As a company grows, its information technology (IT) needs to grow with it. But some areas may be overlooked in the day-to-day hustle of getting the job done, says Timothy A. Heikkila, a principal with the Skoda Minotti Technology Partners Group.
“Companies should be considering options such as the cloud, looking at the security of their data and setting up a disaster recovery plan,” says Heikkila. “An outside advisor can help you ask the right questions and identify areas of concern.”
Smart Business spoke with Heikkila about what IT issues growing businesses should be concerned about and how to address those issues.
What is the first IT issue that growing businesses should look at?
As a business’s IT needs grow, companies need to consider whether cloud computing makes sense. If you aren’t familiar with cloud computing, it’s essentially remote access to applications and services via the Internet; it gives you secure access to all your applications and data from any network device.
Would it be cost effective to take your company’s e-mail to the cloud so that you don’t have to worry about maintaining data at your own location? When considering questions like these, companies should really weigh the pros and cons of taking that step. For instance, do you already have a location for your servers in-house, are you going to have remote offices, do you have a large traveling sales force? For a single location office, the cloud may not be a beneficial or cost-effective step, but for a company with multiple locations or a traveling sales force, it could make perfect sense to have your data housed at a central location in the cloud so that everyone shares access.
How can an outside technology expert help determine your needs in the cloud?
Outside expert advice is definitely recommended because the industry is changing so quickly that the types of questions you need to ask and the way to ask them are changing daily. For example, does the cloud provider have multiple Internet connections coming in to eliminate service interruption? What is the cloud’s capacity? How much is your business going to be able to grow at your current facility without shortchanging yourself?
Security is another important area to ask about. A lot of data centers that house this equipment are having SOC Reports prepared to make sure they have the proper controls in place that ensure their data is secure and not at risk of being breached.
What other technologies should growing businesses be aware of?
We’re seeing a lot of mobility with the evolution of the iPad and other tablets. A sales force can really take advantage of those devices by using them to take notes, share presentations, adjust quotations on the fly, get signed quotes, and close deals on the spot. It benefits the sales team because they can be connected to the office immediately, respond to e-mail and get instant answers as if they were sitting at their desks in their office.
One area of concern around these devices that a company needs to consider is security. Companies need to make sure that they have a policy in place that protects the company’s data in the mobile hands of the employees. For example, companies should be able to lock down or control the devices should they get lost. If a salesperson accidentally leaves an iPad somewhere, the company needs to be able to erase all of the data on that device so that it doesn’t get into the wrong hands.
Most e-mail servers have controls built into them that allow you to send a signal wirelessly to devices to erase the data, but if you don’t have an e-mail server with that capability, you have to get a third-party, add-on product that can erase it wirelessly. Companies need to have a plan in place to cover these new and growing concerns.
What should businesses think about when considering a disaster recovery plan?
Disaster recovery is another area that can help a business grow, or at least ensure that it is not set back. As technology grows more complex, having a disaster recovery plan is becoming more vital, and planning for if something does fail has become almost as important as investing in technology to grow your business.
A disaster recovery plan starts with sitting down to figure out what disasters your company should plan for, prevent, or recover from. For example, if you are OK with a tornado coming through your building and you don’t think it’s worth the investment to plan for a second, off-site location to back up your data, then you don’t need to plan for that event.
But, if you want to prepare for a virus attack against your mail server because it’s critical to get that server up and running again, it’s a complex process. Businesses need to sit down and figure out what they want to plan for and determine the most critical pieces of technology that they need to have up and running again if something should fail. Once the company determines which critical pieces of technology they need to have up and running, the next question to ask yourself is how quickly does it need to be up and running? For example, if you need to have your e-mail fully functional within two hours, you will need to have a standby e-mail server already built and ready to go.
Too many companies understand that something could happen, but they put the blinders on and think that it won’t actually happen to them. There are a lot of things they can’t control, though, and that they may not have thought about. This is another area in which an outside technology expert can help. That person will know all of the questions that go into building a disaster recovery plan and make sure that plan can be executed if needed.
Timothy A. Heikkila is a principal with the Skoda Minotti Technology Partners Group. Reach him at [email protected]
