IT supervision, the secret of super-proactive IT departments!

By Fabien Paupier

Published: 28 October 2024

What is IT supervision? Also known as IT monitoring, this process is used to control and steer the information system, which is central to the activity of the company's various departments.

And to be successful, any VSE, SME or large organisation is entirely dependent on the reliability of its IS, in particular its IT infrastructure, which has to be operating at optimum levels at all times.

But the slightest anomaly is likely to slow progress, cause a loss of sales, or even bring production to a standstill. Unthinkable in an increasingly competitive society!

Let's take a closer look at what IT monitoring is and how it can benefit your organisation 👉.

See all software IT Monitoring

What is IT monitoring?

IT monitoring: definition

IT supervision, also known as IT monitoring, is defined as a technique combining :

surveillance
monitoring,
steering,
alerts,
reports,

with the aim of alleviating problems linked to all levels of a company's IT operations, whether it be :

its system
an activity
an automated or computerised process.

Why do we do IT monitoring?

The aim of IT monitoring is to keep a constant eye on a company's IS. The aim? To spot problems quickly, and so react as quickly as possible to avoid costly service interruptions.

In short, it's like having a vigilant watchdog who makes sure that everything is running smoothly, and even anticipates risks and incidents.

What types of IT monitoring are there?

Technical supervision

Technical supervision focuses on the IT infrastructure itself, and therefore monitors the performance and security of elements such as :

the network : availability of online services, throughput, security, flow control, etc,
hardware components,
the operating system
the data storage system, etc.

Functional (or service) supervision

This form of supervision focuses on the availability and quality of IT services provided to users.

It therefore involves monitoring the performance (with indicators, alerts and probes) of devices such as e-mail, Internet access, file servers, etc.

Application monitoring

Here, monitoring focuses on the software used in the company.

The aim is to check that applications are accessible, work without errors and respond quickly to employee requests.

Business supervision

Finally, let's zoom in on business supervision, which is specific to each company.

It relates to the various business processes of a production entity, and aims to ensure that these operations are running efficiently, in line with business objectives and quality standards.

The 6 benefits of IT monitoring

#1 Early detection of problems

Thanks to IT monitoring, you can detect problems in your IT infrastructure at an earlier stage .

More specifically, real-time monitoring of your IS enables you to identify the warning signs of imminent hardware or software breakdowns:

variations in performance
system errors
capacity overruns, etc.

As a result, IT teams take proactive measures to resolve these problems before they become critical and jeopardise the smooth running of the business.

# 2 Reduce downtime

The proactive approach enabled by IT monitoring significantly reduces downtime for the organisation's systems.

In other words, this supervision work guarantees operational continuity, thereby minimising the financial losses associated with service interruptions.

😃 Not to mention the fact that keeping your business up and running, whatever the circumstances, contributes to customer satisfaction and your company's good reputation!

# 3 Optimising performance

IT monitoring also plays an essential role in optimising IS performance, since it involves keeping an eye on your hardware resources in real time, such as :

processors
memory
storage
network bandwidth, etc.

By identifying potential bottlenecks or overloads, teams can allocate the resources needed to guarantee the company's overall operational efficiency more effectively.

#4 Manage resources more effectively

By keeping a constant eye on its hardware, software and network resources, the company obtains complete visibility of its IT environment.

In other words, it has the relevant data to make informed decisions about potential investments in new equipment or software licences.

At the same time, organisations avoid unnecessary expenditure by identifying under-utilised or obsolete resources.

# 5 Improving security

At a time when cyber-threats are multiplying, IT monitoring strengthens the security of systems and data by detecting potential threats and other abnormal behaviour.

Teams then become more alert in terms of IT protection, and react quickly to mitigate risks.

In addition, monitoring helps to ensure compliance with current security policies and regulations, as it simplifies the application of any necessary corrective measures.

#6 Increase user satisfaction

Finally, IT monitoring makes a significant contribution to end-user satisfaction because, as we saw earlier, it guarantees the availability and performance of IT services.

Customers, staff and partners can therefore count on reliable systems, which reinforces the confidence they have in your organisation. And in an increasingly competitive business world, that clearly makes all the difference!

Good practice in IT monitoring

Convinced by all the benefits of IT monitoring?

In order to deploy such a system correctly in your organisation and ensure that it is fully effective, here are a few good practices to observe 👉.

✅ Define clear objectives before throwing yourself headlong into the project. What aspects of the IT infrastructure do you want to monitor and what are the expected results?
✅ Identify the IT components and services that are critical to your operations. Your priority will be to focus on monitoring these essential elements.
✅ Design a monitoring architecture that takes into account your network topology, the geographical distribution of resources and redundancy.
✅ Automate the collection of real-time data and centralise it using specialised tools. This will make it much easier to analyse!
✅ S et up customised alerts, so you're warned immediately of any anomalies.
✅ Set up security policies to protect your monitoring information from unauthorised access.
✅ Use your monitoring data to plan future resource requirements, thus avoiding bottlenecks.
✅ Draw up documents describing monitoring procedures, including how to react to alerts and resolve problems.
✅ Ensure that the teams concerned are fully trained not only in the use of the supervision tools, but also in all the associated procedures.
✅ Regularly review the monitoring configurations previously deployed. In this way, you ensure that they remain aligned with the organisation's needs.
✅ Demonstrate responsiveness to alert triggers, a sine qua non for reducing downtime.
✅ Maintain transparent communication with stakeholders, keeping them informed of incidents and measures taken to resolve them.
✅ Think "feedback and continuous improvement". In other words, regularly gather feedback from the IT team and end users, with the aim of constantly improving your monitoring system.

Which IT monitoring solution is right for your business?

The IT monitoring service provider

If you don't have a large enough IT team, you can call on an outsourced supervision service, via an IT outsourcer or an MSP ( Managed Service Provider). They can monitor your IS on-site or remotely.

To do this, you will need an IT outsourcing contract.

But whether you entrust this task internally or to a service provider, the use of supervision tools, also known as monitoring tools, remains essential.

Let's take a look at how such software can help you 🔎.

IT monitoring software

Thanks to the use of dedicated software, installing an agent on a machine is quick and easy. It can be carried out without a hitch, on all computer media and all operating systems.

More concretely, this technology is used to anticipate anomalies and then resolve them:

each agent reports information, which can be viewed on a single dashboard;
the management interface is used to control the IT tools.

Having said that, which platforms should you choose in practice 🤔?

3 examples of proprietary IT monitoring software

Atera is a comprehensive remote monitoring and management (RMM) software package. It automates professional services (PSA), manages patches and deployment, to oversee your IT infrastructures. This all-in-one tool has the advantage of being invoiced per technician.
RG System RMM is presented as an RMM module, to which the Data Backup & Restore and Endpoint Security options can be added. The whole package is controlled from a single dashboard, to manage everything from supervision and antivirus deployment to automatic backups.
WhatsUp Gold is capable of providing 360° visibility of your IT infrastructure, thanks in particular to a unified dashboard and numerous advanced features (different monitoring protocols, several scripting languages, performance optimisation, etc.). Its strong point: its easy-to-use, intuitive interface.

2 examples of open source IT monitoring software

Centreon lets you check the status of services and machines. It also supports metrology, reporting, access to supervision events and advanced management of user access controls.
Nagios includes the following features: multiple inheritance, dependencies, notification escalation, service and host templating, and support for active and passive monitoring.