hobgoblin

Managed IT and security · Lubbock, Texas

The work gets done while you sleep.

Hobgoblin runs networking, cloud and the security that connects them for small and midsize businesses across West Texas. Help desk, devices, identity, backups and the security watch, kept by one team for one per-user price.

An empty office with rows of computers ready for the day

Why the name

In the old English stories, the hobgoblin was a household spirit. It kept the house in order overnight, asked little in return and only made trouble when it was treated badly. We kept the first two parts.

Hob: an old English nickname for Robin, as in Robin Goodfellow, the best known of the household spirits.

What we keep

The whole house, run by one team.

Nine disciplines, one number to call and one bill. We operate all of them under both plans, on the hours your plan covers.

Help desk

Remote support for the everyday: passwords, printers, Outlook and the laptop that won't join the Wi-Fi.

Network management

Segmented networks, zero-trust remote access and SD-WAN that keeps you online when one circuit goes down.

Firewall management

Every rule documented and justified, segmentation enforced, intrusion prevention tuned and VPN access reviewed each quarter.

Azure and Microsoft 365

Hardened tenants, conditional access, Defender for Cloud and restores we've tested for real.

Identity and access

Phishing-resistant sign-in, conditional access and admin rights kept to the people who need them, plus onboarding and offboarding for every hire and departure.

Managed endpoints

Every laptop, desktop and server deployed, patched and tuned, with compromised machines quarantined automatically.

SIEM and detection

Logs collected and correlated, with alert rules tuned past the vendor defaults so the real problems stand out.

Vulnerability management

Continuous scanning, ranked by what attackers can actually exploit, followed by the fix instead of a PDF.

Backup and disaster recovery

Immutable backups, restores tested on a schedule and a recovery runbook we've rehearsed before you need it.

How we work

Methodology over reaction.

Most IT shops wait for something to break. We spend the quiet time making sure fewer things can.

  1. Analyse

    We map how your systems fit together, learn what normal looks like and find the structural weak points before an attacker does. Risk gets measured and ranked so the money goes where it matters.

  2. Engineer

    We build the fixes into the infrastructure itself: zero-trust access, firm identity boundaries and immutable backups, defined as code wherever we can.

  3. React

    When something does happen, the response is already written and rehearsed. We isolate the threat fast and restore operations with the evidence intact.

Network cables plugged into a router with link lights on

A night's work

What a quiet night looks like.

Most of the work happens when nobody's in the office. Patches go out after hours, backups finish overnight, and when something trips an alarm, a person looks at it.

You wake up to one short note that explains what happened and what we did about it.

Example night · Night Watch plan On watch
  1. Patch window opens. 41 workstations updated, 2 reboots held for morning.
  2. Nightly backups finish for 3 servers and the Microsoft 365 tenant.
  3. AlertEndpoint protection flags an odd PowerShell launch on FRONT-DESK-02.
  4. Device isolated from the network while we look.
  5. Cause found: a browser extension pulling a script. Extension removed, device released.
  6. Scheduled restore test on the file server passes.
  7. Morning note sent to the office manager.

The bargain

Two plans. Pick the hours you need covered.

Both plans include everything we keep. The difference is when we answer.

Business hours

Day Keeper

$75per user, per month

For offices that need their IT run properly during the working day.

  • Everything in What we keep
  • Help desk and response during business hours
  • Security monitoring with business-hours response
  • Monthly report in plain English

Around the clock

Night Watch

$125per user, per month

Everything in Day Keeper, plus someone on watch at night, on weekends and on holidays.

  • Everything in Day Keeper
  • 24/7 response to security incidents
  • 24/7 response to critical outages
  • Morning note after any overnight event

Business hours are 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Central, Monday through Friday, excluding U.S. federal holidays. After-hours response on Night Watch covers security incidents and critical outages. A forgotten password waits for morning.

One plan per organisation. Onboarding, projects and on-site visits are quoted separately.

Beyond the plans

Some work doesn't fit a monthly seat. These are available to plan clients and anyone else who needs them.

Projects

Architecture and build work with a clear finish line: network rebuilds, cloud migrations and zero-trust rollouts.

Scoped per engagement

Incident response

For a breach in progress: containment, forensics, eviction and secure recovery, whether or not you're already a client.

Hourly emergency rate

Bespoke work

Risk assessments, architecture reviews, control engineering and anything else that falls outside a standard package.

Scoped to your environment

Your tools, your keys

We run your systems. You own them.

You buy direct

Licences and hardware come straight from the vendor at the vendor's price. We don't resell anything or mark it up.

We recommend a stack

We'll tell you which tools we'd run and why. Organisations on our recommended stack get our full security commitments. Bring your own and we'll support it as well as it allows.

Nothing is held hostage

The tenants, the admin accounts and the documentation are yours from day one. If you leave, we hand everything over cleanly.

House rules

What's in, what's extra and how we start.

Spelled out now so nobody gets surprised later.

Included

  • Remote support during your plan's hours
  • Monitoring, patching and backup checks
  • Security operation and incident containment
  • User onboarding and offboarding
  • A quarterly review of where things stand

Quoted separately

  • Projects such as migrations and office moves
  • On-site visits
  • Full recovery work after an incident is contained
  • Hardware and licences, which you buy direct

Before we start

  • A paid onboarding walk-through of your environment
  • A working baseline: MFA everywhere, supported operating systems and tested backups
  • Our response commitments begin once that baseline is in place

Need the policies to match the systems?

Our sister practice, GOVERNANCE Ltd., handles risk, compliance, privacy and AI governance. Combined seats are priced together. When you need an independent attestation, we'll say so and bring in a third party.

Visit governance.ltd →

About

Built by an operator.

Hobgoblin is the operations practice of a West Texas firm that has done security, risk and compliance work since 2024.

Tim Brewer, MSIM

Founder and principal

Tim spent nearly a decade inside a regulated communications company, ending as its business information security officer, data protection officer and AI governance officer at the same time. Before security, he ran telecom operations and support teams. He holds a master's in information management from Arizona State University.

He's also a trained National Weather Service Skywarn storm spotter, so watching the sky for trouble at odd hours comes naturally.

  • 9 audit cyclesPCI DSS and HITRUST maintained with zero findings
  • $1 millionCut from the budget with no loss of compliance
  • 100 percentSecurity awareness training participation
  • ZeroSuccessful breaches on his watch

Questions

Things people ask first.

Are you a help desk?

We include one. It's the front door to everything else we run, from patching to the security watch.

Will someone answer at 2 a.m.?

On Night Watch, yes, for security incidents and critical outages. A forgotten password waits until morning.

Do we have to use your tools?

No. We'll recommend a stack and explain why. You buy whatever you choose directly from the vendor, and organisations on our recommended stack get our full security commitments.

Do you come on site?

Most of the work is remote. When something needs hands on hardware, we quote the visit before we drive out.

What happens if we leave?

You keep everything: accounts, admin access and documentation. We hand it over cleanly and remove our own monitoring tools on the way out.

Why name an IT company after a goblin?

Because the old household spirit did the chores overnight and kept the place in order. Also, it's easier to remember than a set of initials.

Get in touch

Leave a light on.

Tell us how many people you have and what keeps breaking. We reply within one business day and set up a walk-through.

Lubbock, Texas · Central time

A farmhouse with its lights on under a night sky full of stars