SCW Blog

When a component of your business is as foundationally important as your technology infrastructure is, ensuring it operates effectively is imperative to your organizational success. However, this isn’t always as simple as it sounds. Let’s go over what this means for your business and how this challenge can be addressed.

Shadow IT is a big problem in today’s business, but not a lot of people know about it. As powerful as technology can be if it is left unmonitored, it can run into problems. Shadow IT is unmonitored technology because it is brought onto a network without an IT administrator’s knowledge. Today, we talk a little bit about fighting shadow IT and how to get your staff on board.

I want to ask you a question: how is your working relationship with your IT provider, whether you’ve contracted another business, or you have your own internal department? If you suspect it isn’t great, there may be good reason for that.

Other than matters of scale, most businesses have very similar needs when it comes to their hardware. As a result, many of the considerations businesses need to make are the same, regardless of their size. This week, we’re sharing some of these considerations to help you more effectively plan for any upcoming hardware implementations.

So far, 2020 has been a bust, especially for businesses. The challenges that business owners have seen this year have been considerable to say the least: not only have there been economic and political tensions creating roadblocks, we’re now all dealing with the ramifications of an actual pandemic event. If any business is going to make it through all this, there needs to be a few shifts in how business technology is handled from this point on.

Only a few months into the year, it has been made abundantly clear that 2020 will be considered one of the tougher years for business in recent memory. With a pandemic leading many, many businesses to scale back drastically (if not shut down outright), there are many things that are bound to change. To give your own the best chance of survival, there is perhaps no more appropriate time to consider a change over to a managed approach to IT services.

The COVID-19 pandemic is one of the most remarkable situations that will happen in our lives. Unfortunately for businesses, mandated stay-at-home orders for non-essential workers have pushed a lot of the work that typically was done in the office to employees’ homes. This has necessitated many businesses to make a quick digital transformation.

To make any business decision, you must weigh the pros and the cons of your options. This includes when you may be considering managed services as your support method. As we are admittedly biased in favor of you adopting managed services, we wanted to review just a few ways a managed service agreement can help you optimize some critical business considerations.

Your business runs on technology of all types. That’s why it is so important to have knowledgeable and reliable IT technicians whose job is to keep that technology running effectively. Finding the right IT support for your company’s needs isn’t as straightforward as you may think. There are costs, reliability, and coverage variables to sort through and after those determinations are made, it is up to business owners and managers to ensure they are getting value from their choice in IT support. 

While most businesses need the same basic technology to support their operations, some industries have additional, more specific needs that require a more specialized tool to accomplish. As we leave this series behind, let’s briefly consider how a managed service provider can be a valuable resource for a business operating in one of these industries.

Modern businesses can now make use of increasingly powerful technology solutions… as long as they have a means of obtaining and incorporating these solutions into their operations. The services that a managed service provider can deliver include procurement assistance. To wrap up our series on the value that managed services can provide, let’s discuss this aspect.

It wasn’t too long ago that in order for business technology to be fixed, or to undergo general maintenance, it either needed to be brought to a specialist’s location or for the specialist to come to yours. Nowadays, this isn’t so much the case. As we continue our blog series on the benefits offered by a managed service provider, let’s consider the support options available.

If you need to get your current IT infrastructure under control, you don’t want to deal with amateurs. You want to resolve your issues and quicken your response times, as well as grow and upgrade your infrastructure in a way that makes more profits and enhances productivity. To find out if you need an upgrade to your current IT systems, ask yourself the following questions.

“Business as usual.” This is something that people say when their time at work matches their expectations. If your staff constantly has problems with the technology you’ve provided them, the saying may be in reference to your constant IT troubles, which would be problematic on several different fronts. If your company’s “business as usual” is dealing with downtime, runaway IT repair costs, and inefficient and variable productivity, you might want to consider managed IT services.

Take a moment and consider the data that you have collected during your business’ operations. How valuable is it to you? What would it mean if it were to leak out of your business’ control?

Chances are, your employees aren’t going to be able to just sit down and immediately begin using your business’ technology solutions. This is one reason why employee training is an invaluable investment of time. Let’s discuss some others.

While some things may last forever (or at least seem to), your business’ technology certainly isn’t one of them. Moreover, when your solutions do reach their end-of-life (EOL), it is crucial that they are upgraded and/or replaced so that you can avoid negative consequences for your business.

How much does your business rely on technology? Chances are that there is at least one solution your business can’t get by without--and where there is a technology solution, you can bet there will be users who need help with it. We’ll discuss how a help desk solution can help your business avoid downtime and general technology problems.

Businesses need a lot of services to stay ahead of the competition. The “as a service” model allows businesses to save a lot of money in the long run by making previously inaccessible services much more affordable for the average small organization. We’ll walk you through the value you can take advantage of thanks to the “as a service” model.

How does your business handle its IT management? It’s inevitable that your organization will suffer from technology troubles at some point or another, and it might seem like you have little control over it at times. However, the way that you manage your business’s IT can have a considerable effect on how your organization functions on a grand scale. What’s the best way to handle something as important as technology maintenance for your organization?