Newsletter 2
Who handles your IT system ?
A third of IT managers in small companies have no formal training, according to research conducted by Loudhouse on behalf of database company FileMaker. The study also revealed that 40% of managers in small firms have other responsibilities in addition to IT; a figure which rises to 50% in companies with fewer than 20 employees.
The most job role to be paired with IT responsibilities was director (41%), operations (36%), marketing (18%), finance (15%), sales (13%) and HR (13%).
This suggests that in many cases it is the owner/manager himself who takes on the role of IT manager. One of the most challenging issues for IT managers was managing the storage and cost of emails, the research suggested. This problem is made worse by the fact that 60% of employees use their email system as an ad hoc database, rather than saving contacts and attachments and storing them on a dedicated database. Employees in small companies were also far more likely to have access to the software and network resources needed to create simple databases, with 71% of staff having such privileges in small firms compared to just 22% in larger organisations. The functions most likely to go ’off-piste‘ and create their own databases were sales (61%), finance (51%), marketing (42%), operations (33%) and HR (31%). Not surprisingly, IT came last with just 25%.
“The role of IT manager in SMEs is undergoing a sea change: a typical IT manager is seen to be juggling multiple roles and learning ’on-the-job‘ rather than undergoing professional training,” the report concluded.
“Simultaneously, employees, particularly in small businesses, are encouraged to create their own databases and are given the tools to achieve this. With IT skills and resources more dispersed through the business, the result is that employees have created a wilderness of data files outside existing processes.”
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Don’t get tied down go wireless
Installing a wireless network on your own premises or equipping staff to access hotspots on the move means easy access to the internet, email and company systems from large parts of the country. And that brings all sorts of other business benefits.
When direct marketing company Forget Marketing moved into its newly refurbished offices three years ago, director Mike Nicholson decided to install a wireless network (Wi-Fi), as well a wired one.
The decision has paid off. The company has grown rapidly and every time someone joins, the firm has to find them an internet connection. “The rooms only have so many network points so if we didn’t have wireless, it would really restrict how many people you could get into a room,” he says. “Having Wi-Fi gives us the flexibility to decide where we want to move next, as opposed to just basing it around where the network points are.”
That‘s not the only benefit. Staff are equipped with laptops so when they give a presentation to a client, they can take the laptop into a meeting room and deliver a presentation that includes pertinent websites without the need for trailing cables. And clients, too, can use the secure wireless connection if they want to work between meetings or check their email.
Wi-Fi (the popular name for the 802.11 radio transmission standard) provides a wireless connection to an access point. That access point, also known as a hotspot, is in turn connected to the internet. Because the vast majority of laptops – as well as many PDAs – are now Wi-Fi-enabled, you can take your laptop out on the road and connect to the internet from anywhere that has a hotspot. All without the need for cables.
Heating up
Finding a hotspot is getting easier. There are now approximately 9,000 commercial hotspots in the UK.
Hotspots tend to be located in airports, hotels and coffee shops, such as Starbucks, as well as on GNER and some Virgin trains. The number of public hotspots is growing fast: There are plans to extend coverage to 6,000 more bars, pubs and cafés, and there is an agreement with McDonald‘s to put Wi-Fi in 1,200 of its branches. Although Wi-Fi coverage is usually indoors, the City of London now has an outdoor Wi-Fi network and we can soon expect to see outdoor coverage in Manchester. Other cities will no doubt soon follow suit.
So if you‘re thinking of using Wi-Fi, how do you go about it? The answer depends on whether you want staff to use Wi-Fi when they‘re out on the road or when they‘re in the office, or both. To use Wi-Fi on the road, staff will need to be equipped with a Wi-Fi-enabled laptop or another mobile device. When they find a hotspot, they may be asked to pay for it there and then by entering their credit card details or they may be required to buy a voucher.
You could also sign up with a single provider, such as BT OpenZone, which offers several different payment options: one-hour, one-day or 30-day vouchers; a top-up account paying by the minute; or a monthly subscription. If your Wi-Fi usage is high, it is worth considering a monthly subscription: BT OpenZone charges £10 for 250 minutes a month or £25 for 4,000 minutes a month, including the use of OpenZone hotspots abroad. The disadvantage of a monthly subscription is that it limits you to one supplier: it can be frustrating to take out a subscription to one provider, only to find that the hotspots in the hotel in which you‘re staying are provided by another.
Another option is to take out a monthly subscription to a reseller such as Trustive, which gives access to hotspots provided by 70 different operators. This is particularly useful if your staff travel abroad a lot. Currently, however, Trustive does not have deals with BT OpenZone or T-Mobile.
Down to the wire
What about Wi-Fi in the workplace? If you are moving into a new office, then it is worth considering dispensing with cables altogether, because installing Wi-Fi can be up to 70% cheaper than installing a cabled network. The newest version of Wi-Fi – 802.11n – is at least twice as fast as previous versions, making it comparable to the speed of a wired network. Although desktop PCs are not always Wi-Fi-enabled, you can buy wireless cards for them for less than £50.
Even if your building is already wired, you can still benefit from adding a handful of wireless access points. You will probably need one or two in each room, as although a signal travels several hundred feet, it can be blocked by walls. you can employ more staff without adding extra cables, and you can enjoy the flexibility of being able to carry a laptop from room to room without worrying about losing your internet connection.
If you do use Wi-Fi, you should be extra aware of security issues, particularly if you are transmitting sensitive data such as customer details over the internet. There are three main security issues with Wi-Fi, eavesdropping, hacking and freeloading.
Eavesdropping means that someone within the same range is able to read your emails as they are transmitted. Hacking occurs when people are able to gain access to your computer, while freeloading means that someone is piggybacking your wireless connection for free, giving you only half the bandwidth you have paid for.
There are some basic steps you can take to ensure security. But the best way to make sure no one can eavesdrop on your business communications when staff are out and about is to install a virtual private network (VPN), which enables mobile users to connect securely to the office network. “A VPN creates a tunnel of information that goes from one computer to another in a controlled way that nobody else can see,” . The information that is sent is encrypted and cannot be broken into.
Once you get used to having Wi-Fi on the road, it can prove to be frustrating to find yourself without access. You can get around this by also using the mobile phone network, which has almost universal coverage. 3G cards are available for laptops, enabling you to connect to the internet over the mobile phone network, but note that speeds are much slower and costs higher. If a lot of your staff are mobile, you could consider a combined solution, allowing staff to use the mobile phone network when a Wi-Fi hotspot is not available. Some PDAs and laptops will now switch seamlessly between the two.
Most businesses using Wi-Fi now say that they wouldn’t‘t be without it, believe that having Wi-Fi has helped their company expand. “As a growing business, it really does give you the flexibility to move very quickly and not be stuck by having to go back to the office to send emails,” said a satisfied user and and that could prove priceless for a small company.
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Safe guarding you business Data ?
The increased use of IT among small businesses has undoubtedly brought significant improvements in productivity, but the flip side to our reliance on IT is the exposure most businesses have to a computer system failure.
Research indicates that many small UK businesses do not have adequate systems in place to safeguard their crucial data, and that over 40% of companies without adequate systems in place never re-open after suffering a major data loss.
While the recent flooding and terrorist attacks have been a tragic and dramatic reminder of the vulnerability of many businesses, there are far more common but equally damaging causes of data loss. In fact, the vast majority of situations where a business loses crucial information are simply down to corruption in software programs, hardware failure and human error, the vast majority of which are virtually unavoidable for most small business owners.
With many people now working remotely and traveling on the job, theft and accidental loss of laptops is a problem facing more and more small businesses, and which will only get worse as mobile working becomes more common. Added to this the increasing number and malignancy of computer virus‘s, it is clear that many UK small business owners need to take better measures to safeguard their data.
By now, you may be dangerously near the feeling of being overwhelmed by both problems and solutions. But don‘t despair, just remember, prevention is always better than cure.
So, what can you, as a small business owner or manager, do to ensure you don‘t suffer a catastrophic loss of business data?
1. Don‘t try to tackle the problems yourself. The people potentially attacking your network are experts, so you need industry expertise to combat them. Seek expert advice with regards to what you need to protect both your time and your business data.
2. Take out insurance. Backup up your data, online, automatically.
3. Take care if you are moving to broadband. Although there are compelling business reasons to use it, an ’always-on‘ connection does make your business more vulnerable to hackers who try to gain access through continuous port scanning. So make sure you install a Firewall and anti virus software on your computers.
4. Having remote access to company information is particularly important for small businesses. But remember that information passing over the internet is not secure. Even if people don‘t break into your network they may monitor data in transit. Employees connecting remotely should always use a secure communications method such as VPN (virtual private network) which uses a high level of encryption.
5. Make sure to keep up to-date and purchase software that delivers you updates of their software. This will help to make sure that you are protected against the latest viruses. You take insurance out for your house, car, life, etc. Take at least two insurance policies out for your business. One is called online backup of your data and the other is anti virus software to help prevent your business being attacked.
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8 tips to work less and relax more
(Technology tips for improving work - life balance)
Certainly, today’s always-on-and-available-anywhere technology can lead to addictive work habits. We have all seen examples of that among friends and family. But having a cheap, convenient, 24/7 global reach through technology can also efficiently enable you to live the life you have always wanted. The choice is yours.
Here are some affordable tools and ideas that harness technology’s power to save you time and money. Cherry-pick among these solutions to build in breaks, or reconfigure your work-life routines.
1. Use Voice-over-Internet protocol phone service (VoIP) to create a virtual office. To maintain a professional phone line and still travel, take time off or live abroad, VoIP telephone services are a terrific help. You’ve probably heard about such affordable services, which, basically, use the Internet to send and receive calls. Usually, you pay only for Internet access and not for calls, much the way e-mail works.
2. Use online services for office communications and banking. If you host your company’s computers on external servers, so you can access all e-mail, files, and financial information or transactions from any Internet café. (Of course, you do want to have privacy safeguards in place when working this way.)
“We have no bank account in Argentina,” Talisman says. “We’re paid in dollars and living on pesos—enough said!”
3. Leverage the power of a professional Web site. Setting up a Web site, more than any other technological helpmate, this will shave considerable time and effort from your workdays. With a professional site, you can more efficiently conduct business, fulfill orders, organize contacts, share documents with employees or contractors, and market your wares or services, even when you’re out of the office or on the road.
4. Use your Web site features to stay in touch with customers. With so many marketing channels and consumer options these days, increasingly, it’s the business that quickly responds to customer needs that gains a competitive advantage. You can use your Web site to “listen” and react to what your customers request.
For example:
- Set up an online forum so customers can register and post comments to you and to each other.
- Set up a survey that customers can take online. This can be a focus group type of survey (say, about a new product) or a customer satisfaction survey.
- Set up a special e-mail address and ask customers for specific feedback or advice whenever you launch a new product, service, or special promotion.
5. Use e-mail software to track schedules and tasks. Software such as Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 can improve your performance. Most people are good at creating to-do or task lists, but often become distracted and don’t commit to a scheduled time to accomplish those tasks.
By utilizing the task and reminder functions of an e-mail program, you can set up a calendar that generates alerts, whether annual, weekly, or daily. Some business owners say that such alerts boost their productivity by 50 percent or more.
6. Stop thinking you must do everything yourself. “Doing administrative work is necessary, but it can detract from an owner’s primary purpose of growing and nurturing the business,”
“I’ve known too many entrepreneurs who are penny-wise and pound-foolish,” because they won’t hire help, she says. “One was working until midnight because her admin work took so much time.” The solution, Witter suggests, is to hire virtual assistants. “Be more efficient by getting a qualified, trained person who can handle the chores.”
With instantaneous communications and the ability to seamlessly connect from anywhere, virtual assistants can work remotely and provide quality work. “Many of us are in home offices and don’t have room for another person,” Witter says. “That’s another beauty of VAs.”
7. Create a sales contact database for your business. Software such as Business Contact Manager, included within Microsoft Office Live Essentials and Office Live Premium, can transform your electronic address book into a sales, contact management, and marketing tool.
Then, when you send out marketing or sales material, instead of hand-addressing envelopes, you can automate the process with labels or envelopes printed from your database list. Similarly, you can use the database to send e-mail marketing messages. Just make sure that the software you use for your database (usually part of a sales contact program) can be integrated with your e-mail program.
Besides mailings to your entire sales list, you can use the database for specific or premium marketing, such as holiday cards, special discounts, and birthday greetings.
8. Invest in e-mail marketing that yields results. Certainly, consumers now delete e-mail marketing messages faster than you can say “click-through.” However, when it’s done right (which means your consumer really wants your message and knows your brand), e-mail marketing remains relatively cheap and incredibly effective.
You can automate the process of sending and tracking your e-mail campaigns with affordable tools and either off-the-shelf or online software.
Such low-cost services can help you mount campaigns, send out e-mail newsletters or campaign mails, and maintain scrubbed, up-to-date lists much faster and cost-efficiently than you can on your own.
Mobile phones and continual access to e-mail now make us available around the clock. So, in the end, all the technology in the world won’t let you kick back unless you make some rules.
Begin with these, and then move on:
- Schedule specific times to check e-mail.
- Turn off your phone when you’re home or out with friends
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6 tips to reducing Email over load
Lately, more people are declaring bankruptcy. No, they’re not financially insolvent. They just can’t keep up with e-mail. They empty their inbox, announce e-mail bankruptcy, and start over from scratch.
Don’t let it happen to you. Get a grip on the problem before it is too late.
1. Slash the number of new messages
Your first goal is to reduce the amount of incoming e-mail. So cancel subscriptions to unwanted mailing lists. The messages become a nuisance if you don’t have time to read them.
A good spam filter reduces the amount of spam reaching your inbox. But don’t expect to eliminate spam completely. Some will still get through.
Do your friends send jokes or chain messages? Explain your situation and ask that they stop. Hopefully, they’ll oblige.
2. Respond appropriately
Not all e-mail requires a response. If you receive an e-mail addressed to several people, you may not need to respond. If a response it required, it may not need to go to everybody.
Be succinct; restrict your messages to a few sentences. If you can’t, pick up the phone or talk in person.
If an e-mail contains several different points, respond to each in separate messages. This may take longer at first. But, it will be easier to deal with each e-mail thread.
3. Take advantage of subject lines
Subject lines should relate to the body of the e-mail. So be as descriptive as possible. Subject lines that say things like “question” or “hello” should be avoided. Recipients won’t know what the message is about. And it will be difficult for you to categorize responses.
If you have a one-line e-mail, put it in the subject line. This will save you and the recipient valuable time.
If possible, create a set of codes with your co-workers. Placed in the subject line, codes help you process and prioritize messages.
For example, use “FYI” for informational messages. Use “AR” for action required and “URG” for urgent messages.
4. Forwarding and copying
Be courteous when forwarding an e-mail. Summarize the message and say why you’re forwarding it. This is particularly helpful if the e-mail contains several messages.
Recipients will appreciate your thoughtfulness. They won’t need to read through several messages to guess your thoughts. This will cut down on questions from recipients.
Don’t copy someone on a message unless it is necessary. And explain why you’re copying them. Recipients won’t need to guess your intentions. This means less back and forth messages.
5. Be disciplined
Avoid the temptation to check your e-mail every few minutes. Check it every hour on the hour for important messages. If you can go longer, do so. Of course, this might not be feasible in some work environments.
Set time aside each morning and evening to process your inbox. When you’re done, it should be completely empty. File messages you need to keep. Set reminders for messages that require you to follow up.
Respond to messages immediately, so you only read them once. There is an exception to this rule. If emotions might govern your response, give yourself a cooling-down period.
6. Use your e-mail program’s tools
Explore the tools your e-mail program offers. I already mentioned setting follow-up reminders. Filters and folders can help you file and prioritize mail. Auto-responders can alert business associates when you’re out of town. You won’t come back to a full inbox.
Check out this audio course about managing your inbox in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007.
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Many e-mail security solutions only stop spam. SonicWALL Email Security appliances and software protect you from spam, viruses and importantly phishing attacks.
Billions of phishing e-mails are sent out each month in an attempt to steal user information for financial gain. After years of success, phishing scammers are now setting their sights on businesses. Because phishing e-mails are designed to look like legitimate business correspondence, they consistently elude most anti-spam only appliances and software. Making matters worse, there is much confusion over the true capabilities of these products.
Phishing requires specific analysis, identification and handling, and e-mail policies alone are not enough to protect your organization. The SonicWALL Email Security Solution overcomes these challenges by leveraging a global end-to-end attack monitoring network to deliver the highest level of protection from all inbound threats such as spam and viruses, as well as phishing attacks. Not only can it capture and isolate phishing messages, it achieves complete protection using a proprietary evidence evaluation system enabling you to analyze fraudulent e-mail headers, content and contact points.
The SonicWALL Email Security Solution can also be used to stop outbound threats like non-compliant e-mail traffic, making it the ultimate tool for corporate compliance.
To learn more about SonicWALL Email Security solutions, view the Email Security flash video demo.
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Desktop Virtualisation is probably one of the biggest areas of interest to many organisations as it offers an exciting alternative method of organising your computers over the traditional choice of either the desktop or server based computing models.
Server based computing has offered many organisations benefits over desktop computing due to the improvements in the management of the application set and the securing of data, however it has never been all things to all organisations as issues can arise with application compatibility or application conflicts.
The desktop model however comes with its own set of management issues, these primarily being how to effectively manage multiple disparate devices and maintain some level of standardisation and control.
It is into the middle ground where Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) steps, if you could take the management and security benefits of server based computing and add to this the compatibility and flexibility of desktop computing you would be on to something, this is essentially Virtualisation.
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure utilises the consolidated computing power of host systems and presents multiple virtual machines running traditional desktops to the end user. The user experience is identical to running their own desktop but the actual machine is held securely at a central location, with the screen refreshes being sent to the user. So essentially you have the efficiencies of server based computing with the flexibility of desktop computing.
Operational Advantages
The area of most interest for any organisation should be the actual operational advantages that can be delivered by following a virtualised strategy as opposed to individual virtual components.
For example by utilising the combined advantages of virtualised storage in conjunction with virtualised servers an organisation can have created essentially the agile data centre, where servers running in the virtualised storage can be replicated to an alternative location with available host resources that in the event of a disaster the entire infrastructure is ready to be utilised.
Data centre migrations can be massively simplified by combining the need to relocate key resources in a controlled and transparent way with minimal disruption to the organisation by migrating existing physical resources into a virtual presentation and then logically moving over to the new virtualised solutions.
Virtualised applications when combined with Virtual Desktop Infrastructure gives the perfect combination of standardised and controlled highly available desktops with the flexibility to deploy new applications to the user community in a near instantaneous manner. If this solution is presented via virtualised storage then the whole enterprise of servers, data and client machine can achieve business continuity via replicated storage.
The ultimate benefit for any organisation is that all the benefits can be achieved at a fraction of the cost that traditional solutions based on physical limitations have been based to date.
Virtualisation is a coherent technology strategy that is enabling organisations to achieve functionality and flexibility that has previously been denied to them whilst also enabling massive benefits in operational efficiencies.
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