01 Oct Streamline IT Asset Management and Tracking with Mobile Apps

Posted at 13:23h in All Articles by

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In today’s competitive business climate,  IT asset managers are being asked to do more with less while facing scrutiny on tighter inventory controls, improved accuracy and integrity of their back-end IT asset management (ITAM) applications, and greater visibility into the status and location of all assets. Sound business decisions are based on real-time, accurate data and that’s what IT asset managers are charged with producing.

The easiest and most effective way to solve for these increasing demands is with task-driven mobile apps that allow you to automate your field processes and provide immediate asset visibility improvements and cost savings.

With highly useable, task-specific mobile apps and the right mobile devices — smartphones, tablets, barcode scanners, or RFID readers — your IT asset and field techs are armed with the mobile tools they need to perform their daily tasks more efficiently and effectively. These daily tasks may include receiving assets on the loading dock, performing wall-to-wall physical inventories, managing move/add/change operations in the field, or processing mass asset changes in bulk.

With IT asset management apps, field techs can access the asset management software directly from their mobile devices and instantly process and update asset information in real-time. Asset data is accurate, current, and timely, allowing for better decision-making and complete visibility into the asset’s status, location, owner and maintenance history.

Empower your workers in the field with usable mobile apps and a Bluetooth-attached barcode scanner. Allow them to create new asset records on the loading dock, scanning in the associated PO number, serial number, and newly attached asset tag, and immediately capturing these relationships and storing them in the back-end database or asset management application. The immediate benefits of deploying comprehensive apps for IT asset management include:

Efficiency/Productivity

  • Use barcode scanning to quickly access and update asset data
  • Optimize user experience and productivity with advanced UI features
  • Eliminate duplicate efforts and unnecessary travel time

Data Integrity

  • Use barcode and/or RFID scanning to improve accuracy and reduce errors from manual data entry
  • Data entry errors are minimized with client-side validation of data
  • Ability to enter data at the point of action provides real-time updates to the CMDB

Operational

  • Reduce costs, improve productivity and efficiency
  • Enforce best-practice processes for daily asset management and tracking
  • Satisfy ITIL, Sarbanes-Oxley or other regulatory compliance requirements

Deploying apps for IT asset management apps can seem daunting and complex. These tips will help you make a more informed evaluation of the different mobile technologies on the market today. Your mobile app platform should:

  • Accommodate your existing system(s) and enterprise application(s) as well as allowing for future growth in your organization, supporting additional users, additional use cases, and additional mobile operating systems and devices
  • Have proven security features that meet the information assurance requirements of your organization (these vary from simple to government-endorsed security levels)
  • Accommodate specific exposure requirements for forms, fields and tables in even the most complex environments
  • Feature a crisp, easy-to-use experience, resulting in rapid adoption by mobile users
  • Be easily deployed and scaled to meet your business’ evolving needs
  • Allow flexible control and validation functionality in the mobile user interface to high-quality quality data capture and effective error detection
  • Operate in both online and offline environments to enable real-time updates when connectivity is allowed and available, but also provide full functionality when connectivity is limited or unavailable

In conclusion, the right mobile apps can help transform IT asset management with increased efficiencies, increased data integrity, and reduced costs.

To learn how F5 Networks streamlined their ITAM processes and standardized on one system of record, read this case study.