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7 Little-Known Facts About IT Pros

A glimpse into the life of an IT professional
Leon Adato

Managing an increasingly complex IT environment and a business landscape that's constantly evolving requires IT pros to work fearlessly and tirelessly to keep modern corporate enterprises running smoothly.

Results from SolarWinds' recent Little Known Facts survey find that, despite donating time for education and problem-solving for end-users, spending countless hours texting with their monitoring systems, and quelling security threats that would otherwise keep them awake at night, IT professionals agree that they tackle all of this and more because they love their jobs.

The survey results provide a glimpse into the often-overlooked aspects of IT pros and the jobs they do, and shed light on the ins and outs of life as an IT pro.

A comprehensive look at the findings show that:
 

IT pros extend beyond the call of duty to solve end-user and business problems

IT pros spend just over two-thirds of their time (65 percent) actually managing IT and IT-related services. What are they doing with the rest?

■ Educating business leaders and end users about IT/technology (18 percent).

■ Fixing office equipment that is NOT related to IT (nine percent).

■ Performing admin duties unrelated to IT (eight percent).
 

IT pros dedicate most of their problem-solving to senior executives

Of the 65 percent of time IT professionals spend on core IT responsibilities, nearly half of that time (47 percent) is dedicated to resolving technology issues from senior executives/chief officers.

■ Rounding out the top three users who take most of IT's time, 43 percent list finance/accounting/procurement as having the most technology issues that require an IT pro to solve, followed by sales/business development personnel at 39 percent.

■ Marketing and PR required the least support, at seven percent.
 

IT pros (at times) communicate with technology more than humans ...

In any given week, nearly one-third of IT pros surveyed spend more time communicating with their IT monitoring systems than people close to them: 30 percent say they receive even more texts from their IT monitoring systems (for example, system alerts) each week than they do from their friends/family/loved ones.
 

… but they want to connect on social media

LinkedIn is the preferred method to network and connect with peers, according to 57 percent of IT pros surveyed.

Nearly half of all IT professionals (45 percent) use Facebook as their preferred social media platform, followed by Twitter (29 percent) and Instagram (nine percent). Just three percent, however, feel compelled to share face-filtered selfies on Snapchat.
 

IT pros don't fear the machine

Despite industry hype that AI and machine learning are threatening their jobs, keeping their organizations secure is IT pros' greatest concern: 89 percent of IT professionals surveyed most fear a security breach. Just nine percent fear AI will take their jobs, a finding that is echoed by a recent McKinsey report on AI's nuances. 
 

IT pros want you to ask for help!

One in four IT pros surveyed agreed that when a user tries to fix their own problem, there is a two-to-one chance that they'll make the problem worse.
 

IT pros chronically overwork — but still love being an IT professional

91 percent of IT pros surveyed work overtime hours — and of those, 57 percent do so with no compensation for working overtime.

■ Over half of IT pros work at least 10 overtime hours per month, and one in five IT pros works 20 or more overtime hours per month.

■ Of the 44 percent who do receive compensation for working overtime, the majority receive something other than monetary compensation, such as comp days.

■ 94 percent of IT pros surveyed enjoy being an IT pro, and over half of all IT pros love what they do.

These little-known facts demonstrate how much IT pros do to keep businesses up and running, and how we as the end-user can (and should) do our best to support and appreciate them.

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According to Auvik's 2025 IT Trends Report, 60% of IT professionals feel at least moderately burned out on the job, with 43% stating that their workload is contributing to work stress. At the same time, many IT professionals are naming AI and machine learning as key areas they'd most like to upskill ...

Businesses that face downtime or outages risk financial and reputational damage, as well as reducing partner, shareholder, and customer trust. One of the major challenges that enterprises face is implementing a robust business continuity plan. What's the solution? The answer may lie in disaster recovery tactics such as truly immutable storage and regular disaster recovery testing ...

IT spending is expected to jump nearly 10% in 2025, and organizations are now facing pressure to manage costs without slowing down critical functions like observability. To meet the challenge, leaders are turning to smarter, more cost effective business strategies. Enter stage right: OpenTelemetry, the missing piece of the puzzle that is no longer just an option but rather a strategic advantage ...

Amidst the threat of cyberhacks and data breaches, companies install several security measures to keep their business safely afloat. These measures aim to protect businesses, employees, and crucial data. Yet, employees perceive them as burdensome. Frustrated with complex logins, slow access, and constant security checks, workers decide to completely bypass all security set-ups ...

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In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

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7 Little-Known Facts About IT Pros

A glimpse into the life of an IT professional
Leon Adato

Managing an increasingly complex IT environment and a business landscape that's constantly evolving requires IT pros to work fearlessly and tirelessly to keep modern corporate enterprises running smoothly.

Results from SolarWinds' recent Little Known Facts survey find that, despite donating time for education and problem-solving for end-users, spending countless hours texting with their monitoring systems, and quelling security threats that would otherwise keep them awake at night, IT professionals agree that they tackle all of this and more because they love their jobs.

The survey results provide a glimpse into the often-overlooked aspects of IT pros and the jobs they do, and shed light on the ins and outs of life as an IT pro.

A comprehensive look at the findings show that:
 

IT pros extend beyond the call of duty to solve end-user and business problems

IT pros spend just over two-thirds of their time (65 percent) actually managing IT and IT-related services. What are they doing with the rest?

■ Educating business leaders and end users about IT/technology (18 percent).

■ Fixing office equipment that is NOT related to IT (nine percent).

■ Performing admin duties unrelated to IT (eight percent).
 

IT pros dedicate most of their problem-solving to senior executives

Of the 65 percent of time IT professionals spend on core IT responsibilities, nearly half of that time (47 percent) is dedicated to resolving technology issues from senior executives/chief officers.

■ Rounding out the top three users who take most of IT's time, 43 percent list finance/accounting/procurement as having the most technology issues that require an IT pro to solve, followed by sales/business development personnel at 39 percent.

■ Marketing and PR required the least support, at seven percent.
 

IT pros (at times) communicate with technology more than humans ...

In any given week, nearly one-third of IT pros surveyed spend more time communicating with their IT monitoring systems than people close to them: 30 percent say they receive even more texts from their IT monitoring systems (for example, system alerts) each week than they do from their friends/family/loved ones.
 

… but they want to connect on social media

LinkedIn is the preferred method to network and connect with peers, according to 57 percent of IT pros surveyed.

Nearly half of all IT professionals (45 percent) use Facebook as their preferred social media platform, followed by Twitter (29 percent) and Instagram (nine percent). Just three percent, however, feel compelled to share face-filtered selfies on Snapchat.
 

IT pros don't fear the machine

Despite industry hype that AI and machine learning are threatening their jobs, keeping their organizations secure is IT pros' greatest concern: 89 percent of IT professionals surveyed most fear a security breach. Just nine percent fear AI will take their jobs, a finding that is echoed by a recent McKinsey report on AI's nuances. 
 

IT pros want you to ask for help!

One in four IT pros surveyed agreed that when a user tries to fix their own problem, there is a two-to-one chance that they'll make the problem worse.
 

IT pros chronically overwork — but still love being an IT professional

91 percent of IT pros surveyed work overtime hours — and of those, 57 percent do so with no compensation for working overtime.

■ Over half of IT pros work at least 10 overtime hours per month, and one in five IT pros works 20 or more overtime hours per month.

■ Of the 44 percent who do receive compensation for working overtime, the majority receive something other than monetary compensation, such as comp days.

■ 94 percent of IT pros surveyed enjoy being an IT pro, and over half of all IT pros love what they do.

These little-known facts demonstrate how much IT pros do to keep businesses up and running, and how we as the end-user can (and should) do our best to support and appreciate them.

Hot Topics

The Latest

According to Auvik's 2025 IT Trends Report, 60% of IT professionals feel at least moderately burned out on the job, with 43% stating that their workload is contributing to work stress. At the same time, many IT professionals are naming AI and machine learning as key areas they'd most like to upskill ...

Businesses that face downtime or outages risk financial and reputational damage, as well as reducing partner, shareholder, and customer trust. One of the major challenges that enterprises face is implementing a robust business continuity plan. What's the solution? The answer may lie in disaster recovery tactics such as truly immutable storage and regular disaster recovery testing ...

IT spending is expected to jump nearly 10% in 2025, and organizations are now facing pressure to manage costs without slowing down critical functions like observability. To meet the challenge, leaders are turning to smarter, more cost effective business strategies. Enter stage right: OpenTelemetry, the missing piece of the puzzle that is no longer just an option but rather a strategic advantage ...

Amidst the threat of cyberhacks and data breaches, companies install several security measures to keep their business safely afloat. These measures aim to protect businesses, employees, and crucial data. Yet, employees perceive them as burdensome. Frustrated with complex logins, slow access, and constant security checks, workers decide to completely bypass all security set-ups ...

Image
Cloudbrink's Personal SASE services provide last-mile acceleration and reduction in latency

In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 13, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at EMA discusses hybrid multi-cloud networking strategy ... 

In high-traffic environments, the sheer volume and unpredictable nature of network incidents can quickly overwhelm even the most skilled teams, hindering their ability to react swiftly and effectively, potentially impacting service availability and overall business performance. This is where closed-loop remediation comes into the picture: an IT management concept designed to address the escalating complexity of modern networks ...

In 2025, enterprise workflows are undergoing a seismic shift. Propelled by breakthroughs in generative AI (GenAI), large language models (LLMs), and natural language processing (NLP), a new paradigm is emerging — agentic AI. This technology is not just automating tasks; it's reimagining how organizations make decisions, engage customers, and operate at scale ...

In the early days of the cloud revolution, business leaders perceived cloud services as a means of sidelining IT organizations. IT was too slow, too expensive, or incapable of supporting new technologies. With a team of developers, line of business managers could deploy new applications and services in the cloud. IT has been fighting to retake control ever since. Today, IT is back in the driver's seat, according to new research by Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) ...

In today's fast-paced and increasingly complex network environments, Network Operations Centers (NOCs) are the backbone of ensuring continuous uptime, smooth service delivery, and rapid issue resolution. However, the challenges faced by NOC teams are only growing. In a recent study, 78% state network complexity has grown significantly over the last few years while 84% regularly learn about network issues from users. It is imperative we adopt a new approach to managing today's network experiences ...

Image
Broadcom

From growing reliance on FinOps teams to the increasing attention on artificial intelligence (AI), and software licensing, the Flexera 2025 State of the Cloud Report digs into how organizations are improving cloud spend efficiency, while tackling the complexities of emerging technologies ...