By some estimates, more than two-thirds of all businesses in the U.S. work with a managed services provider (MSP) to improve the efficiency, reliability and security of their critical IT operations. As technology environments become more complex, the demand for these services continues to build — analysts are predicting the market will grow by nearly 75 percent over the next five years.

The pandemic has forced organizations to rapidly implement remote work strategies in order to sustain operations. The transition has largely been successful thanks to an array of cloud-based applications, collaboration tools and remote access technologies.

When it comes to IT infrastructure and network reliability, there’s really only one performance metric that matters to your employees and customers: Is it working? IT managers, analysts and support specialists understand there’s not always a simple yes or no answer.

The answer to this question depends upon who you ask. If you ask a vendor who claims to be a managed services provider (MSP), there’s a good chance the definition you hear will sound exactly the same as that vendor’s marketing materials.

If you ask the average small to midsize business owner or IT manager, their definition of managed services will probably sound a lot like the traditional break-fix model of IT support.

Without access to business applications, data and cloud resources, many organizations can’t function. In a best-case scenario, operations are severely limited, which results in low productivity, missed deadlines, lost sales, a poor customer experience and high mitigation costs.

When it comes to performing day-to-day functions, serving customers, operating efficiently, and maintaining a high level of productivity, most small to midsize businesses (SMBs) are as reliant upon IT systems as large enterprises. If servers crash, applications stop working or slow down, or employees can’t access network resources, SMBs lose money and are forced to play catch-up.

Although it was written more than 2,000 years ago, Aesop’s fable of the boy who cried wolf serves as a cautionary tale for the modern information security professional. When security alerts become too frequent, people will eventually stop paying attention.

Most businesses today rely on information technology to one degree or another. As IT grows in both significance and complexity, managed service providers (MSPs) fill an essential need. MSPs deliver value by providing access to expertise and tools that can be cost-prohibitive to maintain internally.

The “always on” nature of business — with an increasingly mobile workforce, the Internet of Things and the ability to engage customers around the clock — demands 100 percent uptime. If IT systems aren’t performing optimally, productivity and customer service suffer.

Given the critical nature of today’s IT systems and networks, the traditional break-fix service model is inching closer to obsolescence. The speed of business requires a more proactive approach to problem resolution, which is why remote management and monitoring (RMM) solutions have become essential.