Managed service providers (MSPs) constantly live on the edge. They must keep clients’ IT environments operational and protected, continuously optimize their profits and mitigate various cyber risks. The growing complexity of IT infrastructure also causes MSP owners and technicians a lot of headaches. 

Let’s look at the six most common challenges and discuss the solutions successful MSPs implement.

1. Evolving cyberthreats

Challenge: A growing number of sophisticated cyberthreats, including phishing and ransomware attacks.

Solution: Implementing multilevel protection. Prevention of attacks with vulnerability assessments, patch management and monitoring. Detection and response for threat discovery and prevention. Backup and disaster recovery for quick recovery in case of successful attacks.

Human error remains a major factor in the success of cyberattacks, according to the 2025 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report. Therefore, security awareness training is a necessary component of protection.

Providing multiple security services increases complexity and management time. Therefore, MSPs tend to prefer a fully integrated solution for cybersecurity to reduce workloads and the risk of human errors.

2. New compliance requirements

Challenge: Keeping clients in compliance with regulatory standards enforced by local government, global standards or enterprise supply chain. Failure to meet requirements can result in severe legal, reputational and financial consequences for clients.

Solution: The NIST Cybersecurity Framework provides solid guidance for MSPs in building compliance practices. While it does not serve as a specific set of compliance guidelines, it can be used as a foundation to implement compliance with various local regulations. MSPs can map their offering and tools to NIST to assess gaps in their security posture.

3. Growing cyber insurance costs

Challenge: Holding a cyber insurance policy is essential for most clients. Almost three-quarters of small and midsize businesses (SMBs) without cyber insurance say a major cyberattack could destroy their business, according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC). Yet, cyber insurance can be expensive and complicated to obtain. Delinea reported recently that 28% of small businesses were denied insurance coverage. For 40% of SMBs, a lack of security protocols was the top reason for denial.

Solution: MSPs implementing comprehensive cybersecurity as a next step provide an evaluation of the client’s infrastructure for cyber insurance. Developing a framework and checklist for cyber insurance compliance enables MSPs to implement standardized offerings across multiple clients. In addition, adherence to cyber insurance requirements helps MSPs to upsell security services to their clients who would not consider those services otherwise.

Following the NIST framework is a solid foundation to support most cyber insurance requirements.

4. Growing complexity of cybersecurity tools

Challenge: Multiple agents, multiple consoles, multiple policies. The abundance of tools creates management and maintenance overhead and increases the risk of human errors.

Solution: MSPs are actively consolidating tools into a smaller number of solutions or a single integrated platform. Tool consolidation is a trend in global IT in general. A recent IDC survey found that over half of the respondents were already consolidating security tools and vendors. The survey also found that consolidation can reduce mean time to respond to an incident by an average of 21% and decrease remediation time by about the same percentage.

Platform consolidation can eliminate the headache of providing IT security and reduce the need to recruit and train more cybersecurity experts. An integrated platform is easier to learn, deploy and maintain, and over time, it can significantly reduce operational costs.

5. IT skills gap

Challenge: The shortage of skilled IT security professionals. Training and retaining a competent workforce is time consuming and expensive. Hiring more people to manage multiple disparate tools can be too expensive for most MSPs to handle. 

Solution: Simplification and standardization are standard solutions. Using fewer or a single integrated platform reduces workloads and increases MSP productivity.

Training for employees is also critical. Many MSPs invest in continuous education and certification programs, such as those offered by industry bodies like ISC2, CompTIA and vendor-provided training. Investments in the team’s skill set pay off quickly and help retain IT professionals by offering them personal and professional development on the job.

6. Budget constraints and competing priorities

Challenge: Investments in cybersecurity and IT infrastructure protection compete with business applications and business development.

Solution: The key solution is offering predictable costs for protection and providing guidance on how infrastructure protection reduces downtime costs for clients. Consolidation of tools on a single platform helps here as well. Standardization and unification of tools lead to a more straightforward pricing model with fewer unexpected changes. 

Overcoming IT challenges is the key to MSP growth

By implementing the right solutions and strategies, MSPs can better protect client data, help clients meet regulatory requirements and grow their own businesses efficiently. The most common solution for most of the challenges is the consolidation and integration of tools on a single platform, which is already helping the majority of MSPs worldwide.