The private sector is increasingly getting into the managed services game, especially where IT is concerned. We’re seeing increasing fragmentation of IT, with a growing trend toward greater and greater specialization. Of course, IT has, from the outset, been a specialized field, but recent advances have only accelerated that pace.
Cloud-based processing has begun to separate non-mission-critical data processing from mission-critical or legacy processing systems that tend to remain in-house. The Internet of Things and Very Large Datasets have further distributed computing in general, and opened whole new vistas to the IT world.
In each of these cases, and in many others, new opportunities are being created for nimble Managed Services Organizations. It’s more than just the private sector that’s standing up and taking notice though. The government is showing an increasing interest in making use of Managed Service Organizations.
The Government’s Problem
In addition to facing budgetary pressures, the government is facing a different kind of problem. Baby Boomers are retiring at a high rate. This is causing a drain on government IT staff that the government is finding difficult to overcome. The simple fact is that the private sector pays better.
Each governmental agency is responding to these challenges in different ways. Some are resorting to the use of unqualified, or vastly underpaid interns, but increasingly, there’s a growing body of evidence that government agencies are turning to Managed Services Providers to fill the gap.
We don’t have perfect information in these instances, because the specifics of departmental funding are hard to come by, but take the IRS as a case in point. Between 2011 and 2012, the IRS’s budget increased by nearly 10%, with funding going from $129 Million to $141.5 Million. During the same period, IRS IT staff decreased from 410 to 363. That kind of shift can indicate a few different things, but the most likely explanation is that they’re moving toward increasing use of managed services to plug the gap.
This makes sense in the context of the IRS for another reason. Last year, the IRS was breached by hackers, an attack that exposed social security numbers and a variety of other personal data. In the face of reduced staff, some other means must be found to help see to it that such attacks don’t happen again in the future.
The Challenge For MSPs
MSPs must be able to source the right skills sets in a timely manner. With the help of VAR Staffing, VARs and MSPs can identify and recruit top quality professionals who will make a real difference in how they handle business and the latest technology.
