Cloud technology has been changing the way many businesses operate in recent years. But over the past two months, the spotlight has been on one of cloud technology’s biggest advantages: the ability to work remotely.
The ability to operate remotely in the cloud has enabled thousands of businesses to continue functioning under lockdown and it’s this flexibility, in terms of where people can do their work, that’s helping many of them to sustain business operations. Bonus: For customers, it’s completely transparent, i.e. it’s no different to transacting with a vendor or service provider who is normally situated in an office.
How else is the way we work changing? Let’s take a look at what current cloud tech is doing for the workplace:
Increased flexibility and productivity with cloud technologies
- Working remotely is enabling business to carry on through a disruption, whether that be pandemic, human error, theft, cyber attack or natural disaster.
- We’re willing to work longer hours knowing we have the flexibility to take time off at hours that suit us better.
- We no longer have to waste time travelling (and being delayed in peak-hour traffic).
- Business owners are able to “elastically” adjust the business resources as required, by instantly adding storage and memory on demand, or scaling down in times of struggle.
- Our work files travel with us wherever we go and are accessible wherever we are.
- It’s possible that office space can be resized if part of the workforce is always working remotely, and rental expenses can consequently be reduced.
- Physical IT servers are no longer required, which means expensive CAPEX (capital expenditure) is transitioned to predictable monthly OPEX (operational expenditure). Insurance premiums can consequently be reduced as well.
More efficiency with cloud technologies
- We’re able to give answers to questions as soon as we see them, through the ease of responding on various devices, even after hours.
- We can collaborate more effectively by sharing data easily,
- We’re improving customer support with live chat facilities, information and training webinars as well as cloud-based how-to videos.
- Cloud technology allows small and medium-size businesses to affordably gain access to cutting edge tools and technologies that were previously only available to large businesses.
- We no longer need to spend time doing software installations and upgrades.
- Support consultants are able to provide instant remote support (you don’t have to wait for a consultant to travel to the site of the issue). This can eliminate common IT related business disruptions.
- We don’t have filing and access issues anymore because there’s only one version of each important document, stored in a centralised place online, which multiple users can contribute to.
- We can link cloud accounting software to CRM software to provide better service to our clients.
Heightened data security with cloud technologies
- We don’t need to remember to backup our files as they aren’t stored on our servers, hard-drives or devices – they’re stored in the cloud which is, in effect, backing them up automatically all the time.
- We don’t need to worry about who has the latest version of a document because there’s only one version and it’s stored safely in the cloud.
- We don’t have to worry about attending to viruses and other computer malware as cloud-based cyber security solutions monitor and classify the activities on our devices before they become a threat. Caution is still needed when opening emails and following links: check out our cyber security course for other tips.
Chat to IronTree about improving your remote office setup with the latest cloud technologies.