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Change old modes of thinking when migrating to the cloud

Not every business owner who migrates to the cloud achieves great results. As much as the service is touted with words like “freedom,” “productivity,” and “collaboration,” realizing the full benefits of the cloud is not a given. So if you’re thinking about transitioning to the cloud, how can you ensure you optimize the technology for your business? Well, it all starts with your attitude before migration. Here are some mental shifts you should make before getting started.

Consider cloud value over costs
When considering the cloud, too many entrepreneurs get hung up on costs. Instead, as a business owner, think about how the cloud impacts your business and saves you money. You must look at the cloud as no different than any other investment you made to grow your organization.

To help you make the proper shift in thinking, ask your IT leaders just how the cloud will benefit your business. They’ll mention how the cloud will provide you value, such as easier team collaboration and the ability for anyone in your organization to work anytime, anywhere.

Think “strategy” before migration
Once you’ve considered the value the cloud provides, you’ll likely come up with goals you’ll want it to accomplish for your business. If you haven’t, do it now, before signing up for the service.

Let’s say you want to gain the productivity benefits of letting your staff work remotely without sacrificing cybersecurity. Therefore, prior to rolling out the cloud in your company, have the specific goal of increasing the use of vetted mobile devices among employees.
Clearly define your cloud goals beforehand, then work with your IT staff to come up with the nuts and bolts of the plan for accomplishing that goal. By having a plan instead of just winging it, you’ll have a better idea of what you want to achieve, have the ability to recognize when you’re getting off-track, and be more prepared to make adjustments in case things don’t go as expected.

Learn to love the quickly evolving nature of the cloud
Compared to other IT tech, the cloud is still relatively new and subject to rapid change. New updates, features, and enhancements are rolled out regularly, so if you want to get the most out of your cloud, it’s best to keep up. Of course, this is a scary idea for many business owners and IT managers alike as fast-paced flux can feel like instability and chaos.

Some cloud services make it easier than ever to keep up with changes. Let’s take Office 365, for example. Adding users and implementing new changes can take mere minutes. Yes, adapting can be frightening, but just remember that Microsoft and your IT managers are in your corner. If you still have some bad memories of long and frustration-filled transition periods after updating your legacy technology, rest assured that updates to cloud-based services nowadays often only require a small learning curve. Most new features are intuitive by nature, making adjustment to these changes painless and problem-free.

One of the best ways to assure your cloud updates go as smoothly as possible is to have a cloud enthusiast who’ll be up to date on the newest features and enhancements and can quickly tell you whether or not an update will benefit your business.

Moving to the cloud is pretty much an all-or-nothing business decision. If you adopt it, the cloud will become an integral part of your business, and you and all of your staff will interact with it on a daily basis. So be prepared for a big transition and a big payoff of higher productivity and connectivity for your entire company.

To learn more about how to safeguard your business, or if you are looking for an expert to help you find the best solutions for your business talk to GCInfotech about a free technology assessment.

Published with consideration from TechAdvisory.org SOURCE

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What goes into a business continuity plan?

Events out of your control can disrupt your business operations. While you can’t necessarily control the unexpected, you can take some precautions to prevent most business disruptions. Here are some things to consider when developing a business continuity plan (BCP).

Backup your data, applications, and servers

Today, companies are more dependent than ever on IT and data. If these critical components suddenly become inaccessible, there’s little chance your business will survive. Regularly backing up these elements ensures they can be restored quickly in the event of a disaster, security breach, or damage to IT equipment.

In the past, most businesses would create backups on-site and with tape backups, but today more and more businesses are using the cloud, and here are several reasons why:

  • Cloud backups are affordable and cost much less than onsite backups
    Backups can be automated, therefore saving you time
  • Cloud providers usually back up your data to multiple locations (so if one of their facilities goes down, your backups are still safe at another site).
  • Backups can be accessed from anywhere, whether it’s at an employee’s home or at an alternate office.
  • If you need to access them, backups can be restored quickly

Virtualize servers and desktops

When you virtualize your servers or desktops, they can be used at any location – be it at your workplace, home, or a coffee shop in the Bahamas. In terms of business continuity, this is useful in case your main office suddenly becomes unusable due to hostile weather conditions.

Have a backup power supply

No electricity means zero productivity and money down the drain. Having a backup power supply will ensure that when the electricity goes down, your employees can continue working.

A good solution is an uninterrupted power supply (UPS), which gives employees a fair amount of time to finish their work as if nothing ever happened. Also, if you have a server room, a UPS will ensure your vital servers stay cool.

Utilize social media

Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, or Google+, most people are on at least one social network these days. And if there is any kind of outage or disaster, social media is usually one of the first places customers, colleagues, staff, and vendors will check the status of your business. So when it comes to business continuity, keep at least one social media account active to keep your customers and followers informed.

Implement unified communications

Unified communication (UC) creates a virtualized communication infrastructure. That means instead of your communication tools – like phones, instant messaging, and video calls – all being stored locally at your workplace, you can access them anywhere. So if your office is inaccessible, employees can still use your phones and other communication tools from their homes. What’s more, UC tools can route business calls to your employees’ smartphones. That means they’ll never miss an important call, even if they’re not in the office.

Keep in mind that these are only the first few items you have to address in your business continuity plan. You’ll also need to consider things like training employees and having a communications plan for informing stakeholders. If you want more advice on these areas or need top-class business continuity tools, contact us today.

To learn more about how to safeguard your business, or if you are looking for an expert to help you find the best solutions for your business talk to GCInfotech about a free technology assessment.

Published with consideration from TechAdvisory.org SOURCE

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How to prepare for the upcoming Windows 7 End of Life

The Windows 7 End of Life date has been announced: January 14, 2020 – even sooner for those who don’t download a recent security update. This means Microsoft will no longer update or support the operating system after that date.

And, while Windows 7 is a decade old at this point – launching on July 22, 2009 – it’s still incredibly popular, with recent reports from Netmarketshare suggesting that Windows 7 is still being used on 39% of all PCs.

So, the news that Windows 7 will no longer be supported by Microsoft means there are many users out there who need to start thinking about finally moving on from their favorite operating system.

If you’re one of those people, in this guide we’ll explain how you can prepare for Windows 7 End of Life. We’ll look at why the end of support for Windows 7 is so important, as well as the options you have, and at how you can go about moving to Windows 10, Microsoft’s most recent operating system, as well as alternative software.

With the Windows 7 End of Life date now rapidly approaching, Microsoft is keen to make sure people know that support for the operating system is ending, and wants to encourage people to move from the operating system.

So, the company is releasing an update to Windows 7 – KB4493132 – which will display notifications reminding Windows 7 users to upgrade to Windows 10 before the End of Life date.

The update is optional, but anyone with automatic updates turned on will receive it. Microsoft promises that the notification won’t be too obtrusive, and you can prevent it from appearing again, but it shows how seriously Microsoft is about getting people to stop using Windows 7.

To learn more about how to safeguard your business, or if you are looking for an expert to help you find the best solutions for your business talk to GCInfotech about a free technology assessment.

Published with consideration from TechRadar.com  SOURCE

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Tweaking your Windows 10 installation

Once you’ve unboxed that laptop you just bought, there are important things that need to be done. After installing Windows 10, you must unlock its full potential by customizing some critical settings. You can ask a technician for help with this, but here are a few things you can do on your own.

#1 Check for updates 

Your new laptop should check for updates automatically, but you can also check manually. Just click the gear icon above the Start button to go to the Settings, choose Update & Security > Windows Update, and then click Check for updates. (Or, just type “updates” into the search box, and click Check for updates.)

#2 System restore

If something goes wrong with your laptop, you can save a lot of time if you have a “restore point,” which is like a backup of your entire operating system. To set up a restore point, search for “restore” from the taskbar and click Create a restore point. You’ll be taken to the System Protection tab of the System Properties window.

From there you can choose what you want to be included in the backup and then click the Configure button. Select the radio dial to “Turn on system protection” if it’s not already on. And then you can choose how much disk space to reserve, usually no more than 2 or 3 percent.

#3 Power plan

If you want to prolong your laptop’s battery life, one of the best things you can do is switch the Power Saver, High Performance, and Balanced power plans based on your needs. To choose a plan, right-click the battery icon in the lower-right corner of your screen and click Power settings. Next, click Additional power settings to select a power plan.

#4 App installation tolerance level

To restrict which apps can be installed on your laptop, you can disallow anything that isn’t in the Windows Store. Go to Settings > Apps > Apps & features, and you can choose whether to permit installations from only the Windows Store, any app installations (with a warning), or unrestricted app installations.

#5 Remove bloatware

Vendors package new laptops with lots of trial apps, which are mostly unnecessary and unwanted software called bloatware.

Windows 10 offers an easy way to see which apps are installed on your new laptop and a quick way to uninstall those you don’t want. Head to Settings > Apps > Apps & features and peruse the list. If you don’t want an app and are 100% certain your computer doesn’t need it, click the Uninstall button.

#6 Anti-ransomware

Ransomware is a form of malicious software (or malware) that makes all your data inaccessible until you pay a fee to hackers.

To combat it, type “Windows Defender Security Center” into the search bar at the bottom of your screen, click it and go to “Virus & threat protection”. Here, you’ll be able to enable a new option called “Controlled folder access,” which protects you against ransomware attacks. By default, the Desktop, Documents, Music, Pictures, and Videos folders are protected, but you can add others too.

Do you know what settings to change and update to optimize your laptop? This article barely scratches the surface of Window 10’s security and efficiency settings. Call us today for a quick chat with one of our Microsoft experts about taking your operating system to the next level.

To learn more about how to safeguard your business, or if you are looking for an expert to help you find the best solutions for your business talk to GCInfotech about a free technology assessment.

Published with consideration from TechAdvisory.org SOURCE

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