business Archives · AE Technology Group

How Managed IT Services Can Help You With Multitasking

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The definition of multitasking is the performance of more than one task at the same time. The brain must rapidly switch between task to task. Depending on how many tasks you’re trying to accomplish and how difficult those tasks are, the less effectively the brain can switch between them, resulting in a possible decrease in performance. For the majority of people, the idea of multitasking can be quite difficult. About 2.5% of people can manage more than one task at a time. Continue reading to learn how this relates to you and your organization.

How Does Multitasking Relate to Managed Services?

As previously mentioned, attempting to accomplish many things at one time and juggling from task to task can have a negative impact on productivity and efficiency. As a business owner, you have innumerable responsibilities on your hands. An extremely important task that you must deal with is making sure that all employees are doing what they need to do to accomplish the goals of the entire company. Although you have to delegate some responsibilities to management to ensure business operations run smoothly, you still have to make sure that managers are doing what is expected of them. More than likely, you have to be the face of the company. This means that you’re likely to be involved with community outreach and communicating with clients and the select vendors that your organization works with. Other job tasks you may have include ensuring your company is following all the rules and regulations set by the city as well as the state and federal governments. Lastly, the direction of sales and marketing efforts of your company will also be under your discretion so you will also have to balance that responsibility.

It is evident that as a business owner, you have many responsibilities to juggle. Hopefully, multitasking comes easy for you. On top of all those responsibilities, you definitely can’t forget about IT support for your company. Technology is the backbone of an organization. Without it, business operations will more than likely fail. Or if you constantly have IT issues, productivity and efficiency will plummet tremendously. This is where managed IT services come in. By utilizing managed IT services, you will have less things to worry about as a business owner. Your employees will also not have to deal with any issues involving software, hardware or anything else related to IT since IT support will be a phone call away.

Managed Services Will Keep Your Company Supported and Secured

With AE Technology Group, your company’s IT infrastructure will be one less thing to worry about. This allows you to focus on the things that really matter within your organization. At AE Technology Group, we will be able to take care of any issues you or your employees may have, remotely. All you have to do is give us a call or send us an email. Give us a call today at (516) 536-5006 to learn more about how our managed IT services will be beneficial to your company.

Enterprise Businesses and Vulnerabilities

It is no secret how vital cybersecurity is for all organizations today. Recent data has shown just how crucial visibility into your company’s infrastructure really is. Today, most businesses have IT solutions to assist with detecting and managing their information systems vulnerabilities. These vulnerabilities can range from a bug in a code that can allow hackers to gain access to a flaw in the update that might fix one vulnerability but cause another. Enterprises face viruses, malware, spam, and phishing schemes. With the number of options available, IT professionals must learn how to manage these vulnerabilities and the types of solutions that will best fit the company.

Enterprise Vulnerabilities are Pretty Bad

Sevco Security recently released a report, The State of the Cybersecurity Attack Surface, that gathered data from over 500,000 IT companies. This report found that many of the assets that these businesses relied on were missing critical endpoint protections or lacking critical checkpoints.

Research showed that from the businesses that were interviewed, 12% of the companies lacked endpoint protection services while 5% lacked enterprise patch management. It was also found that 19% of Windows servers were also missing endpoint protections.

These companies also demonstrated assets that were recognized by the security control console and registered as installed on a device, even though that device is not checking back in. This is an issue that many organizations deal with as 3% of IT assets showed stale endpoint protections with 1% showing stale patch management. Because of this, issues are more difficult to find and resolve before creating problems because devices are supposedly checked out and approved.

IT professionals should conduct proper research on all the available vulnerability management tools to find the appropriate ones to use. It is essential to look for a tool that allows automated scanning, alerting, and tracking of vulnerabilities over time. The tracking helps ensure that these vulnerabilities are patched as soon as possible. Vulnerability management tools should be pretty easy to set up and begin functioning as soon as possible.

The four critical criteria of vulnerability management, also known as VM, are network discovery, scanning, reporting and correlation, and asset prioritization. It is important to ensure that you have an IT department that will always maintain your company’s infrastructure. If needed, you can also outsource vulnerability management to another IT team that will assist in protecting your organization’s infrastructure.

We Can Help Prevent Your Business from Experiencing These Issues

At AE Technology Group, our remote monitoring and maintenance are created in order to identify and solve IT problems before they can interrupt business operations. For more information or to find out how we can assist your company, contact us today at (516) 536-5006.

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Downsizing Offices: Hybrid workplaces

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The Covid-19 pandemic has changed the way business operations are run all over the world. Both in-person and remote operations provide unique value to the processes and procedures of an organization. Hybrid work has become a popular and possibly, the more preferred approach, by many employees as it gives them a more flexible schedule. Due to this, many businesses had to reconsider how their office space is being utilized and how much of that space is actually needed. Continue reading to learn how many businesses are reassessing their office setups as a response to these changes.

Businesses Are Utilizing Less Space

A workplace management software development firm, Robin Powered, released a study in July that asked 247 respondents who are in charge of their office space and documented their responses. Robin Powered, then, created the 2022 Office Space Report with the statistics as follows:

11 percent of businesses are continuing to use all of their available office space
46 percent of organizations were using, at most, half of their available office space
48 percent of respondents were using less of their office space before the pandemic
60 percent of those organizations that were using, at most, half of their office space had started downsizing before the Covid-19 pandemic even began
46 percent of businesses plan to continue reducing their available office space in 2023 with 59 percent of them planning to reduce the space by at least half

Some Businesses Might Not Be Cutting Down Their Office Space But They’re Using It Much Differently

The businesses that are not reducing their available office space are choosing to use it in a different manner. Research director of International Data Corporation’s (IDC) Future of Work, Amy Loomis, states that many organizations are remodeling extra office space for increased flexibility. In other words, the removal of cubicle desks allows for creation of multipurpose rooms and collaborative technologies in order to connect in-person employees with those people who work remotely.

International Data Corporation administered a survey back in April that revealed companies around the world are adapting their approach in the workplace. Instead of being seen as an area where employees physically go to work to be productive and efficient, the office is becoming more of a collaborative space for training and meetings.

With Today’s Technologies, Hybrid Operations Are Much Easier

With the advancements in business information technologies, a hybrid schedule for employees has become much more accessible, while providing them with a more flexible schedule. Collaborative tools such as Microsoft Teams, Slack, Google Docs, and Zoom allow for teamwork and cooperation from all employees, whether they work from home or in the office.

We can help you turn your office space into a hybrid-friendly area for increased productivity and efficiency.

At AE Technology Group, we can offer you and your team various IT services, solutions, and softwares to help implement hybrid operations within the organization. By doing so, employees will continue to collaborate with each other while also having a flexible schedule to allow for a better work-life balance. Give us a call at (516) 536-5006 today.

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How to Create a Business Continuity Plan

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No matter how prepared your business is, you still have a chance to become a victim of a cyber attack. Even with advanced lead time, cybercriminals have many opportunities to attack your business infrastructure. There are several ways to give your business the best shot of preventing an attack, but you need to be prepared if you may not always be able to stop a cyber-criminal. A business continuity plan can give your business the best chance to be prepared to manage a security breach.

Having a plan in place helps prevent extensive damage to your business, possibly putting you out of business for good. How do you create a business continuity plan to safeguard your business’s future?

Establish a Business Continuity Team – Depending on your organization’s size, you want to ensure you have a good team of people to help you execute your business continuity plan in the event of a disaster. Include at least one person from every department to facilitate instructions and processes on the next steps.

Conduct a Business Impact Analysis – A business impact analysis will help you identify the most vulnerable areas that could threaten your business’s operations. It’s an analysis of critical functions of your business and each of those functions’ particular vulnerability and the impact a prolonged disruption will cause.

Identify and Store Critical Stakeholders, Resources, and Functions – Identify contacts within your business that you need to keep your business functioning. Create an emergency or backup contact list that includes essential information on each person or entity and ensure that information is up to date. The contact list should include information such as point of contacts names, addresses, and an outline of their function in supporting your business. Having a contact list allows you to keep your lines of communication open to inform stakeholders of critical situations in the event of an attack.

Create a Recovery Plan – If a cyber attack does occur, you will need to draft a recovery plan to implement steps to recover critical business functions. You want to minimize your losses and get your team back to normal operations.

Consistently Review and Revise Your Plan – Your business continuity plan should be routinely tested and updated to ensure the plan will work when you need it to. As your business evolves, testing the plan can ensure no gaps or flaws in your processes and allows you to address any issues. Conduct regular simulations with your team and continuously improve to ensure you are properly prepared.

You can take many security measures to ensure your business does not fall victim to one of the many cyber attacks that are possible in the digital landscape. Even with advanced security, nothing is ever certain, and you want to ensure your business is protected.

AE Technology Group believes that businesses can take many steps to prepare for such emergencies, and it all starts with a data backup and disaster recovery service. We can assist you with implementing such a policy for your organization to ensure that problems don’t disrupt your operations.

For more information, contact us at (516) 536-5006.

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Has the Return to Office Led Employees To Quit?

The past few years have shown a major shift in the workplace environment. With so many jobs going fully remote during the pandemic, we’re now seeing pushback from employees who are being asked to return to the office full-time. People are referring to this as the “great resignation”, as so many employees are quitting their jobs that hashtags like #quittingmyjob #quitmyjob are trending on social media with hundreds of millions of views. Let’s consider this phenomenon called the great resignation, and how you can improve employee retention.

What Does The Great Resignation Mean?

More people than ever are voluntarily quitting their jobs as society seems to be rejecting the existing corporate model for the workplace. The Bureau of Labor Statistics found that 2021 held 47.8 million voluntary job vacancies, and 2022 is not looking much better with 4.4 million people resigning from their jobs in February alone. These are the highest numbers that the Bureau has recorded since first tracking this data in 2001.

So, this trend is more than just a social media craze, and it’s happening all over the world, not just in the U.S.

But Why are People Quitting?

The influx in remote work over the past two years has given people time to reevaluate their priorities and see what’s possible when not tied to an office 40 hours a week. With companies now pushing for a return to the office, employees simply aren’t willing to give up the freedom that remote work provides.

Many are Generation Z age group, who joined the workforce during the pandemic, have tried to come back to the office, and have found a significant drop in workplace satisfaction, resulting in resignation.

Some are parents who, after getting so much time with their children during work from home, are simply not willing to give that up to return to the office.

Others are dropping the corporate model altogether in favor of freelance work, which provides total time and location freedom to freelancers, allowing them to travel and choose their hours.

Whatever the specific reason is, we’re seeing a huge shift from the “climb the corporate ladder” mentality of the last decade or so. Employees are now prioritizing a healthy work/life balance and putting their personal needs in front of those of a company.

How Can I Improve Employee Retention?

The companies that are not struggling with employee retention during this great resignation are the ones willing to meet their employee’s newfound needs. If you care about maintaining devoted, engaged, and productive staff, it’s proven crucial to offer them the flexibility and autonomy that they desire. This typically looks like offering fully remote or hybrid remote and in-office positions.

AE Technology Group is here to help you put remote or hybrid practices in place with reliable technology solutions to support them. Give us a call at (516) 536-5006 to learn more.

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