IT Multi-Sourcing: How to Manage Your Vendors

In every well-run IT department, there’s one person who rarely appears on the organizational chart. The person who calls the network and security provider before the trouble ticket has even been created. Who doesn’t care whose responsibility it formally is and brings the right people together in the same channel. Who acts as the hub connecting the various vendors.

If this sounds familiar, this post is for you. Because what you do has a name: you’re leading the way. Moreover, our experience—after eleven years as specialists in networking and security—shows that this is exactly how you should lead modern IT sourcing. The question, however, is whether you have the right orchestra—and the right mandate—to be able to do so to the fullest extent.

The short answer:

IT multi-sourcing means dividing the delivery among specialized providers instead of entrusting everything to a single full-service provider. The model works best like an orchestra: the business holds the baton as the conductor, and each specialist is handpicked for their instrument. The benefits include deeper expertise when incidents occur, and the freedom to replace a single instrument—not the entire orchestra—when something no longer measures up.

An orchestra beats a one-man band

Think about what you’ve already procured: operations, networks and security, telephony, and applications. This involves a broad range of expertise, with each supplier chosen because they’re the best in their field. It’s no coincidence that this is the case. On the contrary, it’s a strength.

The alternative is a company that promises to take care of “everything.” It sounds reassuring on paper. But no one is the best at everything, and when something unusual happens, it shows: a technician who only encounters this type of problem a few times a year has to start troubleshooting from scratch.

The specialist has seen this before—often within the same week, in a different setting. That’s why the specialist can pinpoint a problem quickly and efficiently, while the generalist is still ruling out possibilities. We’ve compared the depth of expertise across platforms and partners before, in “HPE Networking vs. Cisco: What Does Gartner Say, and What Does Reality Show?”

So no. Having multiple players isn’t the problem. It’s a prerequisite for a really good team. What matters is how the team plays.

The Conductor: The Role That Brings the Orchestra to Life

An orchestra without a conductor is still made up of skilled musicians. But it is the baton that brings them together as a whole.

In IT delivery, the role of a conductor entails three specific things:

You set the pace. Priorities are based on the business, not on whichever vendor happens to shout the loudest.
You decide who does what and when. When an incident occurs, you immediately bring together the right expertise, rather than waiting for the issue of responsibility to resolve itself.
You can tell when something isn’t in sync. Regular check-ins with each supplier—and with several of them in the same room—reveal friction long before it becomes a problem.

More and more of our customers have realized the value of outsourcing certain responsibilities to specialists while keeping this particular role in-house—often with a key person. It’s a wise division of labor: the orchestra can be outsourced, but the conductor must remain in-house.

Insist that your teammates take an active role

But a conductor is only as good as the orchestra’s willingness to listen. And this is where the real difference between providers lies: the passive versus the active role during an incident. The passive provider waits for the issue to be reported, responds within the SLA timeframe, and then goes silent. You have to chase down status updates yourself, right in the middle of an ongoing outage.

The proactive vendor is the first to reach out. This is how we handle incidents: we always let you know that we’re working on the issue, what we’ve observed, and when you can expect to hear from us next—even before we have a solution. Silence breeds anxiety. Proactive communication creates a calm working environment—for you and for the rest of the orchestra. Furthermore, a proactive vendor steps in to troubleshoot even when the fault may lie with someone else—to help you, the conductor, move forward, not to cover their own back.

Ask your suppliers this question: What do you do in the event of an incident that I don’t have to ask you to do? The answer will show whether you have a partner or just a contractual counterpart.

Change one instrument—not the whole orchestra

Here’s perhaps the biggest advantage of multi-sourcing—and it’s rarely mentioned in procurement processes. With a single-source supplier, everything is tied together. If you’re dissatisfied with one part of the delivery, in practice you have to replace everything at once. It’s a project so large that most people would rather just put up with it. That dissatisfaction becomes a fixed cost.

With an orchestra of specialists, you can swap out one instrument at a time. Is the security service not working? Replace it—the network and operations keep running. The result is that you can always have the right person in the right place, without every change turning into a revolution. That’s a level of flexibility that a comprehensive contract can never offer, no matter how extensive it is.

Frequently asked questions

What is multi-sourcing in IT?

Multi-sourcing means that IT services are divided among several specialized providers—for example, one for operations, one for networking and security, and one for applications—rather than relying on a single full-service provider. The business retains control of the coordination, much like a conductor leads an orchestra.

Who should coordinate the suppliers in a multi-sourcing model?

The Client. Responsibility and execution can be outsourced to specialists, but the role of coordinator—including setting priorities, determining the pace, and maintaining a holistic view—should be handled internally, often by a designated key person with the authority to bring the suppliers together.

What characterizes a good supplier in an IT multi-sourcing environment?

An active role: The supplier communicates proactively during incidents, participates in troubleshooting even when the fault may lie with another party, and collaborates with other suppliers rather than focusing solely on contractual boundaries.

Isn’t it easier to have one provider handle everything?

It’s easier to contract out, but you’ll have less in-depth expertise in each area, and you’ll have to replace everything at once the day you’re dissatisfied. With specialists, you only replace the part that doesn’t meet the standard.