The Pitfalls of Do-It-Yourself IT

According to a 2020 survey performed by Infrascale, network downtime costs up to $50,000 per hour for SMBs. Yet, many small business owners choose to manage their own IT themselves. Overseeing your own IT brings with it a myriad of concealed costs and risks. In this article, we aim to illustrate how the alleged savings from DIY IT may in fact be an illusion.

Common Justifications for DIY IT

The most common reasons small business owners opt for DIY IT management are:

Perceived Cost Savings

Business owners often assume that handling IT tasks themselves, or delegating them to existing staff, will be less expensive than outsourcing to a professional service. They might see the upfront costs of managed IT services as unnecessary or excessive without considering the hidden and long-term costs associated with DIY IT management.

Desire for Control

Some business owners may feel that managing IT in-house allows them to make immediate decisions and changes without having to go through a third party. Alternatively, fears of data misuse, or concerns about responsiveness and service quality can drive business owners to keep IT management in-house. This desire for control can stem from past experiences with external providers or a belief that external services cannot fully understand the nuances of their business.

Belief in Internal Capabilities

Some small businesses might have employees who possess a certain level of IT skill, leading owners to believe that this internal capability is sufficient for managing their IT needs. This belief can be reinforced if the business has not yet experienced significant IT-related problems or a high-severity incident.

Understanding the Pitfalls

In-house management of IT without an experienced team can lead to:

Lost Opportunity and Focus

Running a small business demands your attention in multiple areas. If you opt to handle your IT, you’re dedicating crucial hours to a task that might not be your specialty. This is time you could allocate towards crucial business development, engaging with customers, or strategic planning. For professional services firms, this also means a loss of billable hours.

Technical Debt

Technology changes rapidly. Not keeping up with technology can result in inefficient systems, decreased productivity, and a worsening security posture – a build up of “technical debt” which can compound into significant future costs and delays. The longer the debt builds, the further behind the competition you will fall.

Security Risks

Many believe retail security suites combined with “basic common sense” are sufficient for protection. To cyber criminals, businesses are more valuable targets than your home network – businesses have more valuable data and deeper pockets. Attacks are more sophisticated and frequent as a result. A continuously monitored endpoint protection suite is necessary to keep ahead of evolving cyber threats.

Failing Backups

One common problem we often see with internally-managed data backups is a lack of reliability and consistency. Backups must be monitored and periodically tested to ensure they are working properly. Nothing is worse than having to go to your backups and discovering they have been silently failing for months or worse, years. Most companies that suffer crippling data loss do not survive.

Business Reputation

IT infrastructure involves more than just hardware. It includes software, networking, and data storage. Improperly managed IT infrastructure can lead to recurrent system failure, potentially irritating both clients and personnel.

Don’t let your IT infrastructure lead to reduced customer trust and a damaged business reputation.

Practical Solutions for IT Management

Managed IT services offer comprehensive technology support. They don’t just fix problems - they prevent them by actively monitoring your systems. This proactive strategy saves you both time and stress.

With Highway 99’s Managed IT Services, expert help is always a phone call or an email away, eliminating the need to search through online forums or wait for automated chatbots. This means you get direct, human support when you need it most.