Business Matters published an article last week about the perils of ‘matesourcing’ (which nearly 30% of SMEs are doing according to a Management Today article), ie asking friends or family to sort out IT problems. The logic is simple – get someone you know to do the job for a fraction of the price, but that logic is flawed.

Handing over such vital operations to an amateur or someone not formally contracted to handle your company’s IT leaves you with no real come back when the problem isn’t solved or even worse, causes you further and more complex IT problems that you still end up spending to sort out and likely spending more as the professionals you bring in will need to unpick those well-meant but damaging efforts.

If IT is not your area of expertise, speak to several IT companies and find the one you click with. Get them to review your IT set-up, to make recommendations and to draw up a basis for a maintenance and support contract. We do all that for free. Make sure your IT provision has professional care behind it, not your aunty’s mate’s best friend’s dog.