Why should I use an outsourced IT provider? Many businesses
may ask if they should hire an outsourced IT provider to manage their company's
information technology. The answer is simple, to save time and money by hiring
an expert to manage day to day operations and prevent problems. There are more
details in how that actually applies to a business.
This is especially true for the legal cannabis industry,
which has unique challenges and hefty regulations for growers, distributors,
and dispensaries in the cannabis industry. Federal and State regulations
requires very specific data to be kept in these operations and failure to mange
that data may result in fines or even closures of a business, not to mention
insurance rates.
We recently spoke with Steve Arndt, President of Cannabis
Technology Partners, a Division of Silver Lining's Technology, and Greg Shenefelt,
Help Desk Coordinator at Cannabis Technology Partners about why it would make sense
for a company to engage an IT Services Provider, especially one in the legal
cannabis industry. Below is part of the interview we conducted with them.
Why Should I Hire an IT Service Provider?
There's a lot of great reasons to use an outsource provider.
Number one, it just lets you focus on all the things that you need to do to
make your business successful without having to worry about IT day-to-day
meltdowns or tasks, even when you do have a deep-vested knowledge in IT
practices.
One could ask the question, why would you hire an outsource
payroll provider or an outsource accounting provider. In either one of those
cases, you're doing it number one to buy yourself time, but also, you're trying
to hire an expert that can do it a lot faster and in theory, a lot cheaper than
in-house. Again, time is money, so faster definitely helps. You want somebody
that's there reacting to internet outages and things that are going to affect
operations right away. So, having somebody on the hook that's taking care of
those problems right away when who knows what you're doing, that's gold.
You should hire an outsource firm because these individuals
are going to have specialized tools and expertise that you don't have access to
in-house. And it's also really nice to know, hey, I have this critical thing
happening, and there's somebody on the other end that's already responded to
it. We've got the providers involved. We're getting the service restored,
which, again, like Steve said, time is money, and that brings your money maker
right back up.
I've done IT consulting for years and years and years. But
what I've found great systems is really for an effective IT department, you
need to have four different skill sets in play. A single person doesn't have
the capacity to do and handle all of the things that an IT department itself
needs to do. When you talk about doing it in-house or you have an IT
background, chances are you're doing a chunk of that stuff. There's probably a
whole bunch of stuff that you're not doing, maybe compliance, maybe security,
who knows, applications, that a team, and especially an outsource team where
you've got predictable costs, can handle for you, and quite frankly,
supplement. It's not negative that you know how to do it. It's actually a much
better team environment.
But I Am Knowledgeable in Information Technology, Why Outsource?
I've run across is just in whatever area you're in is you
may have somebody as an expert, but it still doesn't mean you have all the time
dedicated to it. Do you find a lot of companies that just don't have the
bandwidth to be able to do this, and this helps offset some of those?
A lot of times, you don't know what you don't know. With a good,
outsourced IT provider, they're going to fill the gaps and help educate you
along the way. The minute you go through a couple of those iterations, you go,
Gee, oh, my gosh, of course, I should have done that before.
Are All IT Service Providers the Same?
I definitely don't think all are the same. Part of it has to
do with where did they come from, what's their orientation? A lot of what's
called MSPs or IT service providers, grew out of the idea that there was a
strong technical person, and they didn't like working for anybody else. So,
they start their own company.
That’s great but they're very narrowly focused on the tech
itself. Other firms, for instance, like ours, for instance have a more
comprehensive approach. I have a background in CIO, and you think, Well, CIO is
tech. No, it's really business. How does business work? And what do you do with
the tech to operate effectively in business and at cost? Those themselves are
two different, vastly different perspectives. And quite frankly, there are a
number of others. Really, not all firms are the same.
You need to look for one that aligns with gaps that you have
so that they can supplement those. Obviously, pricing is all across the board,
so you need to really understand what the pricing is.
Pricing Differences:
It may seem like one company is more expensive than another,
but perhaps they're offering security and compliance and other things on top of
it or 24 by 7 support versus another one that you're getting bare bones, right?
And you don't really know until something goes outside of those bounds and you
have to pay more for it.
Some companies are only focused on the tech, and then they
forget about the service aspect here, helping you alleviate pressures that
you're feeling in your day-to-day environment or just keeping you ahead of
those things. It's great to go to bed at night and not worry, hey, is my email
secure or my PC is safe? And to have somebody just, again, get on the phone and
have that human one-on-one connection and conversation with and it is not so tech
driven.
Pro-Active Firms vs. Reactive Firms:
There are a lot of firms that are reactive for you, but most
businesses, don't you want somebody that's proactive? Don't you want people
that are preventing the security flaws from coming in rather than just reacting
to them? You have got to do both. I get it, but there's a lot to be said for
having a proactive firm as your partner.
How Does IT Management Affect the Legal Cannabis
Industry?
There have been many folks that have posited the cannabis
industry as the most regulated industry, even compared to drug companies and
such or hospitals and things like that. From my experience, I've seen that.
You've got, not even tobacco, you have to track the product, the tobacco
product from when it comes out of the ground all the way through to when it's
produced as a cigar or a cigarette, alcohol, the same thing. But with cannabis,
we've got to track the product all the way through. You're regulated to do
that. But not only that, every state's regulations are slightly different.
You've got to not just know the general. You have to know Very specific, where
are you operating? Every single one of the states mandates some surveillance of
the product. So not only do you have to track it in terms of data points and
what happens, you also have to show visual proof of what took place with the
product itself all the way through your organization. Those two things are
huge. And quite frankly, those are the two things that get Most of the cannabis
organizations in trouble. I mean, in business, you can get in trouble for a lot
of things.
From a technological perspective, you got to nail both data
points and visual proof. Surveillance is the perfect example where the
surveillance industry, as it's been for the last 20 years, really hasn't been
positioned well to do that. The traditional surveillance provider is a reseller
of equipment, an installer, and then they walk away, hands off, it's done. They
also don't typically think of the network as a whole. I mean, yeah, their
devices sit on the network, but if it's the network's fault, again, they throw
up their hands. Having a full service provider that understands that and isn't
just going to, well, I'm sorry, that's not our thing, but literally take
ownership of the technology all the way through to this idea of making sure
you're fully compliant and responding correctly when there's an outage or
something else, that's a huge thing in cannabis and a requirement. Most people
don't get that they get burned by fines or theft or something else. It's not a
good lesson.
When we chose to start a Cannabis IT Services Provider Company again, it
goes back to the strategic side and the big picture side of things, the
business things. I love that and figuring that stuff out, but I'm also always
about taking ownership. Number one, I don't expect our clients to love, like,
or be good at technology. If they were, again, it goes back to the first
question, why should you hire us? Well, yeah, I think there's valid reasons,
but most of them, these aren't the strengths, and quite frankly, not their
focus as well. For us to know what the compliance requirements are and to
provide that information, again, that's value to our clients to understand the
full life cycle. Cannabis is fascinating, even more so than alcohol and some
other stuff, because quite frankly, now with infusion, in manufacturing. I
mean, cannabis is in everything, and not just edibles and consumables, but
health products. You've got rubs and you've got other things that the product
is used for. It's like an ingredient like sugar, which ends up in everything
all over. Only now you have to track it. You have to know where it's at, and
every state's different
Final Thoughts:
Any business relationship where you're involving a partner,
and again, legal, accounting, IT, whatever it is, construction, I think you
want to look for a person or a team that owns the issue and is accountable to
the issue, that doesn't shy away and start making excuses about this thing or
the other. I want people that are responsible and accountable that work for me,
whether they're internal, external vendors or anything like that, and that's
going to help you be successful.
Man Thanks to Steve Arndt, and Greg Shenefelt for their information.
You can reach them at Cannabis Technology Partners - https://cannabistechnologypartners.com/
You can also hear the entire interview on the Podcast :
Small Business Talks Podcast
