Standard Operating Environment SOE

Outsourcing the management of your operating environment to an experienced standard operating environment SOE provider can deliver a range of benefits.

Working with an external partner provides companies with access to more vendors and experience, allowing organisations to have mixed vendor fleets if they choose to. A mixed fleet can bring ancillary benefits with it, primarily because when you create a competitive environment you can drive better commercial, technical and business outcomes. 

Outcome-based contracts with external providers also ensure that the enterprise is able to achieve the required performance for a fixed fee during the contract length. This mitigates the increasing cost of staff year on year and removes the need to train staff to ensure that they are skilled in the latest resources and security needs.



The workplace is no longer the place where workers go to work. This fact alone is reason to assess support and services across the entire organisation and carefully examine where the most value is to be gained based on current activities and costs. The proliferation of devices per user, the rise of remote work and the shift of where work now lives creates an even greater headache for IT that can be well addressed by outsourcing device fleet management to a provider that can handle everything including the SOE.

Standard Operating Environment SOE Service

Outdated approaches to infrastructure design, management, and operation can prevent companies from effectively and efficiently delivering the services their business needs. A standard operating environment (SOE) service lets organisations simplify and modernise their infrastructure and operations for reduced costs, higher uptime, and improved flexibility, security, and productivity.

A Standard Operating Environment SOE is a specific operating system and collection of software that a company’s IT team defines as the standard build. SOEs provide a solid foundation for repeatable, reliable, predictable IT infrastructure and systems. They basically ensure that all your computers are as similar as possible.

With SOEs, IT teams can automate the deployment and maintenance of end user computing devices. With fully automated provisioning, applications can be deployed faster and with fewer errors. Then, when systems are online, an SOE helps ensure consistent and timely patching and other maintenance.

On the resource side, SOE work is up and down. If you have a dedicated SOE team, you likely find they are often very busy at some points and then not utilised at others- a cost many businesses cannot afford right now.

SOE requires a highly specialised set of skills and expertise, and good SOE managers are a scarce resource. 

SOE takes significant effort to get right and stay right. It’s not easy to enforce a set of standards in a completely airtight way, especially in large scale environments. The deeper the SOE definition, the more hands-on effort is required to test, select and maintain the standard, the broader the extent of the SOE, the more effort is required.

Outsourcing the management of your operating environment is the future of efficient, effective IT.

Standard Operating Environment SOE Solutions

Standard Operating Environment (SOE) solutions offer a number of  benefits for companies that are looking to streamline their operations, enhance security, and improve overall efficiency. 

Firstly, SOE simplifies the management of IT infrastructure by standardising software and hardware configurations across all devices within an organisation. This standardisation reduces compatibility issues and simplifies troubleshooting, leading to significant time and cost savings for IT departments.

Secondly, SOE enhances security by ensuring that all devices are equipped with the latest security patches and updates. This reduces the risk of cyberattacks and data breaches, which can be costly and damaging to an organisation’s reputation.

SOE can also improve productivity by providing employees with a consistent and familiar computing environment. This reduces the time spent adapting to different systems and allows employees to focus more on their work.

In addition, SOE facilitates compliance with regulatory requirements by ensuring that all devices are configured in accordance with relevant standards and guidelines.

Work with ThingsAt to implement a Standard Operating Environment solution for your business and enjoy a more efficient, secure, and productive organisation.