Business Technology Insights

Keeping your company secure from online threats is one of the most important strategic IT decisions that small and medium-sized businesses in Ontario can take. That’s because today’s world is increasingly digital.

Your organization’s financial records, customer data, intellectual property and many other pieces of confidential information are all kept across numerous devices on your company’s network. 

There’s nothing more frustrating than slow and inefficient computers in your office. In fact, one of the most common questions we receive here at OT Group is in regards to slow computers that are seriously impacting the efficiency of small and medium-sized businesses in Ontario.

As an owner of a small to medium-sized enterprise (SME) it’s easy to completely disregard the need for a cybersecurity solution. Many owners have the mindset that “there’s not much to steal” or that cybercriminals will be too busy focusing on larger businesses.

Unfortunately, this common mistake couldn’t be further from the truth.

Small to medium-sized businesses in Ontario operate in a highly competitive market. As a result, companies are continually looking for ways to cut down their expenses, improve their return on investment (ROI) and maintain a healthy bottom line. To make these operational savings, many organizations turn to their IT strategy and the hardware that supports it.

Many organizations have built up a substantial collection of on-premise technologies, but with the benefits of cloud computing many companies are ditching this tech and adopting cloud-first IT models.

There are a huge number of benefits from a cloud-based IT model, which we have covered in our blog ‘What is Cloud Computing and How Can My Business Benefit?’, but there’s also advantages of an on-premise IT strategy as well. 

Most organizations in Ontario, Canada, are familiar by now with the core advantages of cloud computing, particularly when it comes to how this technology can benefit a remote workforce. 

In fact, in a recent blog titled ‘5 Ways Remote Workers Benefit From Cloud-Based Technology’, we listed some of the key advantages of cloud computing - such as greater accessibility, more affordable infrastructure and maintenance costs, the ability to scale up or down at a moment’s notice and improved collaboration between remote workers.

More employees are working from home than ever before. Yet, despite the large number of benefits that come with remote work, working from home also presents a number of challenges for your organization.

One of the most common challenges that employers face when managing remote teams is protecting their team from cybersecurity risks. 

In fact, a study from OpenVPN found that while IT leaders see the benefits of remote work and understand that it’s here to stay, they still fear that organizations leave themselves vulnerable to many risks.  

Has your entire small to medium-sized business made the transition to remote work? There are some measures you should take to ensure your team is properly cleaning their home office and IT hardware - both physically and technically.

If you are like the vast majority of businesses in Canada, then 2020 has probably seen your organization transition to a work-from-home model in which your workforce is largely operating remotely.

This way of working is becoming the norm for many organizations, and is set to continue long into the future. In fact, a study from Regus Canada found that nearly half (47 percent) of Canadian employees work from outside one of their employer’s main offices for at least half the week.

Cybersecurity and data backups should be a priority for your company’s IT strategy, but do you still need to focus on this when working with a cloud subscription service?

One of the most common questions we receive here at OT Group is: ‘Do I need to secure and backup my data when using Office 365, surely Microsoft takes care of this on behalf of my company?