Businesses today have to rely on IT strategies to stay operational, but many companies don’t put enough emphasis on the problems that could be affecting their systems. However, if you put a few preventative measures in place, you can protect your business from hacks and breeches.
How to Solve Common Business IT Problems
Simple solutions can solve the majority of technology problems in your business. Still, it can take a bit of expertise to put your IT structure in place when you get started. Here’s why.
Problem 1: Outdated Tech and New Tech Integration
Outdated technology and new tech integration, while different, suffer from the same problems. Old software is often clunky and reduces productivity, which costs your business money. A new tech integration also reduces productivity from the training process and costs a lot upfront.
However, you have to upgrade your systems as often as possible, preferably once a year. If you don’t, you leave your business and team open to data breaches and mounting overtime hours.
How to Solve Outdated Tech and New Tech Integration
You can solve this problem right away by keeping an IT support team on your side. It’s better to hire a local support team, like Techspert Services, if you live in or near Orlando, Florida.
An IT support team can give you info on how to use technology to improve your business, as well as what applications or services you need to optimize your team’s workflow. Once they switch your system over, they’ll counsel you on how to keep your systems updated yourself.
Problem 2: Lack of Internal Security Measures
A study called the “Psychology of Human Error” revealed that 88% of data breaches are caused by employee mistakes. To make matters worse, employees who make these mistakes aren’t willing to admit them when they occur because they’re afraid of the often harsh consequences.
Your employees aren’t negligent, stupid, or malicious. Usually, they’re clicking on an email that looks real, using weak passwords, or are somehow privy to private info in your database.
How to Solve a Lack of Internal Security Measures
The first step isn’t to rework your internal security policy. If you don’t have a policy in place, teach your employees how to look for email scams or other phone schemes.
Your IT department has to manually delete work data off of your employee’s phones and encrypt your data on your system. You also need to check that everyone’s passwords are strong.
Remember that mistakes are going to happen. If your employees are afraid they’re going to get in trouble if they take too long to answer an email or if they tell you a breach has occurred, they’re going to continue to make mistakes and not tell you. Transparency stops this cycle.
Problem 3: No Data Recovery Process in Place
Losing critical business data can destroy your reputation and your ability to keep clients. After a data breach, your current customers are less likely to trust you, and potential clients may not do business with you. You’ll lose even more customers if you don’t have a backup.
Besides the future costs of a poor reputation, businesses immediately take a hit if they can’t boot from a USB drive. They may need to pay for an expensive service to find what’s left.
How to Solve Your Backup and Recovery Process
The best way to prevent breaches in the first place is to up your security, but that doesn’t mean you’re immune to physical disasters, like fires or floods, so invest in some kind of backup.
You can either use backup software, a cloud service, or an external hard drive in case of cyber attack or equipment malfunction, but never keep your backups near the computer. If you’re going to put an external hard drive in the office, keep another backup elsewhere.
