The Importance of a Dedicated DaaS Team

One of the major benefits of choosing desktop as a service (DaaS) over building VDI in house is that experts have designed and maintain the specialty virtual desktop infrastructure. This means you don’t personally need to maintain and update servers, virtual machines, etc. But without ongoing support for environment design, implementation and maintenance, buying VDI from a provider is really more along the lines of Infrastructure as a service (IaaS) than true DaaS. It’s this next level of service and support that brings true value to DaaS.

When choosing a DaaS model, you shouldn’t be buying virtual desktops “off the shelf” without customization options or implementation assistance – but that’s what many cheaper solutions offer. It might seem good on paper, but the effort involved and ultimate solution often leave much to be desired.

What makes for a truly successful virtual desktop project – one that fits your use cases and has performance that end users love – is having a dedicated DaaS team. The invaluable tasks these full service teams complete ensure you have an environment that works for you and your end users from day one to day 101.

Note: If you have to pay additional fees for any of these services, it’s not a true fully-managed desktop as a service solution.

Solution Design

It’s no secret that different teams and use cases require different desktop configurations. If you’re trying a one-size-fits-all approach, one of two things will happen:

1. You’ll end up with some very unhappy users who have desktops that aren’t powerful enough for their needs (which also hurts productivity)
2. You’ll end up wasting budget by paying for overpowered desktops for employees that don’t need that level of computing resources

With a click-and-buy solution, you don’t always have the right options for your exact needs. A fully managed DaaS provider works with you from day one to identify all your use cases and needs (down to the apps each user requires) and will recommend the best configuration for each use case. You can craft custom solutions and mix-and-match configurations – or add in another service like application streaming for users who don’t need full desktops – to ensure each use cases has exactly what they need.

Because you’re guided through this process by experienced solution engineers, you can be sure no stone is left unturned and you didn’t miss a vital component of solution design.

Implementation

One of the reasons building in-house VDI is so costly and complicated is because desktop virtualization requires specialized infrastructure and expertise. This extends past installing the proper infrastructure. If you don’t have the expertise to design and implement your environments, the solution will fall flat.

Unfortunately, many providers selling outsourced VDI or DaaS don’t include implementation support. If it’s available at all, it’s often an additional (and costly) service. This means if you have a question or run into a challenge, you’re stuck relying on an online library of resources at best and nothing at all at worst. This can significantly delay the implementation timeline or stall the process entirely.

A fully managed DaaS provider doesn’t abandon you once the contract is signed. Instead, you’re assigned a dedicated implementation team that manages the project, establishes the implementation time, handles many of the backend implementation pieces and walks you through what needs to happen on your end. There are regular check-ins, you always know what’s going on and you have help readily available if you need assistance or have a question. With an implementation team, your virtual desktops are up and running quickly and you can be confident that they perform properly (or will be quickly fixed).

On-Going Support

Virtual desktops are technology and no technology works correctly 100% of the time. But desktops are vital business tools (many employees literally can’t work without them) and if they experience an issue it needs to be resolved quickly. If you’re outsourcing virtual desktops, there is only so much your in-house support team can do (and even then, only if they have access to monitoring and management tools). If a bigger issue occurs, your service provider will need to address it. This is easier said than done if the only access you have to service provider support is an anonymous support portal or a limited number of purchased support hours.

This creates a giant risk vacuum. You can’t afford for desktops to be inaccessible, so why would you rely on a service provider that won’t commit to actually helping when an issue occurs. With a dedicated DaaS team, you have a person to contact directly and a team that knows your environment. If there’s an issue, they’ll address it quickly and keep you updated about the process. If your use case needs change or evolve, you have someone to work with to adjust your environment so that it always fits your needs. When you choose a provider that offers dedicated service and support, it’s about creating a business partnership not just selling a product.