Technology in the 21st Century changes more rapidly than ever, and if small-business owners aren’t careful, they can end up spending all of their time putting out fires, updating equipment and worrying about security threats. Small businesses may find it difficult to support the cost of a full IT department to handle their IT management.

“Assembly required” is always a nerve wracking statement when we are making a purchase. Exactly how much assembly are we talking about here? It is hard to tell whether there are two pieces or 200 pieces to assemble, until the package is home and fully unwrapped. Even in circumstances in which an item comes fully intact, it is rare when anything is fully functional straight out of the box. As much as we would like to believe that commodity items should simply work, they don’t. It is a difference in expectations, which can be frustrating to say the least. When considering ways to improve IT infrastructure, any "assembly required" can be costly.

You’ve heard the cliché: “The greater the risk, the greater the reward.” While that is a popular creed among venture capitalists and entrepreneurial businesses, most presidents and CEOs of small businesses prefer a sound program for managing capital expenditures, one that balances the fiscal risk of investment in business technology with a safe ROI.

How many business owners are familiar with the intricacies of small business IT infrastructure? Many business owners understand the results they want, but they don't have the time to properly analyze their IT infrastructure. They set their focus on business growth and relationship development, often ignoring the risks associated with having poor IT services.

There is a common misconception among small business IT support professionals about solving IT problems. Many believe that they can fix any issue by identifying which hardware or software is out of date and then update it, or if they’re not virtualized, they just go to the cloud. The reality is that these quick fixes only address the symptoms of a problem, not the root cause. To truly solve an IT problem, it’s important to put proactive planning methods into action.

Poor IT management can cost a company far more than the physical cost of maintaining IT services. It can impact and affect several areas of the company from payroll to human resources.  I have been working in IT for many years and have seen the IT business structure become reliant on reactive, instead of proactive, solutions. These are certainly not my ideas alone, but I have seen enough to believe that the problem is wide spread throughout many businesses.

What makes one IT managed services company stand out from the other 186,000 IT managed services companies?

In many ways, martial arts can be an appropriate metaphor for running a business. For example, there are probably hundreds of thousands of entry-level martial arts studios available for beginning students. It doesn’t really matter what martial art you decide to study, only that you get started and learn whether the art is right for you. However, as you grow in ability and dedication, you find that your needs sharpen and you need a higher level of expertise to guide you along the right path. You need a master.

I was talking to a business owner the other day who asked me “If I’m in the cloud, what do I need IT services for?” Inwardly, I groaned, because this is a question I’m hearing more often these days – and it represents a misunderstanding about the ‘magic’ of cloud services. The cloud is powerful, and has the ability to save companies thousands of dollars on things like the upkeep of a data center, but ultimately it’s just another deployment model. A deployment model with its own set of challenges, risks and questions that need answering.