever a given system (application, server, network) cannot be accessed or used for its intended purpose. Obviously, there are “shades” of downtime based on the degree of impact (intermittent interruptions or full-blown outage), duration, frequency, visibility (internal systems versus external systems for customer usage), and extent (the number of end-users and locations involved). These “shades” drive related costs and the need for effective management solutions.
What is downtime management?
Downtime management is a combination of physical solutions (hardware and software) and logical practices (policies and procedures). The goal of downtime management is prevention (to minimize downtime occurrences) and mitigation (to minimize the impact of downtime when it occurs). When you outsource network management and support to ManageWatch, we manage your IT equipment: hardware and software, Internet, e-mail and remote connectivity, as well as systems back up and problem remediation. We become a true extension of your business. >Learn More
What are the costs of downtime?
Downtime costs must be viewed in terms of “tangibles” and “intangibles”.
Calculating Tangible Costs:
You can use our very easy and handy calculator to instantly receive an ROI for your business. This will let you know how much your downtime is really costing you. You may be surprised…
Calculate My Downtime Costs
Put it all together….
Once you can identify the costs of downtime, contrasted with the costs of downtime management, you will be in a position to weigh overall costs and benefits. The primary working assumption has to be this:
Downtime is costly and unproductive and should be avoided to the extent possible and practical. The question is …. what is “possible and practical”?
The answer will vary by organization, circumstance, and even by individual system. To find your “possible and practical” solutions you will need to weigh individual downtime consequences against viable management solutions, looking to find the right balance between cost and benefit. Obviously, IT must take advantage of all available “best practices” to ensure that technology is properly installed and maintained. But, fully redundant hardware systems, while theoretically desirable, may not be cost justified under all situations.