If you have IT asset management software deployed within your organization (particularly if it’s Express Software Manager!), be sure to participate in the ITAM Review’s 2010 Tools Census, an independent analysis of ITAM technologies.  It takes less than 5 minutes to complete:

Take the 2010 Tools Census Now

According to Martin Thompson, creator of the survey, “Published results will be anonymised–individual responses will be in the strictest confidence.”

You can view early results of the census here.

Over the last few months, I’ve come across several LinkedIn Groups with great discussions taking place about asset management technology and best practices.  The “IT Asset Management – Global” Group (3,500+ members), the “Software Asset Management” Group (1,500+ members), and the newer “ITAM Review” Group (400 members) have some illuminating posts (and at times, heated debate) regarding such topics as software recognition databases, asset discovery, license reconciliation, and software tagging, to name just a few. 

If you’re a LinkedIn member, be sure to join these groups to access and weigh in on the discussions.  If you’re not a registered member, it may be worth taking five minutes to do so.

I’ve been following Martin Thompson’s blog, the ITAM Review, with great interest since its inaugural post in November of 2008.  Martin’s approach to blogging is a refreshing departure from most blogs covering the discipline of IT asset management—its content is exceptionally wide-ranging, relevant, thoroughly researched, and perhaps most importantly, vendor-agnostic (gasp!).  It’s a resource I rely on to augment my knowledge about ITAM and to make sure I don’t succumb to the temptation, as a marketing professional, to close my mind to information or viewpoints that don’t necessarily align with my company’s philosophy or interests. For all these reasons, the ITAM Review has been instructional as we went about developing our own blog, and for that, we owe Martin a debt of gratitude.

The ITAM Review recently celebrated its first anniversary since launching, so it seemed the perfect time to feature Martin on our own blog.  The following is an interview I conducted with him in order to recognize the great work he’s doing and to encourage our readers to check out his blog as well.  Thanks Martin! 

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This just in:  One of our customers recently completed a product review of our asset management software, Express Software Manager, version 9.0.  The evaluation was submitted to the ITAM Review and is, according to Martin Thompson, the highest end-user score received to date (90%).  Terrific!

The end-user customer is an environmental engineering firm with an estate size of roughly 580 machines (27% desktops, 60% laptops, and 13% servers).

Read the entire Express Software Manager review here.

To the customer who completed the review:  Many thanks for taking the time, and for helping raise Express Metrix’s visibility in a very competitive market. 

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Part 1) The Great Debate

Having read (and responded to) comments to Martin Thompson’s recent blog post about the pros and cons of using agent-based IT asset management technology, I felt compelled to articulate my perspective on the subject.  It’s a topic that seems to generate a fair share of controversy, and although I may live to regret stirring the pot (novice blogger that I am), I believe the arguments in favor of agent-based technology have been generally under-represented, poorly understood, and, in my opinion, often unjustly maligned.  Specifically, some of the advantages of installing a client (such as the ability to communicate with a central server on a regular basis, collect software metering data, etc.) have given rise to an exaggerated claim that agents are, by definition, “invasive,” and therefore, by extension, inherently “flawed.”

So in this series of posts I plan to represent the “other half” of IT asset management professionals who actively choose agent-based technology.  As part of this, I’ll do my best to dispel some of the myths surrounding agent-less technology that occasionally lead to political and organizational arguments against deploying solutions that, in many cases, are more apt to deliver the kind of business value that’s being sought. 

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