What is IT support?

Is this you?

If you’re a small business owner, you’ve probably done at least one of these things:

• Give new employees access to multiple software applications they need to get their job done by going in manually to each app
• Create a spreadsheet that centralizes access information across your software applications but is time intensive to update
• Review your business expenses every month based on your bills
• Check occasionally on who has access to what applications

We’ve got good and bad news—you already know what IT support is. IT support handles many day-to-day tasks that help keep a business moving.

What does IT do at a company?

At any given time, an IT professional or team handles many tasks that help keep the business running, like:

• Provisioning (giving) access to software tools that an employee needs to do their job
• Onboarding new hires and ensuring they have the right software and hardware to do their job
• Tracking who has access to what software, and at what permission level, or hardware
• Communicating with company leadership on how much is being spent on software and hardware
• De-provisioning access to software or hardware that is no longer being used. However, at an early-stage company, these duties typically fall on the founder or an executive at the company.

Unfortunately, most companies don’t get the help they need on these core business tasks until they reach over 30 employees. As a result, IT duties typically fall on the founder or executive at early-stage companies.

Handling IT tasks yourself can create extra work, frustrate employees, balloon your budget, and expose your company to unnecessary risk. 

How do companies implement IT?

That said, there are multiple solutions that a company can turn to for handling its IT support needs:

• Hiring a full-time IT resource
• Contracting or outsourcing to a managed service provider (MSP) like Electric.ai
• Using software solutions like Talisman

Each option may not be possible for a company based on its stage of development. For example, an MSP can cost up to $50k, which may not be a feasible cost for an early-stage company that has just raised its seed round funding. For larger companies like Series A and later, hiring a full-time IT resource can cost upwards of $120k. 

Software solutions like Talisman allow companies with up to 300 employees to manage their IT in-house themselves or help them scale existing resources. 

Talisman helps you manage and automate your IT, saving time and money. You can connect your people, software, and hardware in one platform to manage access, track spending, and automate onboarding and offboarding. 

We’ve been in that situation. We get it. Handling IT support yourself is a drain. That’s why we started Talisman—to help you focus on the tasks only you can do for your business.

Sign up for the Talisman alpha to save money and time when it comes to managing IT at your business!