There are numerous IT Solutions available today, to make working from home entirely manageable, productive and secure. Concerns about IT support, connectivity, and access to colleagues and servers can be put to rest if you utilise the host of technological products and systems now available to any business in the modern world.
An IT Support company is a valuable ally if you choose to instate remote workers for your business, or to run your own company from home. With the right expertise provided by a specialised IT company, your home working set-up will be effectively structured and safely monitored – a must if you wish to ensure both smooth operation and protection from cyber threats and data hacking.
So, what does remote working actually mean? In a nutshell, it’s allowing people to access your computer systems from wherever they are, without the need for a direct connection to your network. This could be logging in to a customer database, creating a project work-space from which to view or share files, or using their email from any computer. And it’s not limited to desktops or laptops – mobile phones and tablets these days are powerful enough to run absolutely everything in your business from them!
At the core of any home working set-up today, is cloud computing. It’s advisable to get in touch with an IT consultant, who will be able to properly explain the mechanics of cloud computing, its benefits, and how best to use it for your particular needs. To help you gain a brief understanding of it for now however, here is a very basic overview.
Previously, it was necessary to maintain a network server to control permission levels and enable remote access to your business. However, cloud computing services have replaced this and opened up a whole new world of opportunities for businesses.
Remote desktops, or virtualisation, is the first tool at your disposal. A hosted desktop gives you remote control of a main computer. All you need is an internet connection and you can access your full desktop, which is housed in a data centre. It acts just like a traditional PC, but provides flexibility – and multiple users can connect to it at the same time. If you make sure that you partner with an IT company using the latest high performance servers and storage arrays, the performance of your hosted desktop will be just as fast, or faster, than that of a local machine. There’s also the added bonus of cost savings – the end user simply requires a ‘thin’ client, which is a low cost, low energy consuming machine. Good news for your electricity bills!
In addition, a cloud based email service, for example, the one included with Microsoft 365, lets you and your staff access their email from absolutely anywhere. There are also online collaboration systems, like Google’s G-suite, which give you the ability to share documents and files from wherever you are, to whomever you want.
As well as all of the above, you can now embrace cloud based telephony. VoIP platforms have revolutionised business telephone systems. You can keep several offices all on one system, choosing to have inbound phone numbers in other cities, or even other countries. You’re able to listen to any calls on your network in real time, and you can play back recorded conversations at will. And best of all, your cloud telephony settings and features can be adjusted easily at any time via a web page – no need to call in your phone company every time you want to make any sort of change.
Finally, the issues of remote IT support and cyber security for the home-worker, can be addressed easily and effectively by your IT supplier. There are various remote support options, and methods of virus protection and software and hardware encryption that can be implemented to keep your systems continuous and safe. An IT support company should always be employed in any remote working situation, to ensure that your IT network is running optimally and safely at all times.
Correct Group offers a wide range of Cloud computing services, IT security measures and remote IT support services, to assist companies of any size conducting business remotely. Get in touch with us today to have a chat about your working from home situation, and find out what we can do to help.