Automated IT Software: Essential Guide and Tips

IT teams today are swamped with so many processes that they’re often unable to dedicate necessary time to more complicated yet equally necessary tasks. With IT automation software, many of these processes can be streamlined, with the need for human intervention removed, allowing these experts to use their skills where they’re most needed.

1What is IT Automation Software?

IT automation software is a range of programs that help automate repetitive IT tasks, workflows, and processes with minimal human intervention. It integrates multiple components of business processes into cohesive automated workflows. The benefit is that it can handle more complex and variable workflows, enhancing operational speed and productivity.

IT automation is vital these days. It increases efficiency, reduces costs, provides faster response times, enhances scalability, and improves accuracy.

IT teams have specialized knowledge, yet if they’re bogged down with day-to-day processes, they cannot focus on things that benefit the business, such as new innovations, better strategies, more focused collaboration, and strengthened security.

Let’s have a look at this real-world example:

A financial services firm suffered as its IT team got caught up in routine tasks such as software updates, data backups, and incident management. This bogged them down and took their attention away from higher-level business needs. The team initiated an IT automation system, which streamlined many of these repetitive tasks.

The team reported a 30% reduction in these tasks, and they used that time to focus on strategic initiatives that would push the business ahead of its competitors.

Statistics

PriceWaterhouseCoopers predicts that by 2030, automation could potentially contribute up to $15 trillion to global GDP.

Finance companies are among the most process-heavy organizations, and employees spend three-quarters of their working time completing 80% of their tasks. Research suggests that 42% of all activities in these companies can be fully automated. If these tasks were automated, they could reduce day-to-day operations to approximately one-fifth of the time they usually take.

Amazon has automated many of its warehouse processes, resulting in a 50% increase in inventory capacity and a 20% reduction in operating costs.

2How to Choose IT Automation Service

There is a lot of automation IT software on the marketplace, and choosing the right one for your IT team isn’t straightforward. Some decisions need to be made before purchasing the product.

Here is a checklist of the most crucial criteria:

Assessing Needs
First, determine what form of IT automation will benefit the business. What processes are currently bogging down the IT team, and which ones can be automated? IT automation software covers a broad range of uses, so it’s crucial to determine the organization’s needs as the first step.

Features and Functionality
Automation IT software comes with loads of features, some of which may not be suitable for your organization. The best product begins with useful features and then lets you add others as the business matures or changes. Does the product need to provide reporting on top of other functions?

It also needs to be user-friendly. Many reviewers comment that some products in the range are not easy to set up or use and can be quite complex. IT teams need to be able to install and operate these platforms simply and efficiently.

Compatibility and Integration
There’s nothing more frustrating for an IT team than installing a new product only to find that it’s incompatible with existing products and, as a result, causes new faults to arise. The best IT automation tools need to work with current products and tools. When APIs are in use, compatibility errors are higher, and this needs to be investigated before a product is chosen.

Budget Considerations
IT automation platforms range from budget-friendly to overly expensive. The common complaint for some products is that they cost a lot and have too many features that aren’t ever required. The best product is the one that charges per feature or device, so the costs only increase when the organization’s needs do. The other thing to consider is the cost-saving benefit. If the final product costs more than the automation will save, then it may not be the right one for the business.

There are also after-sales support expenses to factor in. For example, is customer support included in the initial up-front fee, or is it an ongoing charge?

3Comparison Table of Top Automation IT Software

Here’s a quick comparison by category of the top automation IT software programs, including pricing, target audience, and recent G2 business review scores.

4Categories and Top IT Automation Tools List

Now, we’re going to take a look at the different categories for each type of IT automation software and a couple of options for each.

4.1 IT Operations and Monitoring Automation Software

Monitoring numerous endpoints in a business can be challenging and time-consuming. IT operations and monitoring automation software can keep tabs on every device in the organization from one central viewpoint. This allows for easy troubleshooting, software updates, and monitoring usage.

The benefits to an IT team are that issues can be identified in real-time and solved remotely, allowing for minimum downtime.

AirDroid Business

AirDroid Business is a unified endpoint management (UEM) platform that can monitor an organization's entire Android and Windows endpoints from one location. This allows IT staff to see what every device is doing at a glance.

AirDroid is considered as one of the best automation tools for IT infrastructure.

Nagios

Where AirDroid Business is ideal for organizations with Android and Windows devices that require monitoring, Nagios is more suited to larger companies that need to monitor their entire IT infrastructure. Nagios works across three operating systems: Linux, Windows, and Unix.

4.2 Security Automation Software

Many security tasks can be automated, provided the right software is installed. Processes like vulnerability scanning, threat detection, and compliance management can all be automated. This assists with protecting IT environments, managing risks, and ensuring compliance with regulations.

Qualys

Qualys is automated IT software ideal for businesses requiring an integrated approach to vulnerability management with strong risk assessment capabilities. It integrates with major cloud providers and is suitable for small to medium businesses as it’s very cost-effective. The downside is that its interface is feature-heavy and can be overwhelming to adjust to.

Tenable

On the other hand, Tenable excels in comprehensive vulnerability scanning with RBVM capabilities and has user-friendly interfaces. The challenge for smaller businesses is that Tenable is more expensive as pricing is based on the volume of IP addresses scanned.

4.3 IT Service Management (ITSM) Tools

IT departments get hit hard, with their massive workflows, sometimes their level of in-house support suffers. ITSM tools assist these departments in streamlining the delivery of IT services, handling of requests, managing incidents, and change management.

ServiceNow

ServiceNow is a comprehensive ITSM and IT operations management (ITOM) product. It’s ideal for large organizations with a busy IT department as it provides a comprehensive suite of applications for managing IT services and workflows. The downside is that while the user interface is highly customizable, it can appear quite complex. The other factor is that compared to the other two, it’s rather expensive.

Ivanti

Ivanti streamlines IT service delivery with an emphasis on asset management, making it an ideal choice for IT teams looking for a more integrated approach. It aims to help IT teams respond quickly to user needs while maintaining compliance and security. While the other two are cloud-based only, Ivanti offers on-premises options, too. Ivanti isn’t as feature-rich as ServiceNow and may not be robust enough for larger organizations.

GoTo Resolve

GoTo Resolve is an automated IT support solution that combines remote support, ticketing, and collaboration tools to enhance customer service and IT support efficiency. It’s known to be extremely user-friendly. The downside is that it’s not very customizable and focuses more on ticketing than broader ITSM processes.

4.4 Application Deployment and Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) Tools

Application deployment and CI/CD tools are a subset of IT staff duties primarily focused on automating the process of building, testing, and deploying applications.

Jenkins

Jenkins is an open-source automation server that facilitates the automation of software development processes. It’s been around for a long time, has a broad user base, and has over 1,700 plugins for various integrations and functionalities. The downsides are that its user interface is complex to set up and use, and users report performance issues with large pipelines.

GitLab

GitLab, on the other hand, is known for its fast performance with built-in caching. It’s a complete DevOps platform that integrates source code management with CI/CD capabilities. It’s an all-in-one solution for managing the entire software development lifecycle. It’s newer than Jenkins, doesn’t have as many features, and while it’s extremely user-friendly, it’s only moderately scalable, which means it may struggle with large projects.

4.5 Workflow Automation Tools

Workflow automation tools automate processes and workflows within IT environments, enabling better collaboration and efficiency across teams. They’re most helpful in streamlining repetitive IT tasks, freeing up IT staff to focus on more complex processes and projects.

Zapier

Zapier is a no-code automation platform that connects over 7,000 applications. IT staff can create automated workflows (called "Zaps") to streamline repetitive tasks. Zapier is best suited for users looking for straightforward automation solutions. Its weakness is that it’s not very customizable.

Microsoft Power Automate

Microsoft Power Automate is designed to automate workflows across Microsoft applications. It’s primarily designed to work with the Microsoft suite and an additional 550 third-party connectors. Microsoft Power Automate best suits businesses that are already heavily invested in Microsoft products.