Cybersecurity porfessional at work

Cybersecurity talent is often hard to come by, especially as large enterprises scoop up experienced professionals with high salaries and aggressive recruiting budgets. While the threats facing businesses grow more complex and relentless, the pool of qualified professionals remains shallow, particularly for small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs).

The result? An urgent talent gap that puts data, operations, and reputations at risk.

However, Modern Managed Service Providers are stepping in to close the gap, offering critical expertise that SMBs would otherwise struggle to access. Here’s why MSPs are now indispensable partners in the fight for cybersecurity resilience.

The Scope of the Problem

The cybersecurity skills shortage is not a passing issue, it’s a global crisis. According to the (ISC)² 2023 Cybersecurity Workforce Study, there’s a shortfall of 4 million cybersecurity professionals worldwide, with demand far outpacing supply across all industries.

And SMBs feel this pain acutely. Many small and mid-sized businesses struggle to find or retain cybersecurity professionals with modern skill sets, especially in areas like zero trust, identity governance, and cloud security.

Further compounding the issue, IBM’s Cost of a Data Breach  report revealed that 83% of businesses studied had more than one data breach, with 82% of breaches involving data stored in the cloud. This indicates a clear sign that securing digital assets requires cloud-native, identity-centric expertise that many SMBs don’t have in-house.

Why the Traditional Hiring Model Fails SMBs

Hiring skilled cybersecurity professionals isn’t just expensive, it’s also time-consuming and risky. The average time to fill a cybersecurity position is over 70 days, and once hired, those professionals often face burnout or get poached by larger firms offering higher salaries.

SMBs also need expertise across a wide range of disciplines, from Microsoft Intune configuration to Entra ID governance, from Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) to identity threat detection and management, all of which would require a full team of specialists. That kind of headcount simply isn’t feasible for most growing businesses.

How MSPs Fill the Gap

Modern MSPs serve as a scalable, flexible extension of an SMB’s IT team, bringing not just capacity but depth of cybersecurity expertise. They offer:

  • Immediate access to certified professionals in Microsoft security tools like Microsoft Defender, Intune, and Entra.

  • 24/7 threat monitoring and incident response using enterprise-grade solutions.

  • Zero Trust Architecture implementation, aligning with NIST and Microsoft frameworks.

  • Compliance readiness and risk management, critical for regulated industries like healthcare, finance, and education.

  • Identity and access governance through tools like Microsoft Entra ID, eliminating gaps that lead to lateral attacks.

And perhaps most importantly, MSPs bring a “shared responsibility mindset”, empowering SMBs with ongoing advisory and managed support to raise the cybersecurity maturity level across people, devices, and infrastructure.

Microsoft Technology as the Backbone

MSPs focusing in Microsoft technologies can deliver robust, scalable security outcomes using:

  • Microsoft Defender for Endpoint – advanced threat protection with behavioral detection and automated investigation.

  • Microsoft Intune – unified endpoint management to enforce compliance policies and secure corporate data across BYO and corporate-owned devices.

  • Microsoft Entra – modern identity solutions to enforce MFA, conditional access, and privileged identity management.

  • Microsoft Sentinel – cloud-native SIEM that MSPs can leverage to centralize monitoring and correlation of security events.

Through these tools, MSPs help SMBs adopt a modern security posture that would be difficult, if not impossible, to implement internally.

The Payoff: Reduced Risk and Greater Agility

For SMBs, partnering with a forward-thinking MSP isn’t just a stopgap, it’s a strategic move. Companies using managed security services experience a 43% faster mean time to detect and a 50% faster time to respond to incidents, compared to businesses managing security internally.

Even better, with the right MSP partner, SMBs can transform cybersecurity from a cost center to a competitive differentiator, building trust with customers, partners, and investors alike.

Conclusion

The cyber talent gap isn’t going away anytime soon. But with the right MSP, SMBs can leap ahead of the curve, gaining the security expertise they need. As technologies evolve and threats increase, MSPs will continue to play a vital role in enabling secure growth and resilience in the SMB sector.

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Andrew Reade

ANDREW READE

Andrew is our Digital Marketing Manager and oversees web-based marketing strategies and content creation for the organization. As a marketing veteran, Andrew has worked with organizations of all sizes in a diverse group of industries, from Risk Management to Transportation. Joining the organization in 2021, Andrew is based in Mobile Mentor’s Nashville, TN office.