Tech Lover 9

Putting your business’ data on an easily accessible network database—so long as it stays secure—can open up new opportunities for increasing employee productivity as well as decreasing IT costs. Whether your business already works in the cloud or is just now considering cloud computing, review some tips on maximizing your cloud experience, so you can get the most out of your investment.

Safe Place for Data Backup

One of the most costly—and unnecessary—IT consultant or department expenses is data recovery. In the event of a malware attack or data hacking, or even a break-in or natural disaster that results in computer equipment loss or destruction, your business’ data is at risk. Often, it takes IT people a long time to retrieve data, and sometimes it’s not even possible.






If you store digital copies of all of your essential business data on a secure cloud database, you’ll have backups that

Allowing Work on the Gosecurely remain even if your equipment is a loss. Replacing computer equipment can be a hassle and perhaps costly, if not covered by insurance. But replacing data that took countless work hours to produce is an even greater disaster that could prove even more costly in the long run, as it holds back your business from moving forward in the scramble to reproduce old work.

If you send employees out to meet current and prospective clients, a large portion of their day isn’t used towards work, even if they’re just sitting in an airport waiting for a flight—unless you allow them to access their work via the cloud. Sometimes there are last-minute changes to a business proposal, and an employee who works via the cloud can access them at any time.

Bad weather or minor family emergencies might keep an employee at home, but if you allow them to access their work via the cloud, they can still work and no time is lost. Allowing employees to work remotely when necessary, also boosts productivity as it breaks them out of the typical day-to-day routine.

Allowing BYOD

Not only is the cloud available on the go, it’s available on any brand of device. No longer will your business be compelled to buy the same brand and the same equipment for everyone in the office if you hope to keep them connected to the network servers. You can use Mac OSX, Windows or any brand of device.

Since you can use any brand of device to access data in the cloud, you might want to go a step further and allow your employees to BYOD, i.e., “bring your own device.” You can either ask them to pay for the device themselves, assuming they use one at home anyway, or give them a small allowance toward the purchase. Either way, what you currently spend on purchasing and maintaining new computer equipment and mobile devices will be greatly reduced or even eliminated entirely.

Easy Collaboration

Whether one employee is halfway across the country or just halfway across the office, collaboration on work projects shouldn’t have to involve face-to-face interaction, sharing a screen or long, disorganized email chains back and forth. New versions of projects get lost, people who were supposed to be copied along the way on the email chain get mistakenly ignored and, thus, it becomes a disorganized mess.

Putting projects on the cloud allows employees to engage in active discussion boards and share and upload new versions of a project as they work. The cloud will indicate which user uploaded which versions, so if there are questions about specific changes, you’ll know where to direct them. And even when employees go home, they will still be able to access their work.

Contact Management

Cloud systems often provide easy-to-use contact management applications. Store the contact information for clients, organize your employees by department and/or project participation and keep an organized system of records of all of your interactions for future access. You can even scan in old documents or upload copies of emails for interactions that pre-dated your use of the cloud. And remember, this content will be accessible remotely, so if you’re at a client’s place of business and need to access a detail you discussed several months prior, it’ll be a click away on the cloud.