Smartdesc was founded by Chris Cranie and Adam Monks in 2011 in response to feedback from charities and non-profit organisations about the varying levels of service – and general lack of a proactive partnership ethos – they were receiving from their suppliers.
Chris and Adam had both worked at charities themselves, and experienced this problem first hand.
They built Smartdesc around the core principle of bringing IT Strategy and Leadership into organisations that lacked this expertise. Sharing best practice from large charities for the benefit of all in the sector, and structuring account management to give customers ringfenced and ad-hoc time with our technology experts is a key priority and differentiator.
Helping charities co-author their IT Strategies, or draw up Technology Roadmaps together based on their staff’s requirements, or even simply helping prioritise where investment should be made over the next 12 months to make the biggest impact on organisational productivity – these conversations are at the heart of our mission, and always will be.
Since day 1 Smartdesc has worked relentlessly to go above and beyond service expectations. The vision has always been to offer charities and not for profit organisations higher levels of IT support and proactive customer care than they receive elsewhere, whilst keeping overheads low to enable cost-savings to be passed on at every opportunity.
Approach
The approach proved extremely successful and in August 2012, Smartdesc became a Limited Company.
Since then, Smartdesc has grown to over 65 staff across 2 countries.
Our sole focus remains the charity sector, and we have maintained an exceptionally high level of client retention (over 98%).
We are proud to retain an excellent customer feedback level, and our IT Health Scorecard framework is helping dozens of charities of all shapes and sizes to visualise and understand what their IT Strategy looks like.
With our expert guidance and trusted advice, we are able to hold genuinely proactive relationships that add real value to these organisations.
We are seen as the IT Department for our customers, and that mindset epitomises why charities value working with us as partners, and our reputation spreads across the sector through word of mouth and referrals.
