When you’re the only IT person at your organization, it may feel like you are wearing a bunch of different hats.

“Enterprise applications, infrastructure and operations, [and] security usually falls to you…in addition to running all of IT,” Heller Search Associates Managing Director Kelly Doyle, who has about 20 years of executive recruitment experience, told IT Brew.

Now it may be time to add one more cap to your collection: the negotiation hat.

No team members in your department? No problem. But how do you make the case for a raise for all your efforts when there’s nothing to compare your performance to? IT Brew caught up with two career experts to discuss how IT professionals who are their department’s sole contributor can navigate negotiation talks.

Read more, get real paid.—BM

In the tech industry, there are certain truisms that set it apart from other sectors of the economy—perhaps none more striking than its embrace of regulations.

Rohit Ghai, CEO of cybersecurity company RSA, told IT Brew at last month’s RSAC conference that he has seen little indication that federal regulators are substantially pulling back on Biden administration efforts to put more guardrails in place. Ghai said he and his tech industry colleagues are welcoming this approach, at least so far.

“The current tone is that, hey, we want deregulation that is business friendly,” Ghai said. “Having said that, on the cyber side of the regulation, I have seen no signs of taking the foot off the gas. Because, in general, all the regulation there is deemed as legit, and actually advancing the business agenda as opposed to impeding it.”

Cutting it close. Though the Trump administration is pursuing many deregulatory policies, the administration hasn’t taken direct action to cut regulations on cybersecurity. But they have cut staff at CISA—how many positions, they won’t say—and on May 2, the day after RSAC ended, the administration announced plans to cut $491 million, or 17%, from CISA’s $3 billion budget.

Yet Ghai still feels positive.—EH

There once was a time when a piece of software would be loaded from a disk onto your computer. And that was that; the software lived on that computer in perpetuity.

Over the last 25 years, that relationship between software provider and user has evolved drastically, transforming how the entire tech industry operates in the process. The growth of cloud computing and widespread internet connections gave rise to a new model for how businesses and people alike access digital technology: software as a service, or SaaS.

That model boosted a generation of bootstrapping startups that might not otherwise have been able to afford top-shelf enterprise software. Now, a new revolution in giant generative AI models could be poised to further shift tech industry business models.

But first, let’s back up.—PK