Business Archives - Page 5 of 10 - NuTech Services LLC

May, 2020

Managed Services Have Never Been So Beneficial for Businesses Before

With less than half of 2020 behind us, many of us would already like a re-do of this year. With a global emergency impacting the personal and professional lives of so many, businesses are struggling right now. For these organizations to survive, they will need to get the most out of every business investment. When it comes to their essential technology, we recommend investing in managed IT services.

Why Managed IT Services

COVID-19 has managed to close wide swaths of businesses and organizations as people try to stem its spread by avoiding as much contact with others as possible. Any small business owner would understandably be hesitant to make any large shifts in their operations, but it also needs to be understood that the shift to managed services can help relieve many of the challenges that businesses are currently facing—as well as those that may pop up afterwards.

Businesses Can’t Operate if Their Employees Aren’t There

While many businesses truly need to have their employees physically present to function, there are a great many that feasibly could operate on a primarily remote basis, provided they had the right tools. This approach would work well for those who are labelled essential right now, as it could help minimize the number of people present at the workplace and drastically improve social distancing efforts.

By working with a managed service provider, businesses have a resource to help them reach the safest working conditions for their teams. Any personnel who don’t explicitly need to be onsite could be provided the means to remote in, with these solutions managed by the provider for maximum uptime.

Proper Support Services Introduce Additional Risks

That leads us into the next benefit that managed services offer: the support that a managed service provider delivers is primarily using remote monitoring and management tools. This means that if an issue should arise for one of your remote team members, there is a very good chance it can be resolved without either your users or the technician even getting up from their seat.

Managed services will even help you avoid these kinds of issues in the first place with the same remote capabilities. By proactively monitoring for threats and other problems, your provider can spot many of them before they realize, taking the steps to prevent your employees from having any difficulties. As an MSP, NuTech Services does this kind of thing every day, and while we can’t catch everything, you can be sure that we will catch the vast majority.

Support Services are Expensive, Especially Now

You may be thinking: so, you’re proposing that I make another investment into managed services when my business is clearly going to experience some tough times?

In some ways, yes, but in the given context, consider it more of insurance instead of an investment.

Let’s say you continue to use the same IT services that you always have, essentially paying per incident to keep your business operational. Doing so gives you no consistency, and therefore is impossible to predict and budget for with any accuracy.

Managed services take a different approach: extensive coverage under an all-encompassing subscription fee. Out of fairness, we should mention that there may be an occasional out-of-scope need, potentially creating the need to adjust these fees slightly. Accepting this relatively rare circumstance, working with an MSP allows a business to accurately budget for their information technology services.

There are many more reasons that a business should strongly consider the services of a managed service provider, especially in these challenging and disconcerting times. If you have any more questions to ask, we are here for you. Reach out to us at 810.230.9455.

May, 2020

Six Things You Need from Your IT Service Provider Right Now

While managed services have made more sense for businesses to utilize for some time now, current events have made it even more apparent that this model of IT support is the only feasible option for businesses going forward. However, it has also never been clearer that you need to be selective in who you choose to provide this support.

To help you out, we wanted to go over a few of an MSP’s capabilities, particularly the ones that will assist your business the most during tough times.

Fast Response Times

In this (or any) business disaster, downtime is the enemy. If there is some technical issue that is preventing work from being done efficiently, your business is going to feel the ramifications. Depending on how severe the downtime is, it could impact the likelihood of your business lasting in the long-term.

Therefore, you need a provider who can return your IT to an acceptable standard of working order as quickly as possible should something happen to it. This means that you need a provider that guarantees that they will respond within a given timeframe and abides by that guarantee.

Disaster Recovery

While many descriptions of disaster recovery focus on disasters like data loss or infrastructure damage, there is no denying that a global pandemic and widespread stay-at-home orders could result in substantial business interruptions. Determine if your IT provider has contingency measures that enable your business to shorten these interruptions as much as possible so that you can resume your operations to an acceptable degree as dictated by the disaster.

What solutions need to be prepared ahead of time, and what processes will be put in place to mitigate the impacts of a disaster? These are all considerations that your IT provider needs to make and act upon on your behalf.

Employee Support

Many employees are currently finding themselves stuck at home (or reluctant to spend time in a relatively crowded office). With the remote capabilities that are available today, this doesn’t mean that they can’t accomplish things for your business, just as it doesn’t mean that they are left on their own to deal with issues.

While your employees work from home, an MSP can still attend to their IT issues and concerns using the same remote access tools they would in the office setting. As a result, your employees can maintain similar levels of productivity while working remotely.

Proactive Maintenance

While we’re on the topic, why allow your employees to experience issues at all as they work in what is already a different situation for them? With an MSP providing proactive maintenance for your IT infrastructure and solutions, the likelihood of your processes being interrupted decreases sharply. Many potential obstacles can be nipped in the bud while an MSP is keeping watch.

Budget Planning

Finally, we come to what every business is concerned about right now: their finances. Granted, most of every business’ financial projections have been thrown completely out of whack because of this situation, but even under ideal circumstances there is just no accounting for costly technology issues before they happen. With managed services, budgeting for your IT support—and making any necessary adjustments to that budget—is a much simpler prospect. With inclusive services priced on a predictable scale, NuTech Services ensures that setting up IT services that your business can afford throughout the year is possible.

The Result: (Relative) Peace of Mind

The fact of the matter is this: you have a lot to worry about right now. If your IT provider or their services are currently on that list, they shouldn’t be. Working with an MSP like NuTech Services allows you to focus on the operations of your business, without worrying about what is going on behind the scenes. Take a major source of stress off your plate by enlisting our services to help you get through the crisis at hand, and to better operations beyond that.

While it is a challenging time for any business to consider making any kind of fundamental changes, a switch to managed IT services is the one to consider. Let NuTech Services help your business. Give us a call at 810.230.9455 to discuss your options.

May, 2020

Keep Your Business Going with Strong Continuity Planning

Much is made about business continuity planning, but there is a knowledge deficit about what exactly business continuity planning entails. Today, we will talk about the basics of the business continuity plan (BCP) and how today’s most successful businesses go about reading their contingency plans.

A BCP is a plan that will be enacted in any situation that causes the business’ operation to be interrupted. This could be as simple as a deleted file, but it could also be enacted in situations where the health of the business is in grave danger. Having a comprehensive BCP in place helps eliminate the confusion that could further hurt your business when the going gets rough.

What Should Your Plan Include?

In most cases, people would consider that a BCP is for major, business-killing events. As we mentioned before, however, it’s just not so. The BCP has to be thought out, implemented, and tested regularly to ensure that when operations are interrupted, whether by broken hardware or terrorist attack, that there is a plan in place to get the business back up and running profitably as soon as possible. As a result every situation that could threaten your business’ operational integrity needs to be planned for, even if the downtime you experience is measured in minutes rather than hours or days.

Here are some important elements your business continuity plan should include:

Organizational lists – A list of names, addresses, and contact information of people who have access to the continuity plan. This includes making up primary and secondary contact lists for all affected areas of your business.
Staff responsibilities – Each primary and secondary contact will have a set of responsibilities that they need to carry out.
Any off-site recovery locations – You’ll need to include the address, equipment inventory, and any other relevant information.
Your action plan – This is an in-depth process for returning every element of your business to satisfactory functionality. You need plans for the first hour, the first day, the first week, and for long-term disruption.
Primary and alternate suppliers – This is a list of all your current and backup suppliers. Vendors typically play a big role in returning your business to normal.
Customer data – You’ll need a process to inform clients that have personal, financial, or other sensitive information stored with you. This plan will go a long way toward helping you retain your clientele once continuity is restored.
All relevant documentation and insurance policy information – Keeping accurate records will help the insurance process if a claim needs to be filed.
Technology inventory – What technology requirements does your company need in order to retain continuity? Here you will want to create contingencies for remote work, failover, and more.
Data redundancy – You will need to identify the details of your data backup system to ensure that all of your digital assets are backed up and can quickly be restored.

This may be a basic list of what every business should have in their BCP, businesses with more moving parts will definitely need to have more specific and overarching continuity plans. It is important that no matter how large or small your organization is, that you consistently revisit the plan to update it as necessary. Typically, if a business carries out a BCP autif twice every year, their plan will work the way it was intended to work. Keeping on top of important changes to your business will make this process much simpler and less time consuming.

Additionally, you will definitely want to test the new parts (and the ones that need it) as much as you can to get a good read on how your business would react if they were ever to enact their BCP in earnest. Ensuring your backup system is working as intended and making sure you have a complete inventory of your hardware and software needs are two critical aspects of a well-implemented plan.

Operational downtime can happen in any part of your business. It can happen as a result of faulty IT, interruptions in your supply chain, or situations where your human resources are unavailable. Call us today at 810.230.9455 to help you put together a business continuity plan that will keep you in the game even when the chips are down.

Apr, 2020

Vendor Relationships Could See Strain

The COVID-19 outbreak has a lot of business owners looking over their supply chains and their budgets wondering how they are ever going to make things work. If yours is like most businesses, you use IT to make your business smarter, more efficient, and help your workforce be more productive. Unfortunately, with recessionary winds swirling around as a result of this terrible situation, it may become inevitable that your business will have to do more with less for some time.

Your vendors are a big part of your supply chain, and when you have to make alterations to it to ensure that you are able to meet demand, but also operate within the parameters of your budget, it can be a difficult conversation if you are forced to cut back on, indefinitely pause, or eliminate, a product or service you use in your business’ day-to-day operations. Today, we thought we would tell you why our vendor management service can be an indispensable tool when tough decisions have to be made.

About Vendor Management

Every industry has a certain amount of vendors they deal with; and, if they work with computers they have their IT vendors as well. At NuTech Services, we have identified the time speaking and negotiating with, and fielding calls from vendors as a major time waster for the modern decision maker.

You may not think so, but you spend a lot of time dealing with your vendors. Besides the conversations you have when you are ordering something from them, they command your attention for additional sales calls, they send you endless emails and mailers, and they even use outreach to try and expand their own marketing efforts using you as a referral.

Our vendor management service is designed to manage your technology accounts to keep them from taking up your precious time. Moreover, our consultants typically have prior relationships with many of the companies you would have to deal with, an often fortuitous side effect of having NuTech Services handle vendor management for you. Sure, you may see a reduction in spending, but what you will definitely see is more time to focus on your business. The more time you spend focused on your business, the better your business can become.

COVID-19 and Cost Reduction

With the COVID-19 global pandemic altering the way businesses have to function, you may find yourself having to pause or eliminate non-essential expenses while you can navigate the reduction in revenue. According to the Wall Street Journal, as of April 7th, 29% of the American Economy is shut down. Similar situations are facing business in the UK and Australia.

If yours is a business that needs to pick-and-choose which services to retain (and which to eliminate), the phone calls to your vendors can be pretty rough. With the vendor management service, you don’t need to make those calls. All you need to do is tell NuTech Services’s consultants what services you will be pausing or eliminating and we’ll handle it. If your business has been especially hit hard by the stay-at-home orders, having a professional and trustworthy team of people representing your business will give you the peace of mind that your business is looked after.

What’s more, when this situation is over and you decide to reactivate services, our consultants will not only make the calls and handle the product and service delivery, we will also advise you how to best use your technology budget to meet your business demands in the new frontier.

We take pride in being a company that works hard for our clients, even if that work is tough. Call us today at 810.230.9455 to set up a consultation to learn more about how we can help your business get through this situation.

Apr, 2020

How is Your Business Going to React to a Crisis?

Everyone from Wall Street to Main Street is feeling the effects of the COVID-19 outbreak. As a result, many businesses have had to enact their disaster recovery strategy to ensure that their business remains on solid footing during this dark time.

As more and more people are dealing with the virus and its effects on commerce, supply chains are failing and distribution patterns are completely disrupted. This has had a devastating effect on the world economy. It isn’t like a hurricane or a flood, but an outbreak, like most other disasters, hit business’ suddenly and has led many to enact their disaster recovery strategies. Today, we are going to discuss how IT fits into disaster recovery.

At first, people didn’t pay much mind to Coronavirus. They went on with their business as normal, not realizing that this virus wasn’t like most other viruses. Most of the viruses that you could be exposed to have a vaccine. It didn’t take long before the world around us started to shut down and, with it, came regulations on how your business needs to function. What was looked on as kind of a joke three weeks ago, is now one of the deadliest disasters the world has seen in decades.

Chances are that your business has been directly affected by the COVID-19 outbreak and those that have a disaster recovery strategy have had to enact parts of it. How is your business prepared for situations like this? One thing is for sure, if your business didn’t plan for a situation where your workers can work remotely, you are likely feeling the sting much more than if you were prepared. Sure, you don’t have to like the idea of having a remote workforce, but the truth is that any business that can support remote workers, needs to have a contingency for situations like this.

Ensuring that your business can pivot to it makes a huge difference; and, it doesn’t have to be for when the whole world shuts down around you. If you live in a place that gets a lot of snow, you may want to enact your remote work policy to keep people out of harm’s way. Sometimes you may need your team to work more to get an important project out. Allowing them to work from home keeps them from spending longer-than-normal time at the office, and makes it a lot easier to help them handle the other issues in their life.

If your business needs help through this very trying time, call the IT professionals at NuTech Services at 810.230.9455. We can take you through the options you have right now and take you through our strategy of disaster recovery to ensure when you need to mobilize your remote workforce, that you are able to on demand.

Mar, 2020

How to Operate in an Environmentally-Conscious Way

There are many reasons that you might want to make your office a little more “green.” As it happens, there are just as many ways that you can put forth the effort to do so. If you’re trying to run a more environmentally-conscious business, we have a selection of a few relatively simple ways to start.

Use Less Power

We’ll get the simplest habit out of the way first: don’t leave things, like lights and peripherals, powered on when they aren’t necessary. Build the habit of switching them off when they aren’t in use. It may help to label your switches to ensure the right lights are turning off at the right time.

Use Up-to-Date Technology

Modern technology solutions are another good way to reduce the amount of power that your hardware and infrastructure require. Public cloud options, like Google Drive and Microsoft Office 365, offer a dual benefit in that they not only enable remote capabilities (more on that shortly), they allow you to scale back your on-site infrastructure needs. As a result, your energy requirements are likewise decreased. The same result can come from keeping your hardware and business infrastructure (like the aforementioned lights) up-to-date, as newer technologies are more energy efficient.

Use Your Printer Less

On the subject of using up-to-date solutions, these solutions also help minimize the need to print very much at all. Using collaborative technology can therefore reduce the amount of paper waste your business produces.

Use Remote Capabilities

Returning briefly to the idea of remote work solutions, enabling your employees to operate from home is another means of reducing the environmental impact your business contributes. Not only will your office require less energy by default, there will be fewer emissions generated thanks to the reduced amount of traffic on the road from commuters.

Use Carpooling Practices

If you do require your staff members to be present in the office, encouraging them to set up carpooling groups is another way that you can help reduce the emissions they produce. After all, one car produces fewer emissions than four would, and it gives your staff time to connect, to boot.

Use Fewer Disposables

The average office has quite a few disposable options that could very well be replaced with reusable ones. Switch the paper and plastic products in the break room for washable, reusable options, down to the coffee filter. Instead of offering sugar packets and individual creamer cups, have communal dispensers that can be refilled. Will it make a huge difference? No, but it is something, and it will ultimately be less costly to your business in the long run.

Use Laptops

As the nature of the work environment has shifted, laptops just make more sense for many employees than the desktop. This is good, because laptops not only help enable remote work, they also require far less energy in comparison.

Use Recycling Resources

Finally, as you make these upgrades to your location, equipment, and processes, make sure you are properly disposing of the elements you are replacing–including your equipment. Due to the environmentally-hazardous components that are used to make them, most modern pieces of technology shouldn’t just be thrown out. Instead (once you’ve made sure that all data has been good and wiped from the device) enlist a reputable professional to ethically recycle your device and its components.

We can help you with many of these initiatives, while improving the general functionality of your business’ technology. To learn more, give NuTech Services a call at 810.230.9455.

Feb, 2020

Can Outsourcing Be an Option for Your Business?

There is a major problem that the owners of most small-to-medium-sized businesses run into: impatience. Their business might not be growing at the rate they like, or they may just have too much work to accomplish in order to grow. Whatever the problem is, outsourcing parts of a business can really bring a whole lot of benefits. Let’s take a look at how outsourcing can help the modern business.

Financial Benefits

Looking outside your own business to get work done can be intimidating. Can you trust outsourced talent? Will I lose control over my business? Is it really a value? These questions and many more are reasonable to ask, but if there is one sure thing about outsourcing is that there are clear financial benefits.

The decreased cost of outsourcing is the most well-known feature of the strategy. Obviously, it is extraordinarily expensive to onboard new help, purchase the resources that new hire needs to do the job you need him/her to do, and expand your benefits package (if you offer one) to another person. When you outsource, you may still pay a comparable rate in pay, but you will get someone that has the specific skills you need them for, and you’ll likely save a lot of capital by eliminating the associated costs.

Operational Benefits

Your organization may see some major operational benefits from choosing to outsource. They include:

Internal Focus

Outsourcing can present a business’ leadership the ability to be more aggressive with their resources. There is a lot to do at the average business, giving regular employees access to trained and reliable resources can free them up to focus on operational issues while speeding up business significantly.

Access to Skills

Typically, outsourcers come onboard with very specific skills and no long-term employment contract. This gives the organization the flexibility to find the gig-worker that fits the immediate needs of the company rather than committing to one employee over large swaths of time.

Minimized Risks

In the course of doing business, decision makers are confronted with variable risks. Outsourcing allows many of the risks to be disregarded, although it creates some others. Overall, however, outsourcing will often present a net-positive situation for any business.

NuTech Services offers high-value outsourced IT services and support for Michigan businesses. If you would like to learn more, call us today at 810.230.9455.

Feb, 2020

What’s the Point of An IT Assessment

In business today, information technology is being utilized in a manner that can make it seem like business isn’t possible without it. In some cases, it isn’t, but then there is technology being deployed that is simply inefficiently deployed, used haphazardly, and could be looked on as more of a liability than anything else. Frequently getting an IT assessment can help keep your IT infrastructure secure, agile, and aimed at solving your organization’s operational issues. Today, we’ll take a look at the IT assessment.

Promoting Assessment

The purpose of having an assessment done on your organization’s information systems is simple: to gain a more complete understanding of how your IT works in regards to your business. That’s not to say that having an understanding how everything fits will, in itself, make your business’ IT more effective. No, that’s on you, but in order to know that you need to change, eliminate, or reconfigure parts of your IT strategy, understanding what systems do what is essential.

Moreover, the assessment gives decision makers a look at how inefficient their IT strategy is, and how to make the changes necessary to make those systems work better for the company. A thorough IT assessment will have several parts to it. Today, we are going to go through what to expect when you get an assessment; or, what you need to look at if you want to objectively assess your own business’ IT.

Two crucial metrics that will repeatedly make an appearance are your total cost of ownership, and your return on investment.

Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) – This takes a look at the comprehensive cost of a given piece of business technology. Therefore, it goes beyond just the cost of procurement, and also considers how much the solution will cost to operate and maintain, as well as how much additional cost any downtime could create.
Return on Investment (ROI) – This familiar metric measures your profit from a single investment, once all procurement and operating costs have been covered.

Let’s look how these metrics come into play during an IT assessment:

At the Start

Typically, if your organization is going to conduct an IT assessment, there is some reason for it, and the results of this assessment (or audit, if you prefer) will likely have more to do with your future investments than many other actions would. This fact dictates that the audit is carried out by IT professionals who have the training needed to recognize inconsistencies, irregularities, and most importantly inefficiencies.

Action

Any good IT assessment will begin by putting together a comprehensive Asset Detail Report. This will tell you what IT resources you have, when they were implemented and serviced, the latest firmware and software license and much, much more. This will cover all of your IT, including printers, copiers, cloud-based platforms, computing and networking hardware, software, and more.

Additionally, you might find it helpful (at this stage) to create something known as a site diagram or network map. This visual guide is used to map out the flow of data through your business.

Analysis

The assessment team will next audit your network by performing a SWOT analysis (which analyzes your business network’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats). In this process it will become more clear what potential problems your network has and what it’s doing to function efficiently. There will be investment suggestions aimed to help reduce your organization’s IT risk, while also promoting solid TCO rates and improving your ROI.

Compilation

Finally, a risk report is assembled that combines the results from a variety of factors, including:

Network hardware
Security configuration
Servers
VPN/Remote Access
Websites, domain names, and hosting provider
ISP
Phone System
Email, messaging, and conferencing
Computers, mobile devices, tablets
Cabling
Printers
Software and mobile apps
Procedures, policies
Technology vendors

There are some other factors included in a finished assessment report. These include the status of domain controllers, the Active Directory settings, other potential vulnerabilities (like weak passwords and missing software updates), and any known network vulnerabilities.

Your finalized assessment will give you a comprehensive report that will be an indispensable tool for decision makers.

If you are looking for help identifying your company’s IT issues, call our knowledgeable technicians today at 810.230.9455.

Jan, 2020

Options for Effective Business Communications

Today’s business is much more collaborative than it was in the past. This means that there are a lot more communications to manage. Small businesses may use technology to try and bridge the gaps and large businesses use it to manage huge and complicated workflows. Today, we take a look at the average business’ internal communications, and which tools are best for increased productivity.

Let’s start by examining the reasons for communications that businesses use to manage their internal processes.

Information sharing – There is plenty of news that needs to make its way around any business. There are many different forms of communication that can accomplish this.
Collaboration – Today’s business needs to use collaborative strategies more than businesses of the past, and communication is a big part of any collaborative endeavor.

Now, let’s consider a few solutions that can help you to accomplish solid information sharing and collaboration.

Information Sharing

When you think of internal communications at work, the lion’s share of it will fill this need. Employees need to know certain things to maintain continuity of a business. This includes the publication of policies, procedures, plans, or potential changes to each. To accommodate the sharing of all this knowledge, businesses use the following tools:

Email – Email is the most tried-and-true solution for internal business communications because it works on every level. It is available, familiar, and with today’s email platforms, features dynamic tools that can help anyone get their point across.
Newsletters – Some companies choose to roll out a company newsletter for their staff. In these newsletters there are spotlights on points of emphasis. If you choose the newsletter as the tool you want to broadcast your internal communications, however, it has to be understood.

Collaboration

Nowadays, collaboration is important for every business’ success. Business moves faster and if you don’t have some semblance of coordination between your employees in separate departments, it can cost more than time. It can be the difference between generating revenue and not. Here are some tools used to boost collaboration:

Productivity Suites – Today, there are a lot of collaboration-based applications out there. They are designed for specific business needs, but the most effective are the productivity suites like Google’s G Suite and Microsoft Office 365 because they give you the collaborative tools and shared storage that any team needs to be successful.
Chat Applications and Forums – Instant messaging apps have improved collaborations tenfold. Forums have been useful since the early days of the Internet. Today, developers have created apps that combine the two and offer hundreds of outside software integrations to help promote collaboration.

The IT professionals at NuTech Services have the expertise and access to solutions to help you solve any of your business’ operational problems. Call us today at 810.230.9455 to learn more.

Dec, 2019

Technology: Then and Now

Technology gives business owners opportunities to expand, and essentially has become the center of most business practices. Marketing, customer contact, all sorts of inter and intra communication methods now depend heavily on technology. Let’s take a look at what the past has brought, and what the future could bring us.

Before we discuss what the last decade brought us, I wanted to remind everyone just how limitless innovations are. Many years ago, many of these inventions or technologies seemed unrealistic for the times.

Let’s go through the past decade’s biggest hits, as well as what we might see in years to come.

2010: When Innovation Thrived

While many technologies were introduced in the 2000s, the 2010s saw these technologies used in bigger, more innovative ways. Let’s take a brief look at the past ten years and what improvements we saw.

4G

While 4G was actually first developed in 2009, but primarily spreading in the early 2010s, 4G wireless changed the capabilities of wireless data transmission. As a result, further innovations were made, encouraging (and sometimes forcing) technologies to improve. The companies that worked in real-time and heavily depended on application deployment were suddenly given the tools they needed to really take root. Furthermore, 4G was responsible for the viability of many of today’s biggest players, including Spotify, Instagram, Uber, and Snapchat – among many others.

Apple iPad

Can you believe that the iPad has only been around for about a decade? It was the first of many mass-produced consumer tablets, and it took other companies a few years to catch up as they followed Apple’s lead. Powered by iOS, and featuring a large screen, the explosive initial sales of the iPad cemented the tablet’s reputation as a useful device, both at home and in the workplace.

IPv6

In June of 2012, the longstanding wireless networking standard was upgraded for the first time in years. This sixth standard allowed a new age of connectivity, permitting a far larger number of devices to be connected to the Internet.

Chromecast

As we suggested in the section on 4G, streaming was growing in popularity, and it is safe to say that the first Chromecast was partially responsible for that. While it may seem practically ubiquitous today, integrated casting was revolutionary upon its release… and in many ways, it changed how businesses could communicate ideas. Conference rooms everywhere are now equipped to work with this (or similar) technologies.

Virtual Assistants

Today, every major technology brand has its own take on the virtual assistant. Apple has the OG – Siri – while Microsoft has Cortana, Google has its Google Assistant, Amazon has Alexa, and Samsung has Bixby. As such, the development of this technology spurred a new competitive spirit among these rivals, to the benefit of the user. With all of these companies working to create advanced, better assistants to sway consumers, machine learning has improved exponentially through these efforts.

USB-C

Despite largely flying under the radar, one of the most impactful advancements of the decade is the development of the USB Type C connector. With the exception of Apple, it has been accepted as the industry’s standard connection for power and data transmission, and can therefore be found on most post-2015 devices.

Windows 10

As they attempted to put together a mobile OS, and their redesigned Windows 8.1 OS failing to replace the aging Windows 7, Windows 10 was developed to standardize the Windows experience and modernize it for longevity. Now, Windows 10 has been established as the standard, running on 64 percent of all PCs in existence, a number that will grow even higher as Windows 7 is finally put out to pasture.

2020: When Things Will Thrive

While there is an argument that, technically speaking, the Internet of Things is more of a 2010s development, the 2020s are poised to be the decade that Internet-connected devices are truly viable tools, with the necessary integrations, functionality, and (most critically) security finally in place. This is predicted much for the same reason that mobile technology took off last decade – the fact that wireless networks improved.

Frankly, there’s so much more we have yet to accomplish, as the near future is poised to turn what was very recently science fiction into fact. For instance, the next 10 years will likely see the following technologies come more into the mainstream:

5G Connectivity

With certain areas currently rolling out the 5G wireless standard, and more guaranteed to follow, there is hope of a fundamental shift in how people can use their technology. As if today’s networks weren’t already burdened by our data demands, we are only increasing these demands as time passes. However, 5G potentially promises a variety of benefits – including ubiquitous access, powered by broadcast sites that focus on delivering performance to each user rather than to a given neighborhood. Today’s 5G users have experienced speeds measured in gigabits, so just imagine this capability spreading.

Artificial Intelligence

While the phrase “artificial intelligence” has been somewhat inflated by popular culture, the more practical use of artificial intelligence is slated to increase by a significant amount in the 2020s. Today, neural networks are already in use as a means to recognize data patterns, assisting in automation processes. With the amount of data increasing exponentially, these neural networks are bound to see exponential benefits, and we will be able to put AI to use in more complex and dynamic applications.

The IoT

Like we said, the Internet of Things is only going to grow as time passes, and the many technologies and solutions that are included under this umbrella term will finally have the wireless capabilities needed to make a real impact. Cities will be made smart, using AI to increase the efficiency of crucial services and eliminate waste. Driverless cars will make commuting and traveling safer, and crucial systems in finance, healthcare, and infrastructure will be improved.

Mixed Reality

There has been a notable trend toward increasing how immersive our technology is, and that will culminate in something known as mixed reality. As the predicted replacement to today’s mobile platforms, MR would provide interactive overlays in real-time for all kinds of applications, ultimately reducing data strains. As a result, we could see a variety of applications be completely revolutionized, including education, entertainment, and social interaction.

Just as it did throughout the last decade, technology is sure to transform throughout the coming one. What innovations do you hope to see? Let us know in the comments!

Dec, 2019

Print More Intelligently with Print Management

Once upon a time, the printer was absolutely crucial for business to be conducted properly, but nowadays, the use of digital solutions has greatly reduced the need of printing things in greater volumes. However, this is not to say that printing is not still an important facet of your business to manage. Here, we’ll examine how print management can help a business do so.

Business Printing

In the past, businesses greatly relied on the use of their printers, but it really can’t be said that this use is particularly monitored, even now. As a matter of fact, a survey conducted by Buyer’s Laboratory suggests that a full 90 percent of companies (yes, nine-zero) don’t keep track of their printing costs – a number that can regularly add up to over five percent of a business’ total revenue. If this seems high, take a moment to consider the different expenses that contribute to this total.

Naturally, you have to consider the resources you need in order to use a printer. You need the requisite paper and ink, but not many people would think to include the electrical costs of keeping the printer in operation. You also need to take the time (about 15 percent of it) that your IT department spends dealing with printer-related issues and the 23 percent of help desk calls that are made in regard to these issues.

This all impacts your operational budget, and there’s a chance that you weren’t even aware of it.

What Can Be Done?

For starters, you need to begin tracking your printing costs, as it will be beneficial to find out how much of your budget is potentially being eaten away by unneeded spending there. Secondly, you should implement a print management solution to make it easier to continue this tracking in the future.

In order to really get the most out of your print management solution, you should have a strategy that allows you to do so. By granting you with greater insights into your printing, you can figure out ways to minimize or eliminate excessive costs, without negatively impacting the accessibility of printed materials.

When considering your options for a print management platform, we recommend that you look for the following features:

Comprehensive Assessments – As we said, many organizations don’t use any tools to keep track of their printing costs. This tool in particular will give you a better idea of how much is being printed, where it is being printed from, and when your devices are due for maintenance.
Print Management – A print management platform can provide you with precise controls over how your printers can be used.
Paper-to-Digital Conversions – By transferring your printed resources into digital ones, you can evaluate the value that they provide when printed and better optimize your printing costs.
Better Security – It stands to reason that your data security can improve when you have more control over this data. Hard copies inherently mean that you have less control, and a greater risk of a security issue.
Tracking Capabilities – By tracking how much is being printed, you can help optimize your costs through implementing certain controls, like user limitations on how much can be printed in a set amount of time.
Setting Print Policies – You can set up resource-saving policies like enforcing double-sided printing and establishing print quotas to prevent users from abusing the office printer.

If your business’ documents are resulting in excessive costs, reach out to our IT experts today! NuTech Services can help you keep your printing under control. Call 810.230.9455 to learn more.

Nov, 2019

IT and Professional Services: A Strategic Relationship

When you think of professional services, you may think about smart people doing important things that took them years to learn how to do. You may not, however, consider them the kind of people that lean on their technology to make their businesses work. This is because for the longest time, technology wasn’t a major part of the professional services landscape.

Times have changed.

Today, the professional services industry is experiencing somewhat of a makeover. The effort-based expectations of the past are being replaced with outcome-driven expectations, leaving many professionals looking to technologies to help their businesses manage this shift in expectations. Typically, businesses begin their quest for efficiency by automating mundane portions of the business. This creates cost savings and promotes speed. The problem this model presents for professional services firms is that they don’t have many parts of their business that can be automated.

Since the front office and the back office of many professional services firms have some form of disconnect, and much of the work dictates that a person handles the intricacies of that work, automation isn’t really an option. That doesn’t mean there aren’t ways for professional services to utilize new technology to promote faster, more accurate, and more efficient operations. One way that professional services companies can improve is by making a digital transformation.

What Is a Digital Transformation?

The digital transformation refers to shift from analogue systems to digital ones. Over the past twenty years many analogue systems have been retired to make way for digital ones. This includes cloud-hosted solutions for time and resource management, productivity and collaboration, and even for the archival of information. The added efficiency a professional services firm can gain from committing to digital systems–especially in the processes listed above–is sure to quicken the pace of your business’ operations. Let’s take a look at the technologies some of the most utilized professional services companies are beginning to use.

Medical Practices

Medical practices have been improving their IT under mandate for almost a decade. How has the digital improvement gone? A study from 2018 showed that 60 percent of practices that have upgraded their information systems have had a positive experience, while 23.5 percent had (what they’re calling) positive-to-mixed results. Only eight percent reported having a negative experience implementing technology. It took healthcare officials at every level working together to achieve digital transformations that help fuel electronic health records and other technologies used to help curtail cost redundancies and promote the delivery of comprehensive care.

Law Practices

There are a lot of lawyers that like to continue to do things the way they always have. After all, it is one of the oldest professions and there is a standard of decorum that many lawyers adhere to. In many ways the legal profession remains unchanged. That doesn’t mean that they aren’t using technology. The profession as a whole may not benefit from automation as much as other professionals, but it still does benefit through other solutions like document management, mobile management, and other digital systems often utilized with remote workforces.

Most professional services firms are, like most other businesses, using information systems to improve operations and be the best firm that they can be. If you are working in the professional services market and would like to learn more about how your firm would go about making a digital transformation, call the professional service experts at NuTech Services today at 810.230.9455.

Nov, 2019

Considering How to Monitor Your Employees

Do you know what drives me crazy? It’s the fact that, of all the lists of things you can do to improve your business and boost your productivity and optimize something or other… it seems there’s not much to be said about how your employees factor in.

Which seems a little ridiculous to me, if I’m being honest. Your staff is one of your biggest investments. On top of that, it is important to remember that, since your employees are human beings, pushing them to do more might actually result in them accomplishing less.

In my experience, the best way to help an employee accomplish their best is to track their performance and evaluate their next steps. Is this always foolproof? No – but as I said, in my experience, it is the best way.

Understanding Employees

Before we go any further, it is important that I make something clear: we are proceeding with the understanding and acceptance that your employees are like any others: flawed human beings, capable of a lot and likewise distracted by a lot. Either way, holding them to the same standards as we would some automated alternative is unfair, as I am sure you would agree.

However, and somewhat unfortunately, this often isn’t the impression that employees get from management. Some common complaints from employees are:

Their workplace lacks communication.
They have no job security.
They aren’t paid what they’re worth.
Credit isn’t given for their hard work.
Favoritism is alive and well in the workplace.
Management constantly has them under a microscope.
They have to deal with managers who are incompetent.
There’s just too much work to do.

Now, put in a list like this, these don’t look too great, and you may want to shrug them off and assume that they aren’t happening in your company… they almost certainly are.

Having said that, I want you to think back to when you once worked for someone else. How did you feel going in every day? Now look at that list again – some of those line items may have helped motivate you to go into business for yourself.

Let’s face it – entrepreneurship isn’t something that people are really “born to do”…it is a decision that people make, usually after paying their dues and working for other people and seeing ways that they would do things differently (or in their minds, better). Some staff members love working for certain people, and other staff members don’t, occasionally acting on it.

The point of all this: people are people, and as such, there is no single equation for dealing with employees well.

This means that, no matter what you do and what style of management you use, not all employees are going to be a good fit at your company. This means that, along the line, someone was going to feel displeased about their work situation.

Remember, while you should still be doing everything you can to make the work environment as amiable as possible for your employees, some just aren’t going to be a good fit, and may need to be addressed in other ways.

Is It Ethical to Monitor Your Employees? Or… Legal?

At the end of the day, it is important that you realize while payroll can be your greatest investment, it can also be your worst. This means that you need to keep track of how your employees are performing and spending their time in the office, which leads you to the prospect of actually tracking your employees in the workplace.

This opens up a few more questions, starting with the data you are actually collecting. What is it that you are trying to track? Should you keep it simple, monitoring attendance or the number of hours an employee actually spends in the office? Are there different performance indicators that you like to keep updated metrics concerning? Do you want to monitor keystrokes, making sure that they are working diligently throughout the day, or their browsing histories to make sure they aren’t putting your company in jeopardy by visiting sites they shouldn’t be?

This is where things can get a little murky as far as business ethics are concerned. How much do you really need to know, and how much will you collect as collateral data?

As it stands today, employee monitoring software is in high demand, the market growing as more businesses decide to protect themselves against theft by an employee. The consensus seems to be swaying toward the opinion that you can’t trust your employees not to take advantage of you, either by stealing data and other resources, or dishonestly reporting their time.

There is also a lot of license given to businesses in terms of what can legally be done to protect their own assets, especially where an employee’s privacy is concerned. Courts have ruled in some cases that a company can track an employee’s behavior after they have left the confines of the office. Consider the permissions that a user needs to agree to in order to access work-related files on a personal device. There is little to stop the employer from also going through private messages with that access.

So yes, it is currently legal to monitor your employees, which means the decision really falls to you and your conscience. Of course, this may change, or it could just as likely stay the same. Privacy is a contentious subject these days, with no clear indication of how things will turn out when (and if) it is ever settled.

Mindfully Monitoring Employees

One of the hallmarks of employee monitoring is the fact that the monitoring itself is kept about as hidden as the behaviors it is meant to catch. Whether you’re keeping an eye on your surveillance footage, web activity, internal correspondence, or keystrokes, the person being monitored traditionally would only find out if they were told… which isn’t something that companies have traditionally done, either.

I would urge you to actually break from tradition here.

Ethics aside for a moment, it just makes more practical sense to inform your users how their activity is to be monitored. Not only will this transparency help you build and maintain trust amongst your users, but it can also help keep issues from developing in the first place. Think about it – what happens when people realize there’s a patrol car on the highway? They immediately check the speedometer and correct their speed. Transparency has a great way of acting as a deterrent in that way.

You also want to consider the kind of metrics you’re actually collecting before you evaluate your employees based on them. Do the metrics line up with how the employee provides value to the business, and/or the actual value they deliver? Look at it this way – when you’re looking to buy an appliance, like a toaster, you won’t find out how well the toast is browned by measuring the length of the power supply cord. Metrics can be useful tools, but only where they practically apply.

Finally, don’t give up on your employees too quickly. If your monitoring picks up on one of your staff members having a tough time, try addressing the situation as your first option. Sudden downturns in employee productivity are usually caused by something, and that something might be fixable. This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t terminate an employee if you need to, just to consider alternatives before diving into the hiring process again and losing what may still be a valuable resource.

What are your feelings on employee monitoring, and using these kinds of solutions? Share your thoughts in the comments section, and check back in with our blog to learn more about optimizing and securing your business’ technology.

Nov, 2019

Which Backup Strategy is Best?

It has reached the point that, if you have a business, you had better have a backup prepared. Otherwise, the digital data that modern businesses like yours rely on is vulnerable to loss. Of course, depending on the age of your business, you may have data that no longer applies to your operations. That’s why we’re going over how to select the data you should continue to back up.

Keeping Your Strategy Simple

One basic strategy to sorting out your data is to backup the files that you can’t feasibly replace otherwise. This simple, yet effective approach could easily save your business… but, why go through the effort of sorting through your data at all?

Seeing as your data is one of – if not the – most important resources that your business has, why not just back up all of it?

This endeavor becomes much easier with the Backup and Disaster Recovery appliance that we offer, as it can easily map out and replicate your data stores. Now, it must be said that not every business generates enough vital data to justify a large investment into a data backup. However, as we mentioned above, today’s threat landscape means that what data you do have needs to be protected.

Your Backup Options

There are several different varieties of data backup for you to consider, keeping in mind what it is you are backing up and when you need those backups to be ready. These backups include:

Full Backups

As you may have gathered, a full backup copies all of your data and configurations and saves them to a single platform, whether that be a NAS (network attached storage) device, a cloud backup, or tape (pro tip: don’t use tape backup).

This has the benefits of offering a comprehensive backup that you need, with quick restoration times for single files or folders. A full restore takes a much longer period of time to complete, and full backups are more expensive due to the greater need of storage space. Any backup strategy will typically start off with a full backup.

Incremental Backups

This kind of backup keeps track of any changes that are made to data, which allows it to be used for data that is continuously updated. The costs of an incremental backup are quite reasonable, making it a good choice (despite not being totally comprehensive) for a business that generates large amounts of data.

Differential Backups

Similarly to incremental backups, a differential backup keeps track of changes that are made between the times that a full backup is run, keeping their backups more up to date.

Mirror Backup

This kind of backup is best for redundancy, as it creates a mirror image of the system that is being backed up. While these backups are the fastest to restore, they also take up the most storage space.

Depending on your business’ particular needs, a backup can be run weekly, daily, or even as frequently as every 15 minutes.

Following the 3-2-1 Rule

The 3-2-1 Rule is a simple way to remember what you need to maintain if you want to keep your data protected enough. Here’s how it breaks down:

3 copies of your data
2 stored on different media types
1 copy offsite

This strategy makes it so your data is both secure, and convenient to you.

To learn more about data backups and best practices concerning them, reach out to NuTech Services at 810.230.9455.

Nov, 2019

To Save Your Business from Disaster, Backup is Crucial

Businesses generate and collect a huge amount of data – some of it, practically useless, and some, critical to your business and its operations. It is this latter group that makes it so important that you have a comprehensive backup plan ready to go.

While not all of your data may be equally valuable, data loss is a bad thing across the board. This is precisely why NuTech Services offers comprehensive data backup and disaster recovery solutions.

Backing up your data allows you to sidestep the potential catastrophes that would come with the loss of your most critical information. Here, we’ll review a few situations that could put this data at risk to demonstrate how crucial having a backup really is.

Situation: Actual Disaster Event

Just about every business on Earth could potentially be impacted by some kind of weather event. Some deal with hurricanes, some deal with high winds and tornadoes, others with earthquakes and floods… you get the picture. Unfortunately, whichever one impacts your business, there isn’t very much you can do in the moment – which is why it is important to prepare now, so you can reopen again after the fact. Many don’t prepare, and therefore, don’t reopen.

Acting proactively and maintaining a backup allows you to more quickly bounce back after disaster has struck, allowing your business a second chance.

Situation: Data Corruption or Theft

Cybersecurity is a huge topic today, as there are many, many threats out there designed to target businesses. Take ransomware, for example: all it takes for you to lose access to your files is for an employee to click on the wrong thing. Not good.

However, using a BDR (in conjunction with a comprehensive business continuity plan) to keep your files safely backed up enables you to quickly restore data from an onsite backup copy of your data, while keeping another copy offsite for redundant protections and simplified migrations. This keeps you safe from a variety of threats, including ransomware and many other forms of malware.

Situation: The Classic Office “Whoops!” Moment

The BDR is supremely useful in that it gives you an on-demand resource to pull your data from, on demand, as it is needed. This is particularly handy if a team is collaborating on a project, and somebody accidentally deletes something absolutely critical to the project. With a backup, your progress won’t be lost to bad luck.

A BDR allows you to breathe a little easier about your files and their security. To find out about adopting one for your business, reach out to NuTech Services today. Call 810.230.9455 to get started.

Nov, 2019

How IT is Driving Innovative Developments

Any healthy market economy relies on innovation. The simple act of making bright ideas even brighter helps boost economic efficiency and growth, creating a higher standard of living. Business processes are being transformed through information technology. Here, let’s look at how some of these shifts are shaping up.

Innovation Technology

Information technology systems are the foundation of the many processes that a lot of businesses rely on. These systems enable you to store data efficiently, putting it to use and interfacing with it collaboratively – but as these systems are so crucial, they must also be properly monitored and maintained.

After all, without its technology, a business that relies on said technology isn’t going to be able to accomplish much.

This has been a driving force behind innovations to technology – boosting reliability, introducing transformative tools, and advancing both business and society at large. However, since this isn’t particularly easy to put into practice, various industry thought leaders have been actively attempting to transform a variety of considerations, including:

Applications
Infrastructure architectures
Service delivery
DevOps
Production operations
Security
Compliance

This has effectively been accomplished by developing solutions to meet assessed needs. As a result, new solutions are being thought up to help expand IT from its role in support to actively promoting key business tasks.

Leveraging Cognitive Computing Investments

Cognitive computing is the processing of business data through a combination of machine learning, artificial intelligence, and other powerful computing resources. With these systems, patterns can be recognized, data mined, and language processed far more efficiently than without. With more information, businesses that leverage cognitive computing can see considerable benefits:

Enhanced business agility via quicker decision making
Consistent process scaling to meet operational and budgetary demands
Improved business performance and efficiency

Using these technologies also allows you to support various other aspects of your operations, both internally (filling out your operational structure) and externally (automating customer retention efforts). By making a business more “intelligent,” these investments can provide a competitive advantage, as well as more diverse means of generating revenues.

Smarter Security

A data breach can be catastrophic for a business – and attacks happen far too often today to be ignored. Quite a few tools have been developed to help block out these threats, as well as improve internal data security initiatives.

Of these tools, many leverage AI and machine learning to adapt a cybersecurity policy to better match the threats a business contends with. However, these systems aren’t impervious to threats, which means that business owners need to identify their potential risks, including:

Remote access – With the rise in remote workers and other mobility enhancements that allow data and applications to be accessed from outside the network, the connections that enable this access need to be secured.
IoT – The Internet of Things has seen an explosive growth in popularity, but with the unfortunate side effect of bringing insecure endpoints into your business. You need to have a strategy to minimize the risks they present.
Regulatory requirements – Some businesses and industries have additional rules that they must abide by passed down by the government. You must ensure you are meeting any conditions that apply to you.
Hackers and cybercriminals – While businesses now have access to better tools, so do hackers. This requires you to remain vigilant in your network security.

It is also important to mention that this list is far from comprehensive – there are many more threats out there to resist, avoid, and otherwise defend against. Today’s tools are the most effective way to accomplish this.

To learn more about how you can adopt technology that helps your business succeed, reach out to the IT professionals at NuTech Services.

Oct, 2019

Big Data for the Small Business

Today, large companies typically use their data to help them make more educated business decisions. This strategy can actually benefit smaller businesses as well. However, they often don’t think they have enough data to facilitate analytics or BI (Business Intelligence) platform. Let’s take a look at how small businesses can use their big data.

To Identify Trends

The number one thing you need to know about data analysis is that the data you use needs to be structured in a way to allow you to get the most accurate information possible. This isn’t always easy. In order to put your business in the right position you can’t just rely on decision makers to go with their gut reaction, you need a definitive plan fueled by empirical data so that you avoid huge costs to solve small problems. The simplest way to do this is to identify trends inside and outside of your business. You can do this through a dedicated business analytics platform, using your organizational data to help you make sound business decisions.

Improving Operational Effectiveness

Another part of the business that can be improved through the use of analysis is operations. Traditionally, the more efficient your business is, the more effective it is. This doesn’t change because you have data; but, with the data you can get a better perspective about how your business works, how your customers interact with your company, and a lot more. The better you understand the separate parts of your business the more you can confront its pain points and build effectiveness.

Shifting Your Revenue Generation Strategies

Since you are in business to make money, it stands to reason that using any resources to help you do that is beneficial for the company. Combing through your operations and marketing data can provide opportunities that you didn’t know were there. It can make all the difference for the small business that needs to transition quickly in order to sustain operations.

It’s been said that data is the new oil. That may or may not be true, but for the small business, drilling into your data to see the best way forward is a solid practice that will become commonplace before long. To get out in front of it, call the IT professionals at NuTech Services at 810.230.9455 and we will help you get started using your data to benefit your business today.

Oct, 2019

There’s Value in Outsourcing Your IT, Part II

Old-school business information technology support isn’t necessarily wrong, but it most definitely isn’t cheap nor efficient. IT support strategies are developing in ways that some time ago, would have thought to be unheard of. Your business no longer needs a full on-site staff designated to maintaining network security or updating software. In part two of our five-part series, we discuss how your business can have the support it needs through managed services.

MSP Support

The Managed Service Provider (MSP) provide an experience unlike traditional service providers’ methodology. Let’s take a look at two scenarios:

Tom is emailing his boss in regard to a company project when all of a sudden his software closes. Tom tries to re-open his email, resulting in well, no result. Tom, frustrated at his email software, spam clicks the application which causes his entire computer to freeze. He has to ask his neighbor to contact their IT department for him. Unfortunately, they are out for lunch which results in a massive amount of downtime for not only Tom but for the business itself.

Jerry, who works for a business on the other side of town, is working on a project when he too is experiencing technical difficulties. Jerry has been working on a new business logo in his graphic design software. While opening his file, he is prompted with a message informing him that his software license is not valid. Jerry wastes no time in creating a ticket with his managed service provider. Within minutes, a technician remotes into Jerry’s computer, reconciling the issue at hand. Jerry is up and working in a timely manner.

Time is money, so why not save yourself time with managed services?

Onsite Support Services

Managed service providers leverage remote support simply because of how efficient it is. It doesn’t make sense for a technician to come all the way out to your business to resolve an issue that could have been resolved at their own office. However, when a situation occurs where a technician is actually required to be present, managed service providers have trained staff ready to be dispatched.

When something goes wrong, IT support needs to be present. It isn’t cost effective to have IT support present when your infrastructure is operating as it should.

Keep Business Moving Forward

Time is a business’ most scarce resource, so why waste any of it? Every moment is valuable, so you can’t afford to sit idle waiting for IT to return back from lunch or wait for them to have a free moment. To ensure you get the most out of every second, NuTech Services offers managed services which can greatly benefit your business.

This is far from the end when discussing the benefits of managed services. Return back to our blog page to read part three of this series. If you would like to discuss additional support options offered with managed IT services, give us a call at 810.230.9455.

Oct, 2019

There’s Value in Outsourcing Your IT, Part I

Computers sometimes appear to have a mind of their own. For businesses, this is less than ideal. If the support structure is not in place to take control of your business’ infrastructure, your business’ profitability may be negatively impacted. In this five-part series, we will discuss how being proactive keeps your technology in check.

A Proactive Approach

Which scenario which would you prefer to be in:

You take your car to a shop for a tune up. A technician calls to inform you that your engine has hardly any oil in it due to a leak. However, he replaces a gasket and tops your oil off. The simple fix has cost just $80.

You notice your car is leaving dark black stains in your driveway, but after a quick google search determine that your car is probably fine, and the money you could be spending on a tune up could be better spent on an iPhone. Once all the oil is gone, your motor has completely seized due to the lack of lubrication, and you have to use your brand new iPhone to call a repair shop. The new motor will set you back $3,000.

Your answer to the question should be obvious, but how can you take the same proactive approach with IT? The strategy most businesses choose is one that has proven its worth — managed IT services.

What are Managed IT Services?

Managed IT services monitor systems through the use of remote monitoring. This strategy is extremely beneficial as an IT staff does not need to be on-site at all times. By using state-of-the-art tools, managed IT providers are able to monitor your business’ network and hardware, ensuring they are operating correctly. If it is not working correctly, a technician is typically able to resolve the issue remotely. This, of course, means you might not even be aware of a potential issue–and most of the time–it will be resolved before you know it.

Having a fix-it-when-it-breaks attitude has no place in any business. The value that managed IT services delivers cannot be matched. The only comparable proactive solution is having an on-site IT staff working around the clock. How much do you think that would cost you?

Imagine paying staff to sit around waiting for something to break. Now imagine paying the non-IT staff to sit around, while your IT staff tries to resolve the issue. The biggest cost a business faces with malfunctioning hardware is typically the downtime that results from it.

Avoid Expensive Downtime

NuTech Services provides simple yet effective means which act before little issues turn into operational catastrophes. One solution we offer is a comprehensive patch management service. Not updating software leaves your business susceptible to data breaches. A data breach could put not only all of your data at risk, it could jeopardize your entire business.

To learn how easily you can adopt proactive measures into your business, give us a call at 810.230.9455. Be sure to check for part two of this series on Friday.

Sep, 2019

Are You Looking to Buy a New Server?

So your small business needs a new server. What are your options? Do you know what they are? Today, we’ll try to shed some light on how you should look at the server-buying process and what your organization’s options are.

Business Servers

When you are looking for servers, there is a pretty good chance that you need to centralize application delivery, file storage, or some other core function of your business. A server is a high-powered computer that runs specialized software that is used to support the multiple users that your business has on staff. Some of the multi-user applications that servers are used for include email, some type of messaging, print servers designed to manage company-wide print jobs, and customer relationship management (CRM). If your business already uses one or multiple servers, you need to establish whether you need to upgrade and migrate; or, if you’ve outgrown your hardware and need to set up a new server, and where to host it.

Cloud vs. Onsite

If you are looking to set up your first server, you have an interesting decision to make. Do you set up your new server at your place of business, or do you host it with an established cloud provider? Traditionally, companies would be better served to host their hardware locally, but with cloud services from some of the most reputable companies in the world now available with built-in support and anywhere-anytime access, it stands to reason that looking at how each is priced out is a prudent move by any decision maker.

With the purchase of a server, a company takes on the costs of the hardware, which are often substantial, they then deploy software and have to pay to have that hardware managed. If the hardware costs aren’t enough, the maintenance costs can be multiple times that. When you add in utility costs, you are looking at a large capital cost with a smaller operational outlay. With cloud computing, however, you can get a reasonably secure server that can be accessed from any place users have access to a high-speed Internet connection. This provides accessibility that many other servers don’t have, while paying per month rather than up front. The costs don’t add up quite as fast (the capital outlay is virtually zero), but the operational costs spike, often exceeding what you would pay for a server over time.

Let’s make a list of some pros and cons:

Onsite Server

Pros:

Gives you complete control over organizational data.
Gives you the ability to alter storage types and amount at any time.
Performing onsite backup is much easier.
Restoration from onsite backup is much faster.

Cons:

Upfront costs of hardware.
Exorbitant costs of continued maintenance.
Utility costs.
Upfront and recurring costs of physical security.
Your hardware is only marginally utilized.

Hosted Server

Pros:

Eliminate capital costs of buying and maintaining hardware.
Mitigate server-based utility costs.
Cloud server is scalable.
Data and application redundancy built in.

Cons:

The need for stable and reliable bandwidth rises.
Costs of bandwidth rise.
Security can become an issue.
Lose physical control over the management of the servers.

It all comes down to system control. If you want (or need to have) control over your hardware in order to meet federal, state, or industry regulations, hosting your servers onsite is suggested. If you don’t have these regulations to meet, there’s no reason hosting your servers in a public cloud interface can’t be a viable alternative for your company.

One option that many businesses are using today is the establishment of a private cloud server. A private cloud server is hosted either onsite or in its own dedicated cloud space, and delivers a business a lot of the pros listed above, albeit at substantial cost. The establishment of the private cloud allows companies that need to have control over the management of their organizations data and applications to have it, while providing the ability for users to access the data and applications outside of the confines of its physical network.

Regardless of what kind of server you are looking for the experts at NuTech Services can help. Find out more about your server options by calling us today at 810.230.9455.