Improving the IT health of a 40+ year Iowa clinic

A trusted Iowa clinic on the forefront of innovation for over 40 years had several crucial IT needs, including:

The Problem

• Developing a better understanding of IT costs (including equipment, renewals and support) so that they could proactively budget for the long-term
• Managing unexpected IT costs that forced them to rationalize spending to the executive team before they could go ahead with the purchase
• Understanding which workstations would not support Windows 11 and which workstations would need to be upgraded
• Establishing a process to produce the necessary information to identify which workstations and servers were approaching end of life
• Resolving a lack of access to centralized information about their IT equipment
• Forming a comprehensive renewal process

The Solution

The WIN team worked with the clinic to help them develop a strategic plan to address each of the issues above. This included budgeting for their technology needs and implementing lifecycle management. Budgeting and lifecycle management work together as a 2-step process.

First, we applied lifecycle management to determine what was aging out and when. This included a report that identified:

• Server and workstation name
• Serial number
• Operating system
• Warranty expiration date
• Last person who may have used it
• Whether the workstation runs Windows 11
• Computer vendor
• Upgrade schedule for servers and workstations
• Access points, wireless access points, switches, firewalls, and replacement schedule

We then used this information to establish a timeline and build it into the budget. This process helped the clinic identify outdated equipment, develop a budget, and plan for replacement.

The results? A healthy outcome

The clinic was very pleased with the information provided in the report and shared that they had struggled to wrap their arms around all of these issues in the past. By identifying all of their IT assets and implementing lifecycle management, they could now determine which devices were nearing end of life and plan to replace equipment in phases rather than all at once or when the equipment fails.

The relationship between WIN and the clinic was collaborative and strategic. The clinic can now move beyond putting out fires and instead invest in strategies and projects that will help them move in the direction their organization wants to go.