What does my IT guy need to know this year that he did not need to know last year?

As economic recovery leads to business growth, there has already been a lot of talk about how 2011 will be a different year for IT.

Recently, I have watched over one hundred businesses respond to expanding IT requirements. In particular, the hype of cloud computing is becoming a real issue. As a solution, it promises cost savings and enhanced capabilities for single-PC businesses and huge companies alike. In 2011, even more applications and functions will flood the market and create a wealth of choice.

Unfortunately, there is also a lot of risk. Targetting larger companies to host solutions seems to be the winning formula. In 2010, many of the big players opened their doors for hosted applications. In 2011, we'll see massive uptake of those solutions in a game-changing way.

So, this is the year IT support providers need to be able to offer you a breadth and depth of knowledge in cloud-based solutions. For every infrastructure or software upgrade you do, consider the cloud-based alternative. Weigh the pros and cons, savings and sacrifices. Some cloud solutions will be seamless, others will require change. Regardless, all infrastructure teams will need new knowledge and training so they can migrate from in-house solutions to cloud solutions. But because the field is so new, this is difficult to find.

So, how do you ensure you are getting the best possible advice? Even the industry leaders in IT solutions for SMEs are grappling with this problem. Only a few have started selling cloud-based solutions, and many see them as a threat to business. After all, if applications are hosted on cloud-based servers, infrastructure support is obsolete. So how do you manage the opportunities and threats involved? One answer is to ensure your IT people actually know what they're doing as they move you to the cloud.

Each time we move a company's technology to the cloud we get the same result: parts of it move well, parts of it move with compromises, and parts of it just have to stay on-site. We are investing heavily in our own research and solutions-testing to find the most robust services for our clients, but we still have a long way to go. Often it's a matter of working with our clients to find a solution that fits, and running the testing processes with them. As proactive as we are, we just haven't had the chance to test all the possible solutions out there.

But if you still rely on a small, one-to-two-person IT team, this rapid shift in technology will stretch them. They simply do not have the resources to research, test and deploy these new technologies, while also maintaining existing solutions. Add to that the severe shortage of skilled IT workers and you are in for a difficult year. What's more, with business picking up, demand for updated IT will only grow. So it's a good time to consider outsourcing specific tasks and finding good technology partners to ensure your business is supported as it grows.

David Markus is the founder of Combo - the IT services company that ensures IT is never an impediment to growth.