As you can imagine, we’ve been chockablock helping all of our clients move their IT systems to remote access. Workers across the country are now being asked to work from home for the foreseeable future, and we’re working hard to ensure all high levels of IT security and IT privacy remain at 100% for everyone despite their new home working locations.
So, here are some advice and tips in the meantime to ensure you and your team can work safely and efficiently from home:
Security. In your office you’re fully covered with all anti-virus software, you use a secure VPN and your date is safely stored away. Ensure your team is using approved devices for work purposes only, and be sure to hammer home the impact of not using work devices for gaming, downloading etc.
- Check all home devices have anti-virus software
- Change WiFi passwords if being used for business purposes
- Set up multi-factor authentication
Access. Ensure all data and files are kept in one secure virtual location for ease of access (no one wants to be ringing round trying to figure where that important document got saved two weeks ago right?)
- Create a list per team and then by team member as to who needs access to what. This will make things a little easier to transition
Equipment. What is needed per team to continue business as usual?
- Work laptops
- Phone systems
- Any other equipment tailored to your business?
- Check in with your team to see if their home working environment is sufficent and if there’s anything you need to provide for them. We could be in this situation for a few months at least, so it’s best to address this from the start!
Stop! Communicate, collaborate and listen! (90’s throwback for you there – sorry, not sorry)
- We get it, as a manager you may be worrying about team productivity levels at home, particularly when it can be easy to pop a wash on, fall into a Netflix black hole etc etc. There are ways to keep up the communication and collaboration between the team like any normal working day.
- A few things to consider are project management software, video conferencing, instant messaging, reporting and time management, Office 365 applications such as Teams, Sharepoint, One Note and Planner.
Putting all of these in place now means you’ll be able to easily step back into normal working once the Coronavirus threat is a distant memory and office working resumes.
Over the coming weeks, we’ll be available anytime between 6am and 7pm (phone call or video chat) if you need to talk about anything in relation to the strategic placement of your IT or to come up with any action plan to help with the operation of your business. This applies to our existing clients PLUS any other businesses which need support. Give us a shout and we’ll get things sorted for you.
