Many (and hopefully most) businesses have a concrete view of the role that their IT plays in operations: cost center, money pit, necessary evil.
Something we’ve realized, however, is that these impressions are simply warning signs that a business’ technology strategy and approach need some attention. Listed below are three warning signs that might be all too familiar to you, and what can be done to change course and help turn your IT into a contributing part of your overall productivity.
Deals are great; offering some money and getting more than you’d expect in return… It’s the next best thing to free. It’s also really nice to get something fast.
Not so fast, though. As nice as they can make things seem, “cheap” and “quick” aren’t often synonymous with “effective” or “valuable.” In fact, selecting the presumably easy route regarding your business technology can ultimately lead to bigger problems in the form of something called tech debt.
Alas, crises happen, so the only responsible course is preparing your organization to deal with them. Let’s walk through what modern crisis management should look like for businesses of all sizes, identifying the steps to address these risks and protect your operations.
If your company wants to save money, you may consider cutting down on printing. Although paper documents have always been important, they can take up a lot of space and be a hassle to manage. Listed below: how you can lower your printing expenses and organize your documents more easily.
The modern average business relies heavily on mobile devices to some degree, especially as they make business productivity—and thereby, competitiveness—more easily attainable. That being said, this also makes it essential that a business using mobile devices has a means of managing them effectively.
Listed below: an explanation of the concept of mobile device management, and some ways that your business can take advantage of it.
There is a concept known as the iron triangle that offers a simple framework for project management by outlining the balance between your costs, your available time, and the desired quality of your outcome.
Traditionally, the iron triangle helps illustrate how these factors impact each other. Instead, we wanted to take advantage of the principles of the triangle to explore how advantageous it can be to outsource IT services.
Part of doing business is understanding certain types of trade-offs related to the decisions you make. Specifically, we want to highlight opportunity cost as it relates to technology. What is the opportunity cost of technology, and why is it a critical concept for a business owner to grasp?
Are you paying attention to where you spend your IT dollars and whether or not you are making the most of your budget? It’s imperative to assess your needs before making any major technological purchase, including the goals, challenges, and pain points you are trying to solve. With the right approach, you can increase the value you get out of your IT, especially with the following strategies.
If you could generate more revenue without spending more, wouldn’t you?
If you share most people's goals and aspirations, the answer is a resounding and enthusiastic “yes.” Scaling a business is an imperative element of continued success, provided it is carried out correctly. Listed below: how you can help ensure your success, partly by implementing the right technology.
SMBs need to be able to navigate the complexities of IT, whether it’s with a completely outsourced IT department or an in-house team of technicians. That being said, if you are thinking of technology management in this black-and-white way, you are eliminating the potential for significant benefits via the use of co-managed IT.
You might have noticed that business insurance companies are starting to show an interest in how you are protecting your technology and data. If your org has been in touch with your insurance provider regarding modifying or renewing your business insurance, you were likely handed a lengthy questionnaire about your cybersecurity. Let’s take a look together to help you make informed decisions on how to handle your IT and how to prevent your insurance costs from skyrocketing.
While one of the big selling points of the cloud has always been how cost-effective it can be, it is imperative to remember that this isn’t always the case. There are situations where the value that a business gets from the cloud isn’t really worth the price of admission. How you can evaluate the value that the cloud can offer you, and how to use this data to your advantage, is listed below.
These days you can’t afford not to have some portion of your business’ budget set aside for cybersecurity. The question is, how much do you need, and what should you be spending it on first? Let’s take a few moments to dig a little deeper into this question and examine a few cybersecurity protections you should establish as your business’ baseline defenses.
If you are like many businesses, you use a lot of services from other companies to try and get all the business computing you need, without having to buy new servers and pay company IT administrators to look after them. This process is understandable, but are you really saving money by doing it? Listed below is a look at the myriad of services that businesses use and if it is, as advertised, saving them money.
Technology can be expensive to buy and maintain, but it can get a whole lot more expensive if you aren’t cognizant of how your IT dollars are being spent. Long ago are the days when companies could get their technology for a song and it would work for years at a time. Modern business technology has to build a more efficient workplace, as capital is harder to come by today than it has been for quite some time. Listed below are three ways you could be wasting your technology budget and what you can do to ward against it.
In good times and bad, profitability is the priority for most businesses. However, this priority is usually a challenging one to achieve, but did you know that there are a few different ways that investing in a relationship with a managed service provider can help increase your productivity—and as a result, your overall profitability?
Cloud computing is turning into a tool that is universally utilized by businesses to enhance remote access and provide the scalability for tools that allow a business to get the best bang for their buck. How does modern cloud computing work and why does it have such a huge potential benefit for your organization?
For many years now, there’s been a bit of a fear of artificial intelligence (AI) in the workplace, all while it has been put into practical use more and more often in many businesses. This all ties back to the work of Alan Turing, who, amongst his accomplishments in computing, created the Turing Test as a means of gauging how intelligent a computer is.
No one likes to think about the prospect of being impacted by a cybersecurity incident, but it’s like any other unpleasant event in that it is best to prepare for it. In fact, modern businesses can invest in a cyber insurance policy to help prepare for such an eventuality.
Listed below are some of the ins and outs of cyber insurance so that you are prepared to make the best choice of provider for your business.
How much did you pay Google for your Business Profile? Alas, if the answer was anything other than “nothing,” you’ve been scammed. Google has actually announced that they are taking legal action against scammers who impersonated the company in order to defraud small businesses.
