IT Asset Management Challenges and How to Overcome Them

ITAM Challenges

While there are many benefits from IT asset management (ITAM) adoption, perhaps as part of an IT service management capability, organizations can still face challenges in implementing and maintaining effective ITAM practices. These common ITAM challenges are outlined below.

The common ITAM challenges

IT asset management challenges: Lack of visibility into IT assets

Many organizations struggle to maintain an accurate inventory of their IT assets. This issue is especially true in large, distributed environments. Here, the use of automated asset discovery and tracking tools helps organizations gain visibility into their IT environments and centralized asset management systems to consolidate asset data and ensure accurate reporting.

ITAM challenges: Software license non-compliance

Organizations can face difficulties in managing software licenses. This issue leads to non-compliance with vendor agreements and potential legal and financial risks. To help address this:

  • Regularly audit software licenses to ensure compliance
  • Use software metering tools to monitor usage
  • Maintain accurate records of licenses and entitlements.

ITAM challenges: Underutilization of IT assets

Inefficient asset utilization can result in unnecessary costs and waste. To help minimize this issue, analyze asset utilization data to identify underused assets and optimize their deployment. Reallocate or dispose of redundant assets and potentially implement a chargeback or showback model to promote responsible asset usage.

ITAM challenges: Difficulties managing the IT asset lifecycle

Standardize procedures for each stage and use ITAM tools to automate and streamline lifecycle management processes to help. Review asset performance and condition regularly to determine if and when assets need to be upgraded, replaced, or retired.

ITAM challenges: Integration with other IT management processes.

A lack of integration between ITAM and other IT processes, such as ITSM, leads to:

A unified IT management platform will help mitigate these issues and provide a holistic view of the IT environment.

Practical tips for enhancing ITAM capabilities

Some common ITAM capabilities help to address the challenges detailed above. These capabilities can be best understood through the following practical tips:

Tackling ITAM challenges: Embracing ITAM automation

Employing ITAM tools and automation will help:

  • streamline ITAM processes
  • reduce manual effort
  • improve accuracy.

For example, automated asset discovery, tracking, and reporting capabilities provide real-time insights into the IT environment and help identify asset optimization opportunities.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Audits

Conducting regular IT asset audits to help:

  • Ensure compliance
  • Identify underutilized or redundant assets
  • Assess asset performance.

These audits help organizations to detect asset inventory discrepancies and prevent potential asset-related issues.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Collaboration

Fostering asset-related collaboration with other corporate functions such as finance, procurement, and legal. This collaboration helps ensure IT asset use is best aligned with business needs and managed effectively.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Being proactive

Adopting a proactive approach to ITAM that involves:

  • Anticipating future needs
  • Planning for asset replacements and upgrades
  • Addressing potential asset risks before they become critical issues.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Training people

Providing employees with ongoing training and education on ITAM policies, procedures, and best practices. This helps raise awareness and promote a responsible IT asset management culture.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Exploiting data

Utilizing data analytics for decision-making – gaining insights into asset:

  • Usage
  • Performance
  • Costs

This helps organizations optimize IT asset management strategies, identify cost-saving opportunities, and improve asset utilization.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Governance

Establishing a governance framework for ITAM to help ensure:

  • Accountability
  • Oversight
  • Continual improvement.

An effective ITAM governance framework will include the definition of roles and responsibilities (for ITAM governance), the establishment of an ITAM governance committee, and the implementation of key performance indicators (KPIs) to monitor corporate ITAM performance.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Asset recycling and disposal

Developing an asset recycling and disposal plan to help prevent data breaches and comply with environmental regulations. This activity involves creating a standardized process that encompasses data sanitization, secure disposal, or the recycling of IT assets.

Tackling ITAM challenges: Promoting responsible asset usage

Implementing a chargeback or showback model to promote responsible asset usage by allocating costs to departments based on asset consumption. It involves allocating IT asset costs to specific departments or business units based on usage metrics.

What would you add to this list of common IT asset management challenges? Please let me know in the comments.

Further Reading

Please use the website search capability to find other helpful ITSM and ITAM articles on topics such as making informed decisions, cost-effective operations, inventory management, IT asset management solutions, security risks, enabling strategic decisions, discovering existing assets, efficient and effective asset use, IT asset management processes, information technology management, how to monitor assets, removing time-consuming day-to-day tasks with automation, and cloud asset management tools.

Stephen Mann
Stephen Mann

Principal Analyst and Content Director at the ITSM-focused industry analyst firm ITSM.tools. Also an independent IT and IT service management marketing content creator, and a frequent blogger, writer, and presenter on the challenges and opportunities for IT service management professionals.

Previously held positions in IT research and analysis (at IT industry analyst firms Ovum and Forrester and the UK Post Office), IT service management consultancy, enterprise IT service desk and IT service management, IT asset management, innovation and creativity facilitation, project management, finance consultancy, internal audit, and product marketing for a SaaS IT service management technology vendor.

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