Typically, the word "consultant" brings to mind someone who is experienced and highly skilled, and capable of providing accurate, high-level advice in their chosen field.

This is exactly what we mean at Quest when we talk about consulting:  expertise.   Our consultants are, without any doubt, among the very best in their field.  Whereas many IT consulting firms merely accelerate new university graduates through an MCSE training program, and then send them out as consultants, we see certification as merely the starting point along a very long path to expertise.  All Quest consultants have years and years of field experience, and a track record of superior achievement.

Strategic Consulting Services

With its Strategic Consulting Services, Quest combines a business analytical perspective with a deep understanding of the underlying technology, to deliver advice that can be used by senior management to make sound ICT decisions.  Some examples include:

	Strategic Guidance We can help Senior ICT staff make their important systems decisions.  This can mean a costs/benefit analysis of migrating to Windows 2000, or an ROI analysis of an Exchange 2000 migration.  We can help write and review requests for proposal (RFP's).  We can discuss trends in the Microsoft server world, and how a company could benefit from new technology initiatives.  We can evaluate business risks, and suggest solutions that can provide the appropriate high availability and recoverability for the enterprise.
	Security Let us evaluate your security architecture.  This includes your physical security, procedures, as well as your network architecture & systems configuration.  We can check the configuration of your company's firewall, and we can deliver expertise on 3rd party tools that can help keep your network secure.  We will investigate and recommended changes.  Note that we do NOT do penetration testing, or any other sort of paid cracking (e.g., social engineering tests).
	Technical Partnering This is similar to Strategic Guidance, however with a technical and not a strategic focus.  Here we're meeting with IT technical staff directly, instead of the senior IT management.  For example, perhaps your firm needs help assembling a project plan for a migration project.  Maybe you want help designing your W2K forest or Active Directory architecture.  Maybe you'd like to learn about clustering or load balancing, or hear about Exchange 2000 best practices.  The company sets the rules and we deliver the knowledge.  Ask about our one-day, fully-customised, interactive technology workshops.

Specialised Consulting Services

For its Specialised Consulting Services, Quest delivers cutting-edge, focused technical know-how across the entire spectrum of Microsoft .NET server products. Some examples include:

Problem Resolution Here we are helping your ICT staff solve a specific problem with a production environment.  You describe the symptoms to a Quest systems engineer, over the phone or (for complicated problems) in person.  Once we diagnose the problem, we can either fix the problem on a Time and Materials basis, or provide a detailed procedure (taking into account hardware and software requirements, possible risks, and any business interruption that might result) for you to resolve the issue yourself.

Systems Analysis This category refers to a broad range of services that are aimed at solving problems with your network before they occur.  Quest Consultants can examine your server environment for misconfigurations, which can be introducing needless risks, negatively impacting performance, or leaving your firm open to unnecessary security problems.  This can be as simple as a yearly Health Check of your systems, or as elaborate as availability or recoverability tests.  We can also perform a full inventory of your server hardware, with an eye toward systems migration requirements.

Migration & Configuration Quest Consultants can offer experienced technical staff as resources to help your team perform a systems migration or server installation project.  Perhaps you would like an unattended installation procedure developed.  Maybe you need some servers installed & configured or migrated.  Maybe you need help rolling out a few hundred workstations.  You simply buy a certain number of consultant days, time and materials, and you direct the work.  Deliverables are determined by the client, however you always have the full resources of Quest Consultants behind any of our on-site staff.