Helping IT Professionals with the business side of their business
Since 2006
Committed to your success, Small Biz Thoughts has produced massive amounts of content and training materials for small business owners, primarily IT consultants, VARs (value added resellers), and MSPs (managed service providers).
Some of the books Karl has authored
What we do
Our daily goal
We help IT professionals to be more successful on the business side of their business.
Our Mission
To make every IT consultant as successful as possible.
Because we all tend to work in the moment. Karl works both in the moment, and in the future."
From KPEnterprises to Small Biz Thoughts and beyond
A brief company history of experience, brands, and services
Before becoming an IT consultant to small businesses, Karl had a long history of supporting enterprise and mid-market corporations. He helped companies get connected to the network we now call “The Internet” He also supported a series of online, modem-based information businesses, and helped them transition to modern Internet operations.
In these companies, Karl managed multi-million dollar budgets and large staffs who managed remote access programs, multi-state backups, and a variety of operating systems ranging from mainframe to HP 3000 “mini” computers, Novell, and Windows NT.
Tempted by the lure of the Internet, Karl founded KPEnterprises, a small businesses consulting company, in 1995. He started as an outsourced technical resource for a series of large companies, working for one company at a time. Gradually, he migrated to working with a number of smaller clients.
As the industry evolved, the Internet grew, and all the small businesses in the world decided that they needed to get connected, KPEnterprises grew. In 2000 the company was incorporated as KPEnterprises Business Consulting, Inc.
Coming from the world of larger businesses, maintenance contracts, and ticketing systems, Karl applied all of these practices in his SMB IT consulting business. He also documented everything from standard operating procedures to how every client system was configured. Karl didn’t know that none of this was common in the small end of the IT market.
In 2005, Karl published the first book on how to document small business networks. It was distributed in association with SMB Nation and became one of the first “best selling” books in the SMB IT community – along with Harry Brelsford’s guides to Small Business Server.
After the success of The Network Documentation Workbook, Karl and Harry produced The SAN Primer for SMB, and then Karl released Service Agreements for SMB Consultants: A Quick-Start Guide to Managed Services – the first book ever published on Managed Services. Shortly after that, he published Relax Focus Succeed, a guide to work-life balance.
In 2013, Karl sold his IT company to his service manager, and worked on special projects within that company (not called America’s Tech Support) until it was sold again a few years later.
By 2014, Karl had written thirteen books, including the four-volume Managed Services Operations Manual and the best-selling book ever written on managed services: Managed Services in a Month. He also started teaching a series of 5-week courses at what we now call IT Service Provider University.
Karl continued writing, speaking, and traveling as he built the new brand – Small Biz Thoughts – into one of the most widely followed companies in the managed services and SMB IT industry. Karl started another consulting company in 2015 and sold it in 2017 so he could focus on writing, training, and coach.
The Small Biz Thoughts Technology Community was founded in 2018 as a place for IT consultants to find the core resources they need to make their businesses more successful. Books, classes, audio programs, checklists, standard operating procedures, and more.
Each year, IT Service Provider University (ITSPU) added more 5-week courses, all focused 100% on helping IT consultants to be better at the business side of running an IT business. In addition to continuing education classes, ITSPU offers Certification Pathways to deepen learning and understanding in specific areas.
In 2021, Karl founded the National Society of IT Service Providers, a natural progression of his advocacy around improving the professionalism of the industry. The NSITSP is a 501(c)6 non-profit membership association. Karl served as the executive director for a few years, and now serves as a non-voting member of the Board of Directors.
Our Values
Honesty & Integrity
Fairness
Good Personal Relationships
Healthy Life / Long Life
Helping Others
Meet your instructor / mentor / coach
Karl W. Palachuk
Hi, I’m Karl. I built and sold two successful IT Service Companies in Sacramento, California and am one of the founders of the Managed Services Business Model. In 2007-2008, I moved my business and clients 100% to the cloud.
Since then, I’ve written over 20 books, mostly on how you can run a better consulting business. I teach a lot of IT business classes, and take a handful of coaching clients each year.
I’ve trained thousands of consultants across the globe on managed services, cloud services, and work-life balance. And now, through this Community, I get to share the same resources, support, and knowledge with you!
Our mission is to make YOU as successful as possible.
Karl's Personal Motivations
- Accomplish things
- Relax
- Heal
- Help my family and other people
- Grow personally and professionally
Code of Ethics
Small Biz Thoughts (Great Little Book, IT Service Provider University, SBT, SMB Community Podcast, etc.) is fundamentally a company designed around the concept of helping others to be successful. We literally exist to help as many people as possible to be successful. To that end, we have adopted the following Code of Ethics to drive our behavior and interactions inside and outside our company.
We are honest
In our work with clients, prospects, and strangers, we are committed to honesty at all levels. This drives several elements of our behavior.
We are competent
That means we know what we’re doing, or we don’t do it. It also means that we are constantly dedicated to learning new things. We are committed to never-ending education in a world that is always changing.
We only work with people we like
This includes employees, clients, vendors, distributors, advertisers, etc. We treat everyone with respect, both publicly and behind closed doors. In turn, we insist that the people we work with treat us and others with respect.
We are committed to work-life balance
Relax Focus Succeed. We certainly work hard, but we are committed to giving our employees time to relax, charge their batteries, and then come back to work with renewed creativity and productivity.
We are fair, professional, and compassionate
This is a bit like the “golden rule” of a service business. We treat everyone (employees, clients, vendors, etc.) as we would like to be treated. We remember every day that we are people working with people.
We are committed to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Of course we work hard not to discriminate. But beyond that, we are committed to making everyone feel welcome to show up as their whole selves. This approach welcomes a great variety of “different-ness” and creativity to work its way into our daily operations.
More from Small Biz Thoughts
We produce content and build community over a variety of brands and websites. But, regardless of the URL, the mission is the same: to make every IT Professional a successful IT Professional.
Best-selling resources geared toward small to medium business consultants.
The longest running Blog in the IT space
To improve the professionalism and credibility of the IT Profession
MSP Webinars are free and available to anyone interested in Managed Services.
Continuing education for IT Service Providers on the business side of their business
To help you learn what works and what doesn’t work – in bite-size pieces you can apply every day
