We often think about disasters in the context that they completely destroy the office, rendering your business incapable of operations. However, this is only part of what is encompassed by the term “disaster,” and the whole picture is far more terrifying. Any disruption to your operations can be considered a disaster in its own right, so we wanted to take some time to go over what you should look out for with your disaster planning.
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There is always the possibility that you have been involved with a data breach and you simply have not been contacted by the affected party. Plus, if a hacker has managed to crack a website or service without being detected, you wouldn’t be notified in any case, either. Ask yourself this question: if I were to be involved with a data breach, how would I know it, and what can I do about it? And what is my data being used for anyway?
With inflation proving to be a significant concern for businesses at the moment, reaching highs that it hasn’t in decades, there is a distinct need for businesses to get as much value as they can out of the investments they make.
Let’s discuss a few technologies that offer this more desirable cost/benefit ratio so you can consider them for your own use.
When it comes to drives for your computer or workstation, you have a couple of options available to you, one of which is the solid state drive, or SSD. What’s the difference between your typical hard drive and an SSD, you ask? Well, today we’ll find out. We’ll break down some of the details about SSDs, including how they are different from your traditional hard disk drive, and why you might consider implementing one.
In today’s business, sharing files is easy and something many workers take for granted. Unfortunately, not all file-sharing methods are secure. When efficiency is prioritized over security, it can often lead to extremely troublesome situations. For this week’s tip, we thought we’d go through a half dozen practices you can take to ensure your files get to where you need them to get safely and securely.
You might be surprised by some of the security breaches and vulnerabilities out there, including some for apps that you would never suspect, like Windows’ Calculator application. Hackers are always looking for new ways to infect endpoints, and nothing exemplifies this better than this particular threat, one which utilizes the Windows 7 calculator app to launch attacks against Microsoft operating systems.
Look, I’m not going to pretend that the executive level of any size of business doesn’t already have plenty on its plate. Having said that, it is important that a business’ top dogs are on the same page as its IT team members. Let’s run through the different points that this relationship should focus on for your operational benefit.
Every business depends on productivity, but there are many different forms that productivity can take. The types that every business prefers are the actions that result in improved revenue generation. That’s not to say that all work that is done for your business isn’t important, but the more that can be done to make money, the better off your business will be. Let’s take a look at three ways your business can shift the way they do things with the use of technology.
The Internet of Things can be a tricky concept to wrap your head around, and it certainly doesn’t help that so many new smart devices are being added to it day-in and day-out. Let’s take a look at what makes up the Internet of Things and why it’s important to know what it is from a business perspective.
Let’s begin by making one thing abundantly clear—all businesses and industries could potentially be targeted by ransomware, regardless of their size or target audience. However, as of late, some industries have been targeted more and more. Let’s examine some of the commonly targeted industries that ransomware is frequently waged against.
When it comes to your technology infrastructure, it’s natural that some of your solutions will be more used than others, but do you know where you are wasting money and resources? Today’s blog article is all about the digital employee experience, or DEX, and how you can use it to better your business’ relationship with its technology solutions.
Modern mobile devices are a bit of a double-edged sword for today’s businesses: on the one hand, they are critical for the productivity that is required of today’s organizations, but on the other, they also come with the very real chance of security issues. The permissions you give (or don’t) to these applications can have an impact on this risk.
Let me ask you a question: is there anything in your office that doesn’t rely on technology in some way, shape, or form (and no, the old coffeepot that makes the perfect cup doesn’t count)? Increasingly, the answer to that question is “no.” Let’s review how much the average business nowadays relies on IT to really reinforce how ubiquitous technology has become.
Let me ask you a few questions—first, how confident are you that you could spot an online ruse, and second, did you know there’s a stain on your shirt right now?
Did you look?
If so, you’ve just fallen for the school playground version of social engineering, a serious threat. Let’s discuss the kind that you’re more likely to see in terms of your business’ cybersecurity.
Running a business is stressful, but so is thinking about a future where that business (and its data) no longer exists. If you’re not careful with your preparedness, you could stare down a disaster with no hopes of recovery. This is why we urge you to take proactive action now—so you can prevent these kinds of scenarios from taking your business off the market for good.
As a business professional, it’s your responsibility to protect your company’s digital assets from cybercrime, but the path forward is not always so easy or clear-cut. Without a thorough knowledge and expertise of IT security at your disposal, it can be challenging to protect your infrastructure as adequately as it needs to be. Here are some of the common issues that involve cybersecurity, as well as how you can address them.
The past few years have made many people understandably antsy about their health and spending extended amounts of time around other people—which can make coming into the office a very, very stressful experience for some. How can you make your office a healthier place so your team can feel a little more secure as they work?
Your business’ Facebook Page is about as important of a marketing tool for your business as your website is. For some of your prospects, your Facebook page is their introduction to you and your business. With that being the case, you, no doubt, want to make not only a good impression on your clients and prospects, but you’ll also want a URL that is easy to market and share.
Your business is your livelihood, so it only makes sense to invest in its protections so that your livelihood is secure. This will require a strategic approach. Let’s go over what your business needs to remain sufficiently secure, and what you should look for from each to get the best, most secure option.
Chances are pretty good that, by this point, you’ve heard of burnout—maybe you’ve even suffered from it before yourself—but, just in case you’re a remarkably lucky human being, it’s the phenomenon where your employees become disengaged to the point where their performance suffers. While this isn’t good in any facet of your business, it can be especially damaging in terms of your security.
Passwords are just one part of a comprehensive security strategy, but they are a crucial one. You must make sure that you are investing adequate time and effort into making sure your passwords are secure. This is easier said than done, but by the end of today’s short blog article, you’ll have all the information you need to craft excellent passwords for your accounts.
What does your IT budget look like for the remainder of this year? According to Gartner, your IT costs might be increasing. So, we ask you this: are you being intentional with your IT spending, and are you spending your business’ hard-earned revenue on technology which advances your organization’s ability to succeed? Let’s take a look at Gartner’s study to see what we can learn from patterns in IT expenses.
Let’s get right to brass tacks. Your business is likely vulnerable to cybersecurity attacks. There are a whole lot of things you should be doing to protect your organization, but this one task is something you can do right now to save your business a lot of stress if something were to take down your network and cause a major disruption.
Have you ever wondered how some platforms will only have you log in once for all of your various needs, even though they might be different applications, websites, or services? This is essentially what single sign-on is, and it’s quite common in the technology world today. What is single sign-on exactly, and what kind of security does it actually provide for organizations that use it?
Insurance is a great asset, should you ever need it… including where your business technology is concerned. If you weren’t aware, there is a form of insurance—cyber insurance—that you can purchase in case your business suffers from a data breach.
Is this additional form of insurance worth the investment? Absolutely.
Sticky Keys—the Windows accessibility feature that keeps modifier keys like Shift and Ctrl active after you’ve pressed them—have a legitimate and necessary purpose for some. However, those who don’t need Sticky Keys can find them immensely annoying. Let’s go over how to deactivate sticky keys if you don’t need them.
With Amazon’s annual Prime Day having come and gone, we can’t help but wonder how many of you bought consumer electronics while they were on sale through the web retailer. If you did, that’s amazing, and we’re glad you got what you’re looking for. However, we do want to strongly urge you to consider disposing of your old electronics in an environmentally conscious way.
When we think about cybersecurity, we usually think about protecting our computers from viruses, right?
I’d imagine a few of our older readers remember a time when you would go to the store and buy antivirus software that came in a big brightly-colored box with a CD in it each year.
As you probably already know, things aren’t as simple anymore.
Remember about a decade ago when all of the tech experts were predicting that most work would be done on a touch-screen device, prompting many professionals to purchase the latest and greatest tablets? Although tablet sales have not kept up over the years, they are still perfectly usable for personal purposes—maybe just not in the workplace. Still, we have to ask, is there a place for tablets in the office environment?
Everyone has a smartphone, but only a fraction of people use it productively. Instead of using your smartphone for wasting time, you could be using it to stay productive and get more done, reducing your stress levels and creating a better work life. Today, we’ll give you three useful tips on how to change the way you use your smartphone.
With cloud computing working wonders for small and medium-sized businesses of all types, you may gain confidence in finding hosted platforms that can help your business. Make no mistake about it, the cloud can work for your business in one way or another. This week, let’s go through how cloud options can help you improve your business’ computing.
When you virtualize a software solution, you are essentially storing it in an online environment where it can live. In other words, it remains in the cloud and is accessed through the Internet. This approach is helpful for many businesses, so why not flip this concept on its head and give hardware virtualization a shot? You might find that virtual workstations, for example, offer many benefits that can help your company be more productive and efficient.
Updating your technology is one business task that needs to happen if you want to optimize your operations. Some companies, however, still rely on legacy systems that could be holding them back from peak performance. It’s difficult to update legacy systems without comprehensive IT knowledge and proficiency, which is why you have us!
The cloud is a great business tool and resource, enabling businesses to offset a lot of their IT workload onto these providers. If you haven’t migrated some or all of your business’ technology to take advantage of the cloud, it is certainly something to consider.
If you’re already considering it, we wanted to offer a few tips to help make the process more effective for you.
It feels like streaming is everywhere these days, from video content to music to video games. Coincidentally, it also happens that innovations in cloud streaming have allowed these entertainment mediums to flourish in “as-a-service” type offerings. Just how have the innovations in technology allowed streaming services to grow and expand? Let’s investigate.
Have you ever wondered why it sometimes takes longer than you might expect for certain tasks to be accomplished with your business’ network? It turns out that technology is far from a simple thing, and small issues can seriously derail productivity and efficiency of complex information systems, one of which is the notorious network bottleneck. How can you identify and rectify this issue for your network?
Innovation is something that you want the people working with your technology to have a highly-developed sense of. Creativity isn’t often associated with business IT, but it is something that should be considered a true benefit if it can be brought into your operations.
Let’s explore exactly why creativity is an asset (even with your in-house IT team) and how you can nurture it in your employees.
By now, you’ve probably heard of VoIP—Voice over Internet Protocol—telephony. Chances are pretty good, in fact, that your business is currently using VoIP as a part of its communication. While we’re big proponents of VoIP, it is important that we acknowledge that (like anything else) some VoIP services are better than others.
We’re always talking about boosting productivity and the role your technology has in that quest. What we don’t always talk about is how boosting innovation can help free up your employees to produce better results. It’s the same technology, and it can have multiple benefits. In this week’s blog, we’ll discuss how focusing on how these two thoughts can be one and the same.
How has your business managed its technology in recent years? Depending on the way you have done so, you could be unnecessarily throwing money down the drain when you could instead be reinvesting it into your organization. If you are ready to take your operations to the next level, consider changing your approach to your office’s technology management with managed services.
Every expense that your business takes on needs consideration. When you are looking to keep your business productive, you need to focus on keeping downtime to a minimum. In order to do that you need to have tools that don’t take a lot of work-time maintenance and have professional perspectives available that can help keep operations running when issues with your business’ technology do happen.
For modern organizations that depend highly on their technology, nothing is quite so scary as an event that can completely marginalize its ability to operate. This doesn’t need to be a fire, flood, or some other major cataclysm; it could be something as simple as some of your old IT fails and you’re not ready for it. This week, we thought we’d briefly go through what a catastrophic failure looks like and some steps you can take to keep your business from experiencing one.
Anyone who has a mailbox or an email knows all about junk mail. We all receive Publisher’s Clearing House entries, calls about your car’s extended warranty, promotions for items and events that you swore that you discontinued by typing “STOP”, and just needless spam that you waste your time going through and deleting. We receive unsolicited messages every single day.
Digital communication is an important part of running any business, so you need to do your part by equipping your employees with the tools they need to communicate effectively both in and out of the workplace. Here are three of the most effective tools we have found which enable your business to flourish.
Since it first entered the mainstream in the mid-2000s, cloud computing has become a cornerstone of businesses of every size and shape. The big question that remains, however, is what your business could lean on the cloud to do. Let’s go over the multitude of options that the cloud opens up for a business.
Mobile devices demand a special type of attention in order to ensure security. You want to ensure that your devices are protected as well as possible, but you also need to ensure that this does not come at the expense of your employees’ productivity or efficiency. We’ve put together a list of common security issues you might encounter when securing your mobile devices, as well as a couple of practices you can implement to work toward an adequate level of cybersecurity for your mobile infrastructure.
Now, you may or may not have already made the transition back to the office, and this really applies more to those who haven’t yet. However, even those who have may find some utility here—specifically, in determining if a push to a full return to office was the right move.
Let’s explore how today’s employees may react to the news that remote work will no longer be an option.
Previously, we talked about why it is important to get control over your online accounts, tie them down under one extremely secure email address, and store all of your unique, complex passwords in a password manager. Now let’s talk about how to gain control over your online footprint as a business or organization.
Goodbyes are always painful, but we suspect that this one for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer will be more on the bittersweet side of things. Long a staple in the web browsing world, Internet Explorer has largely been removed from devices running Windows 10 and Windows 11. Let’s take a moment to discuss the approach Microsoft is using to slowly phase Internet Explorer out of the web browsing space.
Microsoft Excel is a great tool that can provide loads of value to power users, but oftentimes users just don’t have the know-how to make the most of it. Thankfully, you have power users like us to guide you through some of the more intricate processes in the spreadsheet software. Let’s look at one such process: removing duplicate values in columns.
Google, Amazon, Facebook, LinkedIn, Netflix, eBay, Paypal, Hulu, Spectrum, NYSEG, Microsoft—most of us have an overwhelming number of online accounts. That’s not only a lot of entities that have information about you, but you want to be able to access these accounts when you need them without having to do a bunch of detective work just to find your credentials.
I’m going to make your online footprint so much easier to manage. It takes a little bit of work, but let me tell you, this is going to save you a ton of time, and prevent a whole lot of stress.
We always hear about how innovation drives business. This has been typically true for the whole of human existence. As businesses have tried to stay profitable among the problems they’ve faced throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, we are beginning to see a troubling trend where new products are released with a laundry list of new features, but aren’t really enhancing the customer experience. Today, we look at how businesses have enhanced their marketing efforts to make products that don’t provide the types of innovations that are useful to customers.
Businesses today have to deal with more potential problems than in any time in history. They are dealing with cost increases at every turn, personnel shortages, and a regulatory landscape that is always evolving. One of the biggest issues that can have a negative effect on a business is not having the processes and resources in place and working to secure its data and network. Today, we will look at five suggestions that can work to help your business keep its network and data more secure.
Outsourced IT is a great option for the modern small business, and no matter where your shortcomings lie in managing technology, we are confident you can find value in the service. Whether you need a full-fledged IT department or someone to help implement new solutions, we’ve got you covered, and for the right price point, too! Let’s take a look at some of the trends you can expect from managed IT, as well as how they influence the costs compared to those of the traditional break-fix model.
Security is an incredibly important part of running a business, but it’s extremely easy for busy employees to fall short of the security expectations you might place on them. This is why it is so important to train your employees on the many facets of cybersecurity. By training them, you are preparing them to tackle the plethora of challenges they will encounter throughout the workday.
When you run a business, solid decision making is crucial to achieving success. This goes from hiring and managing your staff, choosing the right prospects, supporting your customers, and procuring tools and resources that make your business possible. Today, technology is not only important, it is a major consideration when determining your yearly budgets. Let’s go through a couple of tips on how to make the best technology decisions for your company.
We talk a lot about preventing threats from seeping into your company, and hoo boy, there are a lot of them. From ransomware to zero-day exploits to targeted social media attacks, there are a lot of threats out there that business owners need to be aware of. We’re not going to talk about any of those today.
Why? Because you, as the business owner, are likely a threat to your own business.
Burnout—a psychological process that can impact an employee and lead to stress, exhaustion, depression, and frustration—is a serious threat to any workplace. However, have you ever considered the potential harm that could be done if your IT-focused staff members succumbed to these feelings? Let’s examine the phenomenon of IT burnout, and how we can help fix it.
If you want to minimize costs, being proactive can go a long way toward this goal. Your business’ technology is one such area where proactive maintenance can allow your company to save countless dollars and hours of downtime. If you haven’t implemented a proactive maintenance platform yet, then you might be putting your company at risk.
It’s almost summer, which means baseball is in full swing. The game that many of us grew up on has recently gone through a major shift; one that small business owners can replicate to help their organizations. It came about through the use of data and today we’ll discuss how the national pastime has changed and how you can use the same strategies to help make your business better.
When all is said and done, being a manager is a far different experience than being an employee. So, when you promote one of your team members to this position—or perhaps you’ve recently been promoted to management yourself—it is important that a few practices are incorporated into their new workflow. Let’s go over these practices, and how the right IT can help.
Productivity. Your company needs it. Your employees are measured largely by their ability to effectively turn their effort into a tangible product or service that creates revenue. It really means everything to your business. Why then, if it is so necessary, is it so hard to get the people you depend on to realize just how important their productivity is to the success of the business? Let’s discuss what makes a business productive, and what technology will mitigate the major barriers to productivity.
If you are a frequent reader of our blog, you know all about phishing scams. They are emails and messages sent that are designed to extort money and gain access to computers and networks for nefarious purposes. The popular IT support company Geek Squad, a subsidiary of Best Buy, is the latest company caught up in such a scam. Let’s take a look at how the scam works and how you can avoid becoming its next victim.
Businesses that depend on their technology try to stick with it as long as they can so as to not incur large unnecessary costs. Ironically, that may be the thing that is causing a lot of those costs. Today, we thought we would take a look at a couple of variables that can let you know it’s time to upgrade away from your current technology.
The workspace is changing in spades these days, with remote work—once a taboo topic in some offices—being commonplace, along with resignations in the face of a return to the office becoming more of a regular occurrence. Employees want more control over their work schedule so they can balance their personal responsibilities with their professional. A shorter workweek might be the key to making this happen.
Every business wants to make smart technology decisions. For the small business looking to get their workforce the affordable workstations one option that you have today is utilizing the budget Chromebooks that are available. Today we will discuss what the Chromebook can bring to your business and how it can help you reduce your hardware costs and get your staff the resources they need to be productive.
Despite hearing about a constant stream of cyberattacks over the past few years—most of which cause millions of dollars of damage to businesses—it might still be difficult for you to justify spending a lot of money on your business’ cybersecurity plans. There is a finite amount of capital to go around and many times CIOs and network administrators will be rebuffed by management when asking for money to spend on cybersecurity. Today, we thought we’d discuss three ways that you can spend on cybersecurity initiatives and not feel like you are throwing your money down the drain.
A quality surveillance system can help you keep an eye on your business when you aren’t there—a critical responsibility that warrants some serious deliberation if it is to be approached. With so many considerations to make, it is important to make sure that you are balancing your needs with the systems available to you.
Your network security is of the utmost importance to your business for numerous, hopefully obvious reasons. However, there are a few errors that are easy enough to make that could easily be the proverbial monkey wrench in the works. Let’s go over what these network security faux pas look like, so you can resolve them more effectively (and don’t worry, we’ll discuss that, too).
Technology enables some amazing things for businesses, but it can influence the way you both look at operations and the way your business functions. Not all businesses have the capital to make these large technology investments. You are far from optionless, though; today we want to discuss some of the better investments you can make in your technology infrastructure, in particular ones that won’t drain your budget.
How many security solutions does your organization have implemented at any given time? Traditionally, businesses have implemented what we call “point solutions,” which are software tools designed to address a specific part of your security infrastructure. While this approach is certainly better than not having security at all, it presents several problems that must also be addressed in order to most effectively protect your organization.
Your business depends on software for many of its day-to-day operations, whether it’s an email system, productivity suite, or other specialized software. When it comes to acquiring software, you have two options: the traditional method of acquisition, i.e. buying it from a vendor, or subscribing to a Software as a Service solution. What are the differences and how can you make sure your organization is getting value out of its investment?
One of the fastest-growing services in healthcare is telehealth. If you aren’t familiar with this concept, it is basically a virtual meeting designed to provide faster and more direct healthcare consultations and stabilize the ever-rising costs of healthcare. With health information being one of the most attractive to hackers, it is important to be mindful to do everything you can to protect your data. Today, we will go through four tips to help you successfully navigate the risks inherent with telehealth.
Unfortunately, cybersecurity is a lot easier to reinforce in the office than it is when your team members are working remotely—and even then, it can be a serious challenge to maintain. However, let’s focus on the remote worker’s situation for a few moments and review a few best practices that can help a remote worker stay secure.
When looking to cut your costs, one of the best places to start looking is at your printing. While paper documents were once incredibly important for businesses (they still serve a function), no one can deny that they take up a considerable amount of space in the workplace, as well as take up precious assets that could be better spent elsewhere. What’s the best way to minimize the resources you spend on printing?
Most businesses set out to do an IT project when their technology needs an upgrade. Whether your business is looking to add new hardware, refresh the systems you already have, migrate to the cloud, or add new applications to your playbook, it can get pretty intimidating as cost and time overruns threaten your profitability. This week, we thought we would discuss an approach that can help any business—large or small— get their IT projects completed and integrated effectively: co-managed IT.
If you suspect that your organization has trouble managing its technology, you are far from the only one. Small businesses tend to have more difficulties with technology management and maintenance compared to their enterprise-level counterparts, mostly due to limitations placed on resources and time. You can make things much easier for your business by working with a managed service provider.
Working from home isn’t as simple as it sounds for many users. There are a lot of things to consider, ranging from comfort to security. Considering that a lot of people first started to think about working from home two years ago under duress, it’s worth looking at your current situation and determining how you can improve it.
There are countless ways your organization could face down a disaster, whether it’s a high-profile natural disaster, a physical disaster, or a technology-related disaster. If you aren’t prepared to face the consequences, your business could falter in the face of such incidents. How can your business best prepare itself for all manners of disasters?