Small Businesses Hold Back On Tech SpendingSmall Businesses Hold Back On Tech Spending

If you're a small business desperately trying to hold the line on your IT budget, you're not alone. A new CDW survey reveals that fewer SMBs expect technology budgets to improve in the next 6 months.This economy thing can be tough to figure out. The conventional wisdom is that smaller, more agile companies will lead us out of the great recession. But according to the latest CDW IT Monitor report, medium and large companies are now more optimistic about investing in technology than their smaller competitors.

That's not good.

The study says that only 21% of small businesses expect to grow their IT budgets, down 8 percentage points since April. And only 30% expect to acquire new hardware in the next 6 months. On the plus side, 43% of small businesses still expect to get some new software. And while only 6% of small businesses plan to hire new IT workers, that's about the same number who plan to reduce their tech teams.

On the other hand, more than half of medium and large companies feel confident enough to boost their IT spending. More than 80% expect to buy new hardware and slightly more than that are looking to get new software. Some 19% of midsize companies expect to hire new IT folks in the next six months (6% will trim positions), and an encouraging 28% of large companies plan to do so (10% say they'll cut IT staffers).

"This downturn has not followed the path of previous ones, making it more difficult to predict the shape of the recovery," said a statement from Mark Gambill, CDW's executive responsible for market insights. "But IT confidence has held steady for nearly four months, and we're now beginning to see signs of a patchy turnaround with medium and large businesses anticipating future growth."

Whatever happens in IT, though, there's a slight improvement in overall optimism, with increases in the percentage of small, medium and large companies who say their organizations will perform better in the next 6 months:

Let's all cling to that and hope that a rising tide will lift boats of all sizes.

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