EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

Determining how to rightsize your IT department is tricky, especially for small-to-medium sized businesses (SMBs). Compounding the challenge is the difficulty in finding and keeping IT staff with adequate cybersecurity experience. Seventy-three percent of US-based IT teams regard themselves as understaffed, although whether that’s due to the talent shortage, the inability to afford employees, or both, remains unclear.

SMBs can secure just enough talent, without overrunning budget lines or scrimping on security by zeroing in on  IT needs that must be met in-house, as compared to IT needs that could be taken care of remotely.

Of course, mission-critical tasks and long-term projects should be kept at least partially in-house, giving senior management the opportunity to check progress and weigh in on developments.

Beyond keeping costs to a minimum, a major advantage to handing select projects to third-party consultants or analysts is that when your team pushes out new functions and features, third-parties can offer ideas and complementary product suggestions that weren’t previously on your radar. This can improve your team’s final product.

For benchmarking purposes, recent research shows that only 42% of small businesses and 55% of mid-sized businesses rely on full-time, in-house IT support. Is more outsourcing the right solution for your business?

Find out what else to consider as you redesign your IT structure. Check out this article from Hewlett Packard Enterprise.