What is Asset Inventory Management?
IT asset management is a “group of business practices that use IT practices across the business units in the organization. It joints the inventory, financial, risk management, and contractual responsibilities to manage the overall life cycle of these assets including a strategic and tactical decision making.”. These assets include all elements of hardware and software that’s found within the business environment.
IT asset management is referred to as IT inventory management because it involves getting detailed software and hardware inventory information which can then be used to make decisions about purchases and how the assets are used.
IT asset management is effective via electronic records and metadata to help track and categorize its assets. Metadata is the description of the digital or physical asset and any supporting information that’s needed to inform the asset management decisions. The metadata depth will vary based on the needs of the organization.
Why is Asset Inventory Software Important for IT?
IT organizations manage the company’s total asset footprint. IT assets are expensive to acquire and manage. As a result, asset inventory software plays an important role in helping IT teams use the organization’s resources that work best for them.
Here are some main goals of IT Asset Management?
- Improve productivity by developing technology to support business and user need
- Reduce support and licensing costs by reallocating or eliminating underutilized licenses and resources.
- Limit overhead costs by managing the IT environment
- Enforce corporate with regulatory requirements and compliance security policies
Types of IT Asset Management
Digital Asset Management – Digital asset management is apart of a company’s intellectual property management. It’s a form of electronic media content management which manages assets such as videos, photos, and digital data that the company licenses or produces from third parties.
License and Software Management – are concerned with effective control, protection, and management of assets. This includes those that are licensed from third parties and produced by the companies.
IT Asset Management – The overarching set of business practices that combine practical, financial, and contractual inventory functions to support the life cycle management and decision making for an IT environment.
What is an Asset Inventory Lifecycle?
When it comes to IT asset management, the lifecycle looks like this:
- Plan – The decisions and strategies about what assets are needed for the company, how to obtain them, how they will be funded and how they’ll be used.
- Acquire – The procurement of IT assets by building, licensing, or buying them.
- Commission – Introducing assets in the IT ecosystem. This includes installing the asset, adding it with other components, establishing support processes and operations and managing user access.
- Maintain – While the asset is in operation, upgrades, overhauls, and repairs might be necessary to maximize the value to users, extend the life of the asset, and reduce support costs.
- Retire – At the end of the asset’s lifecycle, the asset needs to be disposed of or else it’s disappointed. Retirement includes transitioning the asset to other resources, cancel support agreements, initiate planning for replacement assets, and terminating the license renewal.
Conclusion
To utilize asset inventory software, you have to manage it through every stage of the life cycle. By doing this, you’ll have better control of your assets and give your IT team the skills needed to use them correctly. Thus, respect the asset’s lifecycle so that your team can get the most out of it!
