Even if your business has long acknowledged the benefits of flexible and remote/home working, current events regarding the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic will likely be urging you to ramp up the degree to which your people can work productively in locations outside of the office.
Indeed, now that the UK is currently in the delay phase of the outbreak, the UK Government (along with other governments across the globe) recommends that home working, as part of an overall social distancing strategy, should be implemented to help slow down the spread of the disease.
Fortunately, this doesn’t mean a shut-down of productivity since technology provides many of the answers to maintaining business as usual operations and keeping people connected to each other, even if they are distancing themselves physically.
How can NVT Group help?
At NVT Group, we can support and manage the implementation of your flexible working strategy, including many of the technologies we talk about in this blog. For instance, we can make a recommendation on whether a Virtual Private Network (VPN) or a Remote Desktop Service (RDS) is the best fit for your business needs. We can advise on soft telephony, video conferencing, file sharing services as well as any additional cyber security measures that you will require.
We are also offering extended and out of hours support, to ensure we align with our clients’ flexible working strategies, regardless of whereabouts or the time of day.
So what solutions can we implement on your behalf?
VPN or RDS?
Three letters, one important decision. When it comes to maintaining network access while working from a remote location, you should consider either a Virtual Private Network (VPN) or a Remote Desktop Service (RDS). Both solutions allow access to business resources on a remote network in different ways.
There are security and bandwidth variances to consider with each, so no matter what solution you select, it is essential they are configured suitably for your unique needs by an IT specialist.
Virtual meetings & softphone solutions
We can advise on teleconferencing technologies that will make your experience of working at home feel just as connected as it does in the office. It has been reported that the demand for such tools has surged due to the rise in remote working, with a 500% increase in the usage of Microsoft Teams in China during the last couple of months.
We can provide advice on what virtual meeting and collaboration tools will work best for your business needs, to enhance the efficiency and productivity of your people working from a home base.
When it comes to telephony, there’s a solution for this too. Our enterprise smartphone app turns an employee’s smartphone, laptop or tablet immediately into an extension of their business phone. Installing the app will enable your employees to make calls, send instant messages and transfer files.
File sharing
Collaboration shouldn’t take a hit when it comes to home working. Having the ability to work on shared documents regardless of location ensures teamwork can continue.
Our Viia Sync & Share solution will allow your home workers to securely collaborate, share and store files no matter where they are working and on any device. No VPN is required and your teams can even collaborate offline.
Cyber Security
Whilst the purpose of social distancing is to help slow the spread of the coronavirus infection, it is also important that we stay vigilant to the dangers of computer viruses and other cyber threats.
We can advise on any enhanced cyber defence measures you should implement to best protect your data, including two-factor authentication solutions for your remote teams so that you can be certain that only authorised personnel are accessing your network.
From an information governance perspective, it is also important that your remote working teams and are clear on the risks of file sharing what is best practice to protect the integrity of your data records.
Reminding your employees of the password protocols, asking them to ensure they are not connected to public networks whilst accessing sensitive data and being wary of malicious links are just a few concerns to highlight.
Our cyber defence business Blue Rock, can advise on such matters and help you develop and implement procedures and processes that best defend your data against cyber crime, as well as educate your teams on the cyber threats they face while working from a remote location. For more information on this, please contact Blue Rock directly on info@bluerockcd.co.uk.
How is NVT Group responding to the COVID-19 outbreak?
You can read our official response to the COVID-19 outbreak by clicking here.
You can also read the latest updates from the Government’s website on the COVID-19 outbreak and sign up for e-mail updates here.