SMBs Told to Let MSPs Run Their AI. Delegation Is Not Strategy. It Is Abdication.
The article argues that small businesses will not architect their own AI labor strategies. Instead, Managed Service Providers are positioned as the trusted intermediaries who identify pockets of value and deliver outcomes like revenue growth, better customer experience, and employee focus on higher-value work. The framing is that SMBs should essentially outsource their AI thinking entirely.
This illustrates the principle of intermediary capture, where a knowledge gap between buyer and technology creates a market for middlemen. The mechanism is information asymmetry: the MSP holds expertise the SMB lacks, and that imbalance becomes a revenue stream. The lesson for the reader is to recognize when you are being sold delegation as a service rather than being taught capability. You should at minimum understand enough to evaluate whether your intermediary is competent.
Managed Service Providers, or MSPs, are identified as the actors who identify AI value pockets for small and medium businesses. The article does not name specific MSPs or cite specific revenue figures from these arrangements.
- List three repetitive tasks in your business that require human judgment but follow a predictable pattern. Expected outcome: a short inventory of candidate workflows.
- Open a free consumer AI tool like ChatGPT or Claude and attempt one of those tasks yourself with a simple prompt. Expected outcome: you see firsthand what the tool can and cannot do.
- Document what worked and what failed before you ever speak to a consultant. Expected outcome: you now possess enough context to evaluate whether an MSP is offering real strategy or generic boilerplate.