How long does it take to hire a CISO?

90-180 days for recruiting, interviews, background checks, and offer acceptance. Add another 30 days for onboarding. That's 4-7 months from decision to first day of work. A managed IT provider can deploy a team in 2-4 weeks.

What does a managed IT provider do that a CISO doesn't?

A managed provider handles 24/7 monitoring, incident response, endpoint management, backup/disaster recovery, vendor management, and compliance automation. A single CISO handles strategy and oversight but still needs a team for execution. Managed IT becomes that team.

Can we start with managed IT and hire a CISO later?

Yes. This is the best path for growing PE portfolio companies. Use managed IT to establish a secure baseline while you recruit a full-time security leader. The CISO then works with the managed provider instead of building everything from scratch.

What's the cost difference between hiring a CISO and using managed IT?

A CISO costs $200-300K annually plus benefits, tools, and training. Managed IT/security runs $60-80K monthly but includes a full team, 24/7 monitoring, SLA-backed response, and scaling capability. True cost matters more than line-item price.

At what company size should we hire a CISO instead of using managed IT?

100+ employees, regulated data, and mature security operations are the inflection point. Below that, managed IT security is faster, cheaper, and more reliable. At scale, a CISO should partner with a managed provider rather than go solo.

CISO vs. Managed IT: Which Model Fits Your PE Portfolio

The CISO Hiring Trap for PE-Backed Companies

You just closed an add-on acquisition. The seller's security posture is a disaster. Your board meeting is in 60 days. Someone says, "We need to hire a CISO."

That sounds right. It's logical. It's also the slowest, most expensive mistake you can make.

Hiring a full-time CISO for a 40-person company means: 90-day recruitment, $200-300K salary, $50K+ onboarding overhead, and a single point of failure. Worse, that CISO won't have a team, infrastructure, or playbooks on day one. They'll spend three months learning your systems while your security posture worsens.

We've cleaned up after this decision six times in the last two years. The pattern is identical.

The Managed IT Security Model That Works

The alternative is embedded managed security from a provider who understands deal context.

Day one: You get a defined team—security architect, SOC monitoring, incident response, compliance automation. Not a job posting. Not a promise. Actual people, actual infrastructure, SLA-backed response times.

Within 60 days: Threat assessment complete. Vulnerabilities prioritized. Compliance roadmap locked. Your board presentation has teeth because the work is actually done.

Within 180 days: Your environment is hardened, monitored 24/7, and compliant. No hiring cycle. No culture fit risk. No waiting for someone's background check to clear.

The Cost Math Is Not Close

Full-time CISO for three years: $750K salary + $150K benefits + $100K tools/training + 200 hours/year of executive time = roughly $1.2M in true cost.

Managed security and IT integration for three years: $60-80K per month = $2.16M total, but it includes endpoint management, network monitoring, backup/disaster recovery, vendor management, and team coverage during vacations and departures. One person is not backing up a CISO. A team is.

More important: The managed model scales. If you acquire another company, that team grows with you. Your CISO hire? They're already underwater.

When You Actually Need Both

At scale (100+ employees, sensitive data, regulated industry), a full-time security leader becomes necessary. But that CISO should hire a managed IT provider as their force multiplier, not run everything alone.

The operators we work with in this position have a single person focused on strategy, compliance frameworks, and board communication. The team handles execution, monitoring, and response.

Until you're there, managed IT and security from a provider who gets your deal timeline is not a cost-cutting measure. It's your competitive advantage.

The Decision Framework

Ask yourself three questions:

Timeline: Do you need security fixed in 60 days or 6 months?
Scale: Are you growing faster than hiring cycles?
Risk tolerance: Can you afford a single person managing your entire security posture?

If you answered "yes" to any of those, the managed model wins. If you have 200+ employees, regulated data, and a true enterprise security program, hire that CISO. But pair them with a managed provider. Don't ask one person to be your entire security department.

How We Think About This

We're not anti-CISO. We're pro-execution. We've embedded with portfolio companies that had full-time security leadership. We've also taken over from startups that tried to hire their way to security and burned six months in the process.

The operators who move fastest are the ones who distinguish between strategy (executive-level, internal) and execution (distributed, partner-led). Managed IT security handles execution so your leadership can focus on scaling the business.

If your board wants security locked before the next check-in, talk to us. We've done this 40+ times. We know the playbook, the timelines, and the specific work that moves the needle on PE risk metrics.