Managed 365: Taking the pain out of managing your Microsoft 365

By Matt Fooks, VCG’s Head of Microsoft & Cloud Services

Microsoft 365 is a suite of cloud-based productivity tools and services designed to enhance collaboration, communication, and efficiency within organisations. But let’s be honest – managing all its features, updates, and security can be a real headache.

Many businesses find that it takes more time and expertise than they possess to keep everything running smoothly:

“Managing Microsoft 365 takes up time our teams don’t have”

“We need to meet strict compliance standards but are unsure how to get this configured and managed in Microsoft 365”

“Keeping on top of the changes and the Microsoft 365 roadmap is a luxury we don’t have”

Whether you’re a small business or a large enterprise, the benefits of adopting Microsoft Managed 365 are undeniable.

In this blog, Matt Fooks, explores the challenges businesses face when managing Microsoft 365, and how VCG’s Microsoft 365 as a managed service can help you.

1. Getting the most from your Microsoft 365 investment

Microsoft 365 is a great investment. However, since it’s not free, businesses must make the most out of their investment. We see many businesses with access to some great technologies and features within Microsoft 365, but haven’t yet deployed them or are using a third-party product that could easily be replaced by a 365 feature.

There was a time when Microsoft wasn’t a security player and let’s be honest their anti-virus product that shipped with Windows operating systems was poor at best. That seems like a long time ago now, and the Windows security centre (Windows Defender) is considered one of the best tools available. Gone are the days when a third-party anti-virus product was necessary. Microsoft has pivoted from being a software provider focused on office apps and Windows operating systems to becoming a major leader in security and artificial intelligence. If someone had travelled back in time 12 years and told their younger self this prediction, they would have laughed! However, the world has moved on, and that is who Microsoft is now. This is part of the reason why product sets like Microsoft 365 are seen as a great bundle of products that can help almost every part of a business

2. Making the changes

Microsoft 365 has many great benefits to businesses. However, it leaves IT staff with a lot to manage and maintain. Also, with these solutions being “evergreen” they are always evolving, meaning great new services and features are being introduced. This is great but also means more to manage and in ways which are different to the previous products. At times this has led to tenants being poorly maintained, features not enabled, and in some cases left unsecured and wide open to exploitation.

Looking today, there are over 1700 updates within the Microsoft 365 roadmap. That’s a large number of changes happening now or being scheduled for the future. Reviewing these alone takes time. Our Managed 365 service means you don’t have to, our Microsoft 365 expert engineers will review each one and flag any important changes or features that are coming.

3. Security

Tenant Security

The default configuration with Microsoft 365 can leave organisations open to vulnerabilities or data oversharing. You don’t want just anyone sharing information or inviting guests to your tenant?

VCG uses best practice baselines that configure your tenant so it’s secure and enhanced for maximum productivity. The good thing here is that we guide our customer through the process, matching the right configuration to their security posture.

Device Security

User devices are essential for the organisation’s productivity. However, if un-secured they can leave an organisation vulnerable and exposed.

Managed 365 ensures devices are secured and managed. We utilise Intune to create rigorous policies that protect the devices but don’t impact your users from getting their job done. This service also covers device updates such as operating system patches and updates. Ensuring that your devices also meet compliance and reduce the exposure to un-patched vulnerabilities.

VCG manages Intune, Entra ID, and Defender for you and ensures that devices are safe and meet your security requirements.

User Security

Ensuring users are secure is essential. After all, it’s our users that plug in USB sticks with malware or click on that web link that infects their machine with Ransomware.

Our Managed 365 service significantly enhances identity security by configuring and managing features within Entra ID and Microsoft Defender. By implementing robust security policies and best practices we improve password security, web security, and email security features to reduce these risks.

Data Security

Ensuring that important documents, whether financial, intellectual property, or files that hold personal identifiable information, stay where they are intended can be difficult. Luckily, as you’ve probably guessed we can assist with this as well.

We elevate your data security by configuring and managing Purview Data Protection technologies. These innovative tools help safeguard sensitive information by enforcing data handling policies, performing automated risk assessments, and ensuring regulatory compliance. Our proactive management includes setting up data classification, encryption, and loss prevention policies that protect your organisation’s data from unauthorised access and breaches, while still allowing seamless access for authorised users to maintain productivity.

App Security

Maintaining the security of client applications presents numerous challenges, including the constant need for updates and patches to combat emerging threats, the risk of vulnerabilities being exploited during deployment, and ensuring that all applications comply with the latest security standards and regulations. Without proper management, these challenges can lead to significant security breaches, data loss, and decreased productivity.

Cyber Essentials mandates apps are updated within a 14 day period. This can be problematic when some organisation don’t know what apps are out there on end-user devices. Added to this is the challenge that some apps update on opening, Zoom being an example of this. If your users only use Zoom occasionally you’re at risk of having vulnerable apps and failing Cyber Essentials Plus.

We manage our client applications for you. Managing the deployment and updating of them. Maintaining an app store of thousands of Windows and Mac apps, we are able to deploy a user an app within minutes.

4. End-to-end platform management

We have only covered the tip of the iceberg in this article. Microsoft 365 does a lot and can save you money in 3rd party tools, improve security, improve compliance, increase productivity and manage the ever-evolving raft of changes.

When selecting with us as your MSP, we will improve your business and:

• Manage your tenant
• Manage devices
• Manage your apps
• Manage your Microsoft 365 security, responding to alerts and incidents
• Manage your users, Exchange mailboxes, shared mailboxes, distribution lists and Email security
• Manage SharePoint, OneDrive, Teams’ policies and settings
• Ensure you get value for your investment

Why choose us to manage Your M365 product estate?

The VCG Care Managed 365 service takes care of your tenant. VCG manages the day-to-day operations, as well as ensuring that the devices, apps, users, and critical services are maintained and secured.

Our VCG Managed 365 service is designed by qualified Microsoft 365 expert architects to maximise your investment in Microsoft 365. Our skilled team use tried and tested tools and standard operating procedures to ensure your Microsoft 365 environment is managed securely and optimally to give your organisations staff the best possible experience.

For more information get in touch with the team at cloud@vcg.group