Enterprise Technology Management: What It Is and Why You Need It

If you are a business leader who wants to optimize your IT spending, streamline your processes, and gain visibility into your technology costs, you need to know about Enterprise Technology Management.

What is Enterprise Technology Management?

Enterprise Technology Management (ETM) is a cloud-based expense management service platform that helps businesses connect, validate, and manage all their large-scale corporate communications costs and inventory. Enterprise Technology Management covers the entire stack of IT services, from wireline and wireless connectivity, to cloud, SaaS, security, and software licenses. Enterprise Technology Management automates and optimizes IT procurement, billing, allocation, chargeback, and reporting, while providing a live and interactive dashboard that gives actionable intelligence and insights.

If you’ve been in the business world for a few years, you’re likely thinking “this sounds a lot like Technology Expense Management (TEM).” But since Technology Expense Management was very focused on business phone systems and minutes, the fact is that Enterprise Technology Management is a more holistic and cloud-centered approach that replaces the now-outdated TEM system.

How is Enterprise Technology Management different than Technology Expense Management?

Telecom Expense Management (TEM) is a system that can help organizations streamline their IT operations and financial oversight. Businesses use TEM to gain a comprehensive solution for managing your corporate communication costs and IT services, including fixed and mobile telephony, data, cloud license tracking, and IoT connectivity. The key benefit of a TEM solution is that it provides strategic data-driven tools for C-level decision making. However, the downside of most TEM systems is that it is often a software-driven activity using static financial data.

Enterprise Technology Management (ETM) is different than Technology Expense Management (TEM) in several ways:

• ETM covers the entire stack of IT services, from wireline and wireless connectivity, to cloud, SaaS, security, and software licenses, while TEM focuses mostly on phone systems and minutes.
• ETM leverages machine learning algorithms, robotic process automation, and data integrity checks to ingest, validate, and reconcile invoices electronically, while TEM relies on static data and manual tasks.
• ETM is a combination of advanced technology and human expertise that works in tandem to deliver the best results for businesses, while TEM is mostly a software-driven activity.
• ETM provides a live and interactive dashboard that gives actionable intelligence and insights, while TEM provides static reports and spreadsheets.
• ETM leverages machine learning algorithms, robotic process automation, and data integrity checks to ingest, validate, and reconcile your invoices electronically, while identifying and resolving any anomalies, errors, or inefficiencies.

Here is a comparison table outlining the key differences between Enterprise Technology Management and Technology Expense Management:

Aspect	Enterprise Technology Management	Telecom Expense Management
Data source	Live and interactive dashboard	Static reports and spreadsheets
Technology	Machine learning, robotic process automation, data integrity checks	Software-driven activity
Human expertise	Works in tandem with technology to deliver best results	Relies on manual tasks and interventions
IT environment coverage	Wireline and wireless connectivity, cloud, SaaS, security, software licenses	Phone systems and minutes, some wireline networking
Benefits	Optimizes IT spending, validates invoices, finds billing errors, automates and streamlines IT processes, provides actionable intelligence and insights	Provides strategic data-driven tools for business executives in relation to network bandwidth and telecommunications spending

What industries can benefit the most from using Enterprise Technology Management?

Some of the industries that can benefit the most from using Enterprise Technology Management are:

• Professional service firms that need to track and allocate their IT spending across multiple departments, projects, and clients.
• Government agencies that need to comply with regulations, audits, and reporting requirements for their IT services.
• Hospitality companies that have multiple locations and need to optimize their communication costs, manage their contracts, and avoid billing errors.
• Banking and healthcare organizations that have complex and diverse IT stacks, including wireline, wireless, cloud, SaaS, security, and software licenses, and need to automate and streamline their IT procurement, billing, allocation, chargeback, and reporting processes.

Why should a business use Enterprise Technology Management?

Businesses should deploy Enterprise Technology Management because it can help them:

• Save money by optimizing their IT spending, validating their invoices, and finding billing errors and overcharges. For example, Blue Mantis Enterprise Technology Management solution partner Warner Telecom saves customers an average of around 20% on their monthly bandwidth and telecom costs alone. When it comes to optimizing SaaS and IaaS spending, Blue Mantis FinOps saves customers an average of 30% on annual costs. It’s a powerful combination!
• Automate and streamline their IT procurement, billing, allocation, chargeback, and reporting processes, using advanced technology and human expertise. Enterprise Technology Management solutions from Blue Mantis use a cloud-based platform that ingests, reconciles, and visualizes data from multiple sources, using machine learning, robotic process automation, and data integrity checks.
• Gain actionable intelligence and insights from their IT data, using a live and interactive dashboard that shows market analysis, ROI analysis, invoice breakdown, spending trends, contract renewals, and more. A good Enterprise Technology Management solution will also provide customized dashboards and reports based on the customer’s needs and preferences.
• Manage their entire stack of IT services, from wireline and wireless connectivity, to cloud, SaaS, security, and software licenses, using a single solution that covers all vendors and technologies. Businesses should always look for an Enterprise Technology Management provider that can also handle the help desk, order management, and optimization for all these services, and work with the customer’s existing providers and partners.

If I had to give a one-sentence explanation for the benefits of an Enterprise Technology Management solution, it’s that Enterprise Technology Management is the instantaneous way to get your CIO, CISO, and CFO synchronized on budgeting. You eliminate the harried end-of-month reporting, the endless meetings, and all the stress that comes from manual processes before Enterprise Technology Management. Once you have a good Enterprise Technology Management platform in place, the automation takes over. With ETM, your spending and budgeting on IT becomes faster, more transparent, and with accountability that benefits everyone.

Blue Mantis delivers Enterprise Technology Management solutions

If you want the benefits of an Enterprise Technology Management platform at your organization, then reach out to us at Blue Mantis. We offer managed Enterprise Technology Management solutions that integrate with your existing business processes to provide your IT, procurement, and finance departments with real-time visibility into your technology spending—and it can literally pay for itself thanks to our partner’s 150% fee guarantee!

Connect with us today to learn how we can optimize your IT spending now and in the future.