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What Is the Difference Between Co-Managed IT and Staff Augmentation?

A company’s IT needs can change significantly over time. Most of the time, companies can rely on their IT staff members to perform maintenance, install patches and fulfill other essential tasks. When it comes time to open a new location, explore new equipment for a major upgrade or process huge amounts of data during the busiest time of the year, though, companies should consider the benefits of staff augmentation and co-managed IT.

By comparing the similarities and differences between staff augmentation and co-managed IT organizations can choose options that match their unique needs.

What Is Staff Augmentation?

Staff augmentation means bringing in outside contractors to help with a project or meet KPIs during a chaotic, busy period. Common reasons companies use staff augmentation include:

  • Increasing the number of people available to work on an IT project.
  • Coordinating with specialists that perform specific tasks.
  • Improving an IT strategy by bringing in objective outsiders who can offer fresh perspectives.

Advantages of Staff Augmentation

If a company needs more staff members or people with specific skills, why wouldn’t they recruit them to fill full-time positions?

Staff augmentation can offer advantages over hiring full-time IT specialists. Companies might choose staff augmentation because they:

  • Want to avoid the long-term expense of hiring a new employee.
  • Don’t want to spend money on benefits.
  • Only need to pay the additional staff members when needed.

Disadvantages of Staff Augmentation

Staff augmentation doesn’t fit every organization’s needs. Potential disadvantages include:

  • Forcing the company to rely on third-party specialists instead of investing in long-term solutions.
  • Less oversight and control than companies have over regular employees.
  • Long ramp-up times as augmented staff members get acquainted with tools, processes and project goals.

What Is Co-Managed IT?

In some cases, co-managed IT looks very much like staff augmentation because companies bring in contractors to perform specific tasks. Most of the time, though, co-managed IT involves high-level decision-making and process improvement. Instead of augmenting the existing staff by increasing the number of people performing basic tasks, co-managed IT helps oversee projects and usually involves fewer people.

Advantages of Co-Managed IT

Some reasons companies choose co-managed IT include wanting to:

  • Improve system security without hiring a cybersecurity specialist.
  • Access 24/7/265 support from a dedicated company.
  • Find ways to align their technical resources to boost efficiency and workflows.
  • Get advice from someone qualified to work as a CIO without bringing a new CIO into the business.

Disadvantages of Co-Managed IT

Companies can experience challenges by choosing co-managed IT. Disadvantages rarely occur, though, unless the organization decides that it wants to become self-reliant.

How Envision Can Help With Managed IT and Staff Augmentation

Envision offers staff augmentation and managed IT solutions tailored to meet each client’s unique needs. Envision can help with issues involving:

  • IT security
  • Cloud services
  • Microsoft 365 adoption and management
  • VoIP
  • Meeting industry regulations

Learn more about how Envision can help by setting up a meeting today!

Envision Consulting

Envision Consulting

We started Envision Consulting for businesses that share our passion for building long- term and healthy relationships. While we might be technology experts, we’ve always known that trust, reliability and looking after a client’s best interest are paramount to succeeding in business. But in 2001 and to this day, there were few managed IT providers available that embodied our customer-centric values. There were countless support companies more interested in reacting to issues than paving the road forward for clients, making it far too difficult to build long-term relationships. We felt a strong pull to make something different, and we did.