In-House IT Hire vs Managed Plan: A Lubbock Salary Math Walkthrough

A common conversation we have with growing businesses goes like this: “We’re at 25 people. Should we just hire an IT person instead of paying an MSP?”

It is the right question to ask. It is also a question with a less obvious answer than people expect. Here’s the actual math for a Lubbock-area business in 2026.

The fully-loaded cost of one IT hire

A competent IT generalist in West Texas in 2026 — someone who can manage a Microsoft 365 tenant, run a network, do basic security work, and not freak out when a server alerts at 3am — earns:

• Junior (2-4 years experience): $52,000 to $68,000 base
• Mid (5-8 years): $70,000 to $95,000 base
• Senior (10+, with security or specialty): $95,000 to $125,000 base

Pick the middle of the road: $80,000 base for a mid-level hire. Now load it.

Loaded cost factors:

• Payroll taxes (FICA, FUTA, SUTA): roughly 8% → $6,400
• Health insurance contribution (employer share, family plan): $14,000-$22,000 → call it $16,000
• Retirement match (4-6% of salary): $4,000
• PTO/holidays as a productivity discount: ~10% → $8,000 of unworked-but-paid time
• Hardware (laptop, monitor, phone, software licenses dedicated to them): $4,500 first year, $1,500/year amortized
• Recruitment cost (agency or internal time): typically $8,000-$15,000 amortized over expected tenure
• Continuing education / certifications: $3,000/year minimum to keep skills current

Year-one total: approximately $121,000-$130,000 fully loaded. Steady-state ongoing: approximately $115,000-$120,000.

That’s one person.

What that one person can actually do

A single IT generalist in a 25-person business is on call for everything: tickets, projects, vendor calls, compliance, security, hardware procurement, networking, the random emergency. When they take vacation, you have no IT. When they get sick, you have no IT. When the family has a baby, you have one week of slack and then no IT.

They are also good at maybe two of the eight specialty areas a modern IT department covers. The other six are blind spots. A typical specialty list:

1. Networking and firewall
2. Server administration (Windows, Linux)
3. Cloud / Microsoft 365 / Google Workspace
4. Cybersecurity / EDR / vulnerability management
5. Endpoint management and patching
6. Telephone systems and VoIP
7. Backup and disaster recovery
8. Compliance documentation

Nobody is good at all of these. The rare engineer who can do all of them costs $140k+ and probably does not want your job.

What a Carbon-tier Managed plan provides at the same price point

For comparison, our Carbon plan at $295/user/month for a 25-person business comes out to:

• 25 users × $295 = $7,375/month → $88,500/year
• Plus a server at $400/month if applicable → +$4,800
• Approximate total: $93,300/year

What you get for that:

• A dedicated engineer assigned to your account, by name
• Full team behind that engineer (eight specialties, on tap)
• 24/7 monitoring and after-hours included
• Full security stack (EDR, dark web monitoring, phishing simulations, password manager, vulnerability scanning)
• Unlimited remote and on-site support
• Monthly business review meetings
• Quarterly Blueprint Assessment refresh
• Compliance documentation kept current
• Policy library
• IT budget preparation
• Asset lifecycle management
• Cabling included
• Project work at $150/hr instead of $200/hr (the plan rate perk)

That is materially more than one hire delivers, for a similar or lower fully-loaded cost.

When the in-house hire actually makes sense

There are real cases where you should hire:

You are above 50 users with specialized in-house knowledge needs. A 75-person law firm with three offices and a custom case management system needs someone who lives in your environment full time. The Carbon model still works at this scale, but adding a dedicated in-house person on top is reasonable.

You have specialty needs that are core to your business. A medical research practice that runs custom data pipelines needs a full-time data engineer, not an IT generalist. That is a different hire and a different conversation.

You are growing fast enough that the MSP can’t keep up. Some businesses outgrow the model. We tell people when this happens. We also help them hire the right first internal person and continue serving as overflow.

The hybrid that actually works

The model that wins for businesses in the 30-100 user range is hybrid:

• One internal IT person (mid-level, $80-95k loaded)
• Carbon-tier MSP relationship for everything they don’t want to or can’t do (security stack, compliance, after-hours, vendor management, project surge capacity)

This costs more than either alone (typically $180-200k/year combined), but produces an IT operation that small companies usually only get when they hit 200+ users. The internal person becomes the customer-facing layer; the MSP is the depth of bench behind them.

The conversation we usually have

When a business asks us “should we hire?”, we run the math live in the meeting and tell them the honest answer:

• Under 30 users: stay on Steel or Titanium. Hiring will cost more than it returns.
• 30-50 users: Carbon, with a candid conversation about whether you have ops needs that warrant an internal resource.
• 50-100 users: hybrid. We help you pick the right first hire and stay engaged.
• 100+: full internal team, MSP transitions to project/specialty work.

The trap most businesses fall into is hiring at 15-20 users because it feels grown-up. The math almost never works.

A real number for your business

If you want to see the math on your specific scenario, the free IT Blueprint Assessment is the easiest way. We walk your office, count what’s there, and show you what each path actually costs over three years. You keep the numbers either way.