When you read the articles available on our blog, you may see the phrase “managed services” a lot. That’s because we firmly believe that managed services are the solution to a lot of problems that small and medium-sized businesses have with technology management, maintenance, and acquisition. How can managed services help your business push past its limits and establish itself as a powerhouse in the local market?
Businesses have always relied on technology in at least some capacity, whether it’s hosting an email server or platform or using a word processor for various tasks. However, many struggle with technology procurement, management, and maintenance for a variety of reasons. Listed below is a look at what some of these reasons are, as well as how managed services can relieve these pressures to create a better experience for your organization as a whole.
When you invest in a new technology solution, you might be wearing your rose-tinted glasses and expecting too much from the solution right out of the box. We all have expectations for what we want the solution to accomplish, but sometimes these expectations just are not realistic. Listed below are some common misconceptions people have about technology in the workplace, especially in regards to implementation.
The cloud is without a doubt an invaluable business tool, so long as you maintain control over your business’ usage of it. This centralized authority over your cloud’s access controls is vital to its successful utilization. Listed below is a discussion on what this means, and the ways that this can be established.
We use the term “best practice” a lot… enough that, without an appreciation for what the term actually means, it can start to sound like just another buzzword that the IT guy is using to sound more impressive. We assure you that this is not the case, and that the term “best practice” actually does mean something.
With businesses relying so much on technology to accomplish just about everything, IT undoubtedly has an imperative role to play. It makes sense that you would want your organization's IT to deliver as much value as possible. Listed below are three IT-centric processes that are primed to help your business accomplish this.
Companies often struggle with finding talent, and a variety of factors can contribute to this. Some are limited by their geographic location, although this has been made significantly less of a factor thanks to remote technology, whereas others might be limited by budget. Fortunately, outsourcing is a great way to shore up weaknesses in your organization’s operations, particularly for finding IT talent.
Whether you refer to them as customers or clients, the people who act as patrons to your business are essential to its success and survival; you need to keep them as happy as possible. While there are many aspects of maintaining a high level of customer service, we wanted to take a bit of time to examine how deploying the right technology can assist your business in doing just that.
For many businesses, despite the incredible benefits that technology can offer, it is often a source of significant stress. This is especially true for the small business owner, who often has much more restrictive parameters to work with, such as a limited budget, workforce, and even the workspace or office. How can businesses like yours stay competitive against companies that have so many more resources available to them? One answer, in terms of technology management, is managed services.
With so much tragedy, confusion, and conflict happening over the past year, businesses of all sizes have turned to technology as a required means of remaining open. As a result, the perspective that many of these organizations have of their IT has changed significantly. Listed below are some of the revelations that businesses have had, and how they’ll impact operations from this point on.
Your business needs its technology to fuel its day-to-day operations; that means they need to be maintained. Companies that don’t have an IT department will often look to utilize different strategies to ensure their IT is up and running. However, without the proper expertise, keeping this technology maintained can be a significant problem.
Technology has made its way into nearly every business, especially this year with the Covid pandemic. There really is no choice, but with the commitment to technology there comes risk. If technology fails, your business takes a step back. Below we discuss how managed IT services work to manage your risk and keep your IT running effectively.
While COVID-19 has mostly dominated the public awareness and created massive interruptions to businesses of all sizes, small businesses have clearly been impacted the most, essential and non-essential businesses alike. Naturally, this doesn’t mean that large enterprises and corporations aren’t also impacted. The difference is that these enterprises and corporations are sometimes better equipped to do something about it… which many have.
When was the last time your routers were updated? Not sure? How about your servers? What about other pieces of technology in your office?
Maintaining a business’ IT requires more than just running a virus scan every once and a while, or updating a critical program on each workstation. It requires an in-depth comprehension of each component and its history, assisted by the use of specialized tools and extensive record-keeping.
Macro Systems is always trying to get our message out, sharing how our services can add value to just about any kind of business - including nonprofits and municipalities - seeing as just about every modern business relies on technology to some degree. We wanted to demonstrate below how that value can present itself through managed services.
It wasn't too long ago that we had to haul a computer into the shop to get it fixed if there were problems. However, with the pace that modern business is conducted, this approach just isn’t effective for businesses any longer. Today, with the support of a managed service provider, support is available much more efficiently and affordably than ever.
Other than their size and the resources at their fingertips, what makes a small to medium-sized business so different from a large, enterprise-sized one? If you really think about it, there isn’t all that much. This is why many SMBs have turned to managed services… to receive IT support comparable to what the large businesses receive.
Some aspects of running your business’ infrastructure require a lot of time… time that you just don’t have in the day. Implementing patches, monitoring network traffic, and updating software solutions are all the usual culprits. In light of this, we recommend that businesses utilize a solution that permits for management to occur remotely, as it can offer a great benefit for businesses with both limited workforces and budgets.
Outsourcing your IT management or project management is routine for modern businesses, but it wasn’t always. For the first couple of decades of IT for business, outsourcing was the only way you were going to get a piece of technology up and working again without massive capital investment. Below we'll take a look at the break/fix method to IT management and how it is far more expensive than you may be aware of.
No organization can be successful if it’s constantly suffering from data breaches. Thus, you should take measures to reduce the problems caused by these threats before they present themselves. Listed below are four of the biggest problems your company could encounter in the field of network security.
