How DayBlink Consulting supported a transition of IT services away from a sole managed outsourced service provider
Read the full case study here: Managed Service Provider Technology Transition Support
Introduction
A major Energy & Utilities organization faced a critical inflection point in the management of its IT operations. For years, the company had relied on a single, monolithic Managed Service Provider (MSP) to deliver the entirety of its IT services. This included complex and interdependent domains such as application management (with more than 100 applications), network and infrastructure, cloud, security, IT service management (ITSM), resiliency services, and IT vendor management. As industry trends shifted toward agility and cost-efficiency, the limitations of this one-size-fits-all outsourced model limited organizational growth and performance.
Problem
An expiring contract left the client with only four months to plan and transition seven major service areas
With the organization’s MSP contract approaching its termination, leadership made the strategic decision to move to a hybrid operating model. This model would blend repatriated internal IT capabilities with a new ecosystem of specialized vendors, allowing the organization to retain control over strategic services while outsourcing commoditized or volume-heavy tasks. The selection of new vendors took longer than expected, resulting in a shortened window to execute the transition. Only four months remained to transition from the incumbent—a fraction of the time typically allocated for projects of this scale and complexity.
The condensed timeline posed major risks. The organization sought to avoid disruptions to critical business systems, and integrate disparate internal and external teams. Given the volume and scope of the transition, the organization recognized the need for external expertise to structure and manage the program effectively. They engaged DayBlink Consulting to provide comprehensive program leadership and transitional support.
Solution
Our Team guided the Technology Organization through a seamless transition from the monolithic operating model into new hybrid operating approach
DayBlink Consulting was brought on board to design and execute a structured transition plan capable of meeting the aggressive four-month timeline. The team began by conducting a rapid current-state assessment, identifying the unique challenges, risks, and requirements associated with each IT service domain. With that foundation in place, DayBlink Consulting developed granular, workstream-specific roadmaps that outlined details across five key phases: Planning, Knowledge Transfer, Shadow, Reverse Shadow and Go-Live.
Each roadmap was tailored to the individual characteristics of the service domain it addressed. For example, in Application Management, special attention was paid to knowledge transfer processes for over 100 applications, many of which had limited documentation or operational history. In Security and Network Management, emphasis was placed on ensuring proper access provisioning, threat intelligence, and monitoring capabilities. Across Cloud and Infrastructure, DayBlink coordinated management migration activities, monitored platform performance, and validated system integrations. In addition to each of the domain-specific plans, a significant number of dependency mapping sessions were conducted to identify areas of support across the new service owners, and ensuring the order of operations was considered given the forced timeline. For example, the service catalog for each application had to be transitioned to the new vendor prior to the reverse shadow phase so the new operator received customer requests.
To manage complexity and ensure accountability, DayBlink Consulting implemented a robust governance model that aligned stakeholders from the internal IT organization, the outgoing MSP, and the incoming vendors. This included daily standups with service leaders, weekly program status updates and tracking, weekly domain-specific meetings, bi-weekly operational committee discussions, the detailed management of a RAID log, and clearly defined ownership for all tasks and milestones.
A critical part of the transition framework was the facilitation of discussions and then removal of gating mechanisms between phases. Before any service could proceed from one phase to the next, specific readiness criteria had to be met. For instance, during the transition from Shadow to Reverse Shadow (where the new team took over operations while the incumbent team observed), DayBlink facilitated formal sign offs from all stakeholders to confirm that knowledge transfer was complete, operational tools were configured, and access rights had been appropriately reassigned.
DayBlink Consulting also played a central role in organizational communication and change management. The team supported the design and delivery of internal communications, including IT town halls, vendor engagement sessions, and detailed go-live notifications. This ensured that both IT staff and broader business stakeholders remain informed, aligned, and confident throughout the transition.
As different services and tools were brought live on a staggered basis, DayBlink Consulting coordinated hyper-care activities. These included real-time issue logging, triage and resolution tracking, validation testing, war room quarterbacking, and feedback loops with end users. Hypercare ensured that any early-stage issues were addressed rapidly and that long-term service stability could be achieved.
DayBlink also brought subject-matter expertise to key areas of need such as service management, operations & governance, and identity & access management, strengthening the organization’s ability to execute a successful transition and to prepare for long-term operational success.
Outcome
Helped successfully hit the aggressive 4 month schedule, compared to over a year for the previous transition & triage
DayBlink Consulting’s structured approach, collaborative leadership, and subject-matter depth allowed the organization to achieve a seamless and on-time transition of all seven critical IT service domains—an outcome that represented a major success for the company given its historical challenges with large-scale vendor transitions.
The program’s staggered go-live strategy allowed for a smooth transition across domains without overwhelming internal resources or introducing systemic risk. This incremental approach also provided flexibility to refine operational processes in real-time, resulting in a significantly de-risked termination event with the incumbent MSP.
Most notably, the entire transition was completed within the compressed four-month timeline, and no major hyper-care issues were reported following the go-lives. The effectiveness of the transition allowed the organization to avoid more than $1 million in anticipated budget overruns (~5% of the transition budget), which had originally been earmarked for extended vendor support and issue remediation.
The internal organization emerged from the program more resilient, informed, and in control of its operations. The hybrid op model offered greater flexibility, cost-efficiency, and service quality, while reducing the risk of over-reliance on any single vendor. Furthermore, the new governance model and clearly defined service ownership structure positioned the company for continuous improvement across its IT landscape.