The Future of IT Support: Why Most Businesses Are Falling Behind

Technology is moving faster than most businesses can keep up—and the gap is only getting bigger.

In this episode of Behind the Stack, Jade Barter is joined by Dean Irwin to explore how the role of IT support is rapidly evolving from fixing problems to driving business strategy.

Together, they unpack why so many technology projects fail, how AI and automation are reshaping managed services, the future of cybersecurity and cloud, and what business leaders need to do today to stay competitive tomorrow.

Whether you're a CEO, business owner, IT leader or technology professional, this conversation will challenge the way you think about technology—and why the businesses that thrive over the next five years won't be the ones with the most technology, but the ones that know how to use it best.

In this episode:

• The evolution of IT support and managed services
• Why technology projects fail
• AI's impact on business and IT
• The future of cybersecurity and cloud
• Technology leadership and digital transformation
• How businesses can stay ahead in a rapidly changing world

If you're serious about using technology as a competitive advantage, this episode is one you won't want to miss.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

The truth is technology is moving much faster than most businesses in keep up. This episode is for business leaders who want technology to deliver tangible results. The businesses that will thrive over the next five years are not the businesses with the most technology, but the ones who know how to use it best.

SPEAKER_01 0:51

I think it depends who you talk to. I think when you're talking to, you know, sort of smaller businesses in that SME market, I think it's definitely seen as an operational expense. When you talk to more mature businesses, they understand the value. And when uh technology has a direct impact on a business and they can see that value, they appreciate that value. And it is it's something that we we try to educate our customers with on a day-to-day basis, is the importance of technology, but technology being a business enabler rather than just a cost center. So it is a challenge. It's good to, it's you know, it's it's incredible numbers that that you mention around the MSP market. I wish that was ours. But um, but it just shows the the relevance for the MSP market and um and how many MSPs are out there, and um, and that's great to hear.

SPEAKER_00 1:42

And speak to someone who doesn't really understand what an MSP is and and the value they provide to a business. Um yeah, speak to to your company, expand IT, and what what it is that you do for people that makes up obviously this number, but more importantly, what that technology results in.

SPEAKER_01 2:02

Sure. So I think you know that there's almost like an evolution that takes place with an MSP. So when you start out, you're very focused on on you know pretty much any business that you can get your hands on. You're a small business, um, you are really just trying to get customers. And so you you get in, you know, customers that maybe have one, two, three, five, ten, ten users in the business. And essentially their requirement right then and there is they need IT support because they you know they run into problems on a day-to-day basis, and they need someone to lean on to to be able to help resolve those issues. But then beyond that, um, every company needs internet, so you need the connectivity aspect, um, every company needs to be secure, so you need the cybersecurity aspect. You uh and then you you almost got to see it as you start um moving into bigger organizations, so does so does your MSP need to evolve adequately. So you need to stay relevant, and that's where you start moving into things like having your own private cloud and being able to host your clients' applications in your own private cloud, being able to address things, being more of a strategic partner, so being able to um assist clients with compliance. You know, when you move into slightly bigger organizations or businesses, they um they have compliance requirements, being able to assist them with that compliance, whether it may be you know Poppy or ISO or whatever it is, being able to assist them with that journey. And you know, now obviously the latest trend is AI. So you know, clients will look at you as their strategic partner, and I think that's a a key, I think, term is partner rather than a supplier. And it's basically to be able to explain what the benefits are to them of let's call it AI, because that is the latest trend at the moment, it was cloud adoption, and being able to explain the risks and be able to mitigate those risks for your client because there are you know there are many risks that come with new technology. So as a strategic partner, and then I think focusing really on the business outcomes rather than just the technology.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

And has that always been the case in kind of the MSP landscape? Was there a point in kind of your career where you think it was just transactional, more sales? Well, you need a laptop, you need this, here we go. Or have MSPs always played in the space of we here to act as your IT manager and support you and as opposed to just here's the laptop, this is what you can do and how you can utilize it to better your business.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

I I th I think it's just that that natural evolution. And I think if MSPs fail to evolve because they're stuck in, you know, just really being able to transact with customers and just focusing on on support and ticketing and not going beyond that, I think that's going to make it very difficult because you know, if you look at just the support component as an example, there's not a lot of value that that's there anymore. So it's really about you know tickets and resolving tickets in a timely manner or within SLA. And um, and and that side is really a bit of a race to the bottom. So it's because it's so competitive, you're just dropping your price, you're dropping your price, and eventually it becomes very difficult for a um a business to be sustainable when you're just looking at that. And that's why I say it's really important that you look at how you can add more value. And the more value you can add, the more profitable your MSP can be.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Right. And and speak to kind of the projects. What is for business leaders out there or different businesses of different sizes and levels? I I mean, we we spoke you spoke a bit about like MS SMEs and stuff like that, but what what is the scope? And you mentioned AI, what what is the level to which these projects can kind of get to for guys out there?

SPEAKER_01 6:02

I think they can be astronomical, but I think you know it's all relative. It's all relative in terms of the um the size of your business, the size of your um your technology workforce, and what you can, you know, what capacity you can actually take on. I think when you move beyond the capacity that you have, because maybe you bite off a little bit more than you can chew, that's you know, normally when things go wrong. So you've got to you've got to scale proportionately. Um you've got to take on the projects proportionately to what you can deliver on, and that you can deliver exceptionally. Um and I think just you know, talking around projects, I think you know, often we talk about it, but I think one of the biggest things from a um from what we see around projects is that we see a lot of the companies focusing predominantly on the technology. And when companies predominantly focus on the technology rather than the people, that's when we see failure because it's really about the people being able to adopt the technology, and that's where you know people kind of we see people miss the mark, and we've made that mistake ourselves in the past. So you you've you've got to focus on the people because the people are are really who are going to operate and who are gonna drive and who are gonna use the technology, and then I mean with that, speak to your team as you lead, expand, and you help businesses out there.

SPEAKER_00 7:25

What is important in your team in terms of your people and what how they look at solutions and different customer interactions or or stacks that they're looking for?

SPEAKER_01 7:36

I I think we we've got to we've got to have a shared vision and we've got to have a shared strategy. So, you know, it it really does start with that. You know, what are we working towards? What um what technologies are we adopting? What technologies do we want to drive into our client base? And then it's having the skill set around that. And I think ultimately what we're wanting to achieve, we want to make sure that everyone has a shared vision and everyone is on the same page. So, you know, when you have different people in the business that are focused on different areas and and it doesn't align with the vision, then it becomes a bit then it does become a challenge. So from a people point of view, we really want to make sure that everyone's jellying, everyone is working together, that um and and a massive part of that is culture. So you want to constantly, well, we constantly working on our culture to make sure that um that everyone is equally aligned.

SPEAKER_00 8:35

And then for your clients, to that point, once your team's aligned, you know where you want to head, what you want to do, what are some of those things that are important? Uh you spoke about earlier strategic like becoming a strategic partner to your client base. How do you ensure that with your team and ensure that they become that more and more?

SPEAKER_01 8:56

So I think it's um for for us definitely it is about being a strategic partner, um, as opposed to you know what I spoke about earlier being seen as a cost center, and that is really about the value that we can take to our customers. And and that is I think that goes back to what we were talking about earlier is having that vision, having that um, you know, that collaboration, and everyone you know, sort of singing from the same hymn sheet. That's really what it boils down to. So that we are reiterating that message to our clients. Um, but in terms of the perception from our customers, we we want to be seen as a strategic partner. That's really we we want to be seen as someone that that helps our client achieve their business objectives. So as opposed to, you know, really we need to buy some equipment, let's get hold of those guys, and you know, you know, who's gonna give it to us cheaper? And and that is, you know, everyone's got a budget to work with. Everyone, you know, does want to get more for their budget. That's completely understandable. But I think when you can almost, you know, and there are commodity items that I spoke about, that'll always be a race to the bottom. But when you start having those strategic discussions and you start talking about business outcomes and how we can improve productivity and how we can improve your efficiencies, we've now gone beyond that commodity discussion because now we're shifting the conversation more towards this is how much money we can save your business and this is how we can improve efficiency. And then I think ultimately where we are right now is helping customers get to almost a point where it's like a launch pad where they are able to innovate quicker. And that's what we have seen. You know, there was that that big cloud adoption where clients were moving to cloud, and that's really just helped them to be able to scale quicker so they don't need to provision hardware and all that ad hocly so they can spin up things and um you know in the cloud a lot faster. And now obviously with the AI side as well. So it's about getting our having our clients ready to be able to execute on um on their game panel a lot faster.

SPEAKER_00 11:01

And and some of the clients or or businesses out there that have said, okay, we we're relying on the technology and what the future is and what the plan is. What are some common mistakes with adoption to that technology once they've kind of clicked, yes, this is where we want to go?

SPEAKER_01 11:18

Jade, I think it goes back again to where people focus a little bit too much on the technology without focusing on the people. And the technology is absolutely important, but you pretty much most businesses are people businesses. So you need to have, you know, people need to be aligned. People need you need to have buy-in from all the stakeholders. If you don't have buy-in from every stakeholder, it's it's very seldom that a project will be successful unless you have the right buy-in from all stakeholders.

SPEAKER_00 11:50

And practicals for business owners, leaders out there, what can they do to ensure that? Is it training courses? Is it launching the technology with the team present and understanding issues? What yeah, I guess some light on how someone who's listening can live that out better.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

Yeah, look, I think there's a there's a far better response to what I'm gonna say right now, but it's almost like you know, sort of fail, fail fast and move forward. So you you're not always gonna get it right, but I think be careful that you don't, you know, bite off too much too soon. So it's all you you want to you want to learn through um through smaller projects and then evolve. You know, don't go and jump, jump in, you know, sort of all guns blazing and um and and learn on the biggest possible project. Start small and and be patient and and and evolve, I think, responsibly, you know, grow responsibly. I think that's really what I would say.

SPEAKER_00 12:47

Which is hard to be honest in today's world with the speed of technology and AI and the the way stuff is evolving as is, it's as humans it it feels already we're a bit behind. Every day there's there's new technology, there's better technology. So I think in the MSP space, how how do you adapt to that? How do you you help companies in this fast-paced uh world and where tech is just with as I say with AI evolving so quickly? What are what can be done to ensure that there's still value that the client's getting and they're not getting lost in the noise or in the hype of everything out there?

SPEAKER_01 13:30

I think that's that's just it. There is a lot of hype, and I think you've got to be very, very careful because there's always a narrative and there's always you know technology that's being driven by big players in the market that are creating FOMO that's saying if you're not adopting this technology now you're falling behind, and you've got to be so careful that you don't get caught up with that, and then you're trying to, you know, sort of live on the bleeding edge of technology and learning very hard lessons. You know, if you look at any sort of big adoption and you let's go back to cloud and you look at all the the big organizations that move to cloud, you know, the early adopters, 90% of those guys, those projects failed. You know, so you've got the same thing with AI, you've got to be so careful where you if you're stuck in this mindset, if I don't jump now and I don't do something right now, our business you know is not gonna survive. So just you've got to be cautious about that. And I think you know, you're asking how do we do, how do we prepare or how do we have better? I think you've got to align yourself with a partner that is uh staying relevant, that is staying up to speed with where technology is going, but talking about it responsibly to you and not trying to throw it down your throat and creating fear. And then also probably the most important thing I can say is look at use cases. So ask them for use cases and say, I'd like to, you know, have you done this with another company or have you done this with another partner? How did it play out? Can I chat to them? Can I have a discussion with them? Let me meet them because your partner's not gonna be afraid to introduce you to another customer if it was a successful implementation and it really benefited their business. If they're not gonna want you to meet that customer, then maybe then you've got to have some reservation. So look, there's a lot of information out there. Um, make sure that you are consuming that information from trusted sources, that you're not just throwing things into you know, sort of LLMs and and getting information back that doesn't necessarily have a good reference point. I've seen it a lot myself when researching and things, information that comes back can be very outdated, and you've just got to be careful where you're getting that information from.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

Yeah, hundreds. Um, and then what technology trends are you seeing like business leaders and different clients that you interact with underestimating and and not utilizing fully or or thinking about?

SPEAKER_01 15:59

Yeah, I th I think the the the impact that AI is having on productivity. So, you know, it is helping businesses improve productivity massively. And then I think second to that, Jade, is cybersecurity. So cybersecurity, you you know, AI is absolutely incredible, but it's also advancing bad people. And you know, it's helping them to write scripts that they were never able to write before. It's helping them to be able to write code faster, um, and you know, in a malicious way, and to be able to be smarter and gather more information about people to trick people. So cybersecurity is is pretty much I think AI and cybersecurity are at the absolute forefront at the moment, and that's really where you know and a lot of like compliance and governance and all that comes into security, but that's really where I think the majority of focus should be at this point in time, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_00 17:03

In the next five years, uh, roughly, what would you say will separate MSPs and businesses who thrive and continue to utilize technology well to to ones that are left behind? What do you think they'll be good at or some practicals that that MSPs and and businesses alike can implement?

SPEAKER_01 17:24

So I feel technology will become more intelligent, uh far more automated. And and I I really believe that you know AI is going to become a if I look at how we're using it at the moment, become more of a coworker and you know, almost a massive productivity tool that is gonna be embedded pretty much in everybody's life, whether you like it or not. So it's we already see it's it's embedded in a lot of the software that we're using. That's not by that's not by our choice. So it's just gonna become more of more and more of a norm, and you're gonna be using it without even knowing, and um and I think that's pretty much what what we anticipate.

SPEAKER_00 18:16

And so that I mean that means adaptation, moving quickly with things, I think for people, for MSPs, uh yeah. I think it's to me it's it's almost having a willingness to keep learning the next five years, ensure that you're keeping up with the trends, you're not afraid. But I think like you said earlier, that you get action caution with these things, and you're not going ahead of where you need to be now. And I think as you say, the next five years it'll evolve more and more and more. How can business leaders prepare for that? How can how can you to that point be prepared for the next technology waves and and as it advances, what do people need to do?

SPEAKER_01 19:00

I I think it's really about just trying to stay up to date with um with what is happening in the market. It's about we often go to uh conferences and we go to conferences overseas. We're very fortunate to be able to do that. And I do find that you know often the US market and and the European market is is ahead of South Africa, so it's it's almost getting an opportunity to see at what rate they are adopting the technology. And I think one of the big benefits for South Africans is that when we look at that, we see where it hasn't gone according to plan. We see that you know where it has failed, and we can avoid a lot of those pitfalls. But yeah, attending conferences, speaking, you know, reading up about case studies and and looking just outside of you know South Africa and looking at at you know the US market and and the European market and just actually seeing what they've done and and what's working and what's not working. I think they're just on a bigger scale to what we are when it comes to technology, so they they do adopt newer technology quicker than what we do. So that would that would be my recommendation is try and speak, you know, speak to people that are in the industry and that have got first hand experience to more than just um South African use cases.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

And what should business leaders do today to to stay ahead with the next technology wave?

SPEAKER_01 20:34

We spoke about culture earlier, and and I you know I'm a a big advocate of having a good culture, but you you really should be trying to develop a culture of learning, a culture of people that thrive on on progressing themselves and their their knowledge. Um so I would say you know, develop a culture of of constant learning if you don't have that already in your business. I think having a AI policy is absolutely crucial. And we've gone through the exercise ourselves because there are so many AI tools, and we know AI is not always accurate, we know AI hallucinates, we know that we don't always get up-to-date information from AI. So you want to make sure that you've got an AI policy in place that people understand the risks around AI, and especially if you are now if we're a partner and we are educating our customers, we need to make sure that we are educating them with the correct information. So having a having an AI policy is um, I think is absolutely crucial. And then lastly, Jade, cybersecurity. I I can't say it enough. It's just with all of you know AI at this point in time, there's just so much risk that is out there for a business. So having a proper cybersecurity policy for your business, a proper framework, and really making sure that you check all the boxes as far as cybersecurity is concerned. So that's pretty much um how I would sum that up. Those three things. I think it's it's really about a culture of learning, having a a good AI policy and a watertight framework when it comes to cybersecurity. So so part of being a strategic partner, and I think being in the in the market for as long as what we've been, we've we've been exposed to to a lot in terms of business. Um, so not just technology. And we always say we we need to try and identify what a problem is and then solve the problem, and that's really where you're getting to add value. And having the um the the diversity in customers that we do, we've got small businesses or small partners, we've got big partners, we've got partners in uh in healthcare, in manufacturing, in mining, in financial, and they all in some way they their problems are all intertwined, but they have unique problems, and and we sit with them and we resolve those issues with them and we build solutions out. And then we what we do is we're able to take that resolution and we're able to re use it as almost like repetitive across um different companies. So having the exposure that we've had over you know sort of the you know going on 20 years now of being um in business and and working with customers of all sizes, we've been exposed to a lot of problems. And we we we really welcome customers to come to us with problems and that we can help solve those problems together.

SPEAKER_00 23:49

Dean, thank you so much for your time, for your insights. I think to people listening out there, reach out to the likes of an expand IT and and lean on guys like you. I think that's that's the benefit I'm seeing hugely of an MSP is you've got this strategic partner that can help you with some of the uncertainty. Like you're saying, you are exposed to so much more that a lot of these businesses aren't. So I think to anyone listening, reach out to Dean, lean on an MSP, and and your your business will only benefit more.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

Perfect. Thanks very much, Jade. And and really appreciate the opportunity being on your podcast. It's a it's a great opportunity to share our story and our experiences, and um, yeah, all the best. Thank you, Dean.