Implementing ITAM Software: Moving Beyond Excel

Many organizations begin managing their IT assets using Excel due to its familiarity. However, as the number of assets grows, Excel’s limitations start to hold you back and create additional hassle.

In this blog post, we go through why moving from Excel to real IT Asset Management (ITAM) software is important and share our tips on how to ensure successful implementation.

Why you should replace Excel with ITAM Software?

More Assets, More Manual Work
Excel struggles with a large number of assets as it is not designed to work as an asset inventory. Adding data often means adding new columns, which can make the Excel file heavy and unwieldy.

Besides that, Excel does not provide any smart automations, reminders, or integrations, so everything needs to be managed manually.

Outdated Data and Errors
Keeping the device inventory up-to-date and maintaining more than 10 columns in Excel can be very time-consuming. Manual data entry in Excel often leads to human errors that make asset management harder for everyone.

Mistakes can be costly; a lost device may pose security risks, and a device forgotten in storage will lose its value quite fast.

Access Management Limits
It is not uncommon for someone to accidentally delete an entire Excel file or the wrong rows. At first glance, managing access to Excel may seem easy, but it becomes increasingly challenging when you need to limit visibility to specific information. On top of that having multiple people use the same Excel file often leads to a mess.

How to succeed in implementing ITAM software?

Moving from Excel to ITAM is easy. With these simple tips, you can quickly transfer a large inventory from Excel to your new ITAM software.

Start with a Plan:
Make a clear plan that includes:

• When things will happen
• What needs to be done
• Who will do it

In some cases it is also good to involve people outside of your IT. They can help you to prepare the data and you can share some of the administrative work.

Prepare the Data:
Getting your data ready is important because it will be the foundation of your new ITAM software. Look at what data you already have and make sure you’re not missing anything important in your Excel files. It is common for items like docks or expensive headphones to be missing from the inventory.

Moving your data to the ITAM software is usually easy if it’s already set up in Excel. Most ITAM tools have a simple way to import the data.

User Rights and Login:
After moving the data, think about what access each user should have. In the best scenario, everyone can see their own devices. This cuts down on how much work IT has to do and reduces unnecessary questions.

Set Up Automations:
Now that you’re done moving away from Excel, spend some time setting up automations. These can make your work a lot easier and avoid unnecessary hassle. Typically it is best practice to integrate your IT asset data with the unified endpoint management solution that you are using. Software like Microsoft Intune, VMware Workspace One, Google Workspace Endpoint Manager, and Miradore are examples of such software.

With the UEM tool integrated, ITAM software can automate a lot of the work for example the following:

• Receive notifications for device creation, updates, location changes, and deletions. You can for example be notified every time the user of a device is changed.
• Notifications if device is non-compliant or when a device is unused or borrowed. You can for example get notified whenever an asset is left unused for over 30 days.
• Alerts when a device’s user is no longer with the company but is still marked as the device user.
• Notifications for warranty expiry, leasing contract ending and exceeded operating times.

(Extra) Procurement Features:
If your ITAM software has features for procurement, start using them right away. In the future, all new devices will automatically be registered into the system, and in some solutions, you can even allow your employees to order the new devices by themselves.

Did you know that IDR combines procurement, asset management, and recycling. If you want to learn more read more here.