Stefan Mileschin

It is a pity they are as dodgy as hell

Trust is the most important factor for CIOs when choosing IT partners to work with, according to new research by security outfit ESET, showing that 80 percent of respondents rate it as ‘quite important’ or ‘very important’ in their decision-making.

The report said that IT providers were not exactly trustworthy with only half of CIOs saying they trust their existing security reseller ‘quite a lot’ or ‘a great deal’, while less than a quarter say the same about providers they don’t currently work with.

The study asked over 100 IT decision-makers about their future plans around cybersecurity and their views towards their security partners. At a time when competition for security budgets is fiercer than ever, these findings are likely to be a concern for IT resellers and services providers, many of whom are aiming to deepen their relationships and become ‘trusted advisers’ to clients.

CIOs rate trust in their channel partner (4.12 out of 5) as more important than having a high level of technical and engineering expertise (4.10) and cost (4.04), while their provider’s knowledge of new technologies is rated as significantly less important in influencing end-users’ choice of security supplier (3.88). However, right at the bottom of the pile in terms of importance are regular contact from account managers (3.44), a painless renewals process (3.55), and peer recommendation (3.55).

https://fudzilla.com/news/50064-cios...in-it-partners