The media is filled with end of year task lists from financial planning, to updating sales plans. All necessary but they certainly adds to the stress of the season.
I came across a check list of questions to ask in order to prepare your company, and your budget, for an IT network. As I read through it I kept wondering how a small to medium business owner could have the time and resources to handle this.
And why go through this when a move to the Cloud eliminates, or mitigates, 99% of these tasks.
How?
The checklist just for your servers includes:
- How old are your servers? If they are older than 4 years old you may want to plan on replacing them soon.
- Are your servers under warranty? See when your warranty expires. Often you can renew the warranty for an additional couple of years after the initial warranty expires, so you may want to consider that when budgeting for 2012.
- What Operating System are your servers running on? Windows 2003 is a bit antiquated and Microsoft has added a lot of new features that might benefit your organization.
Cloud apps do not require your business to purchase, operate, or update servers as your data is hosted at datafarms, managed by Tier 1 companies with 99.9% guaranteed uptimes.
And it doesn’t matter what Operating System, browser, or computer your team uses.
The checklist for security includes:
- Is your antivirus up to date on both your computers and your servers? This process can be automated, so there’s no excuse for not having antivirus on all your hardware.
- Are your updates and patches up to date on your servers? This process can also be automated.
- Are you allowing remote access to your network? Is it secure enough?
Cloud-based computing operates your apps in the Cloud where viruses don’t exist, updates and patches are handled by the vendors scheduled not to interfere with your operation, and security is trusted to companies such as InfoStreet who have been providing SAAS since 1994.
Scheduled tasks for your computers include:
- How old are your computers? If a lot of them are over three years old, you may want to start planning for replacements. You also may want to purchase a spare computer you can have configured and ready to go in case an older computer breaks.
- What operating systems are they running? Would you like to standardize to one operating system?
Use a PC or a MAC, old or new, and operating systems are not an issue in the Cloud.
Scheduled tasks for Data Backup include:
- Are you backing up everything regularly? Or just the critical data? If you’re not backing up the entire system, are you okay with the downtime that would come with having to reconfigure?
- Is the backup automatic, or does somebody have to put in a tape (or a hard drive)?
- Do you have a disaster plan? Do you know how much downtime you might experience if something happens to your servers?
Who do you trust with your data? Your IT consultant or companies such as Amazon, Google, or InfoStreet? It might feel good to stash your money in your mattress, where you can see it and touch it but we trust our financial institutions to do a better job.
Planning is essential when operating any business but smart planning can make the difference between stagnation and success in the coming year. There are no guarantees in life or in business but the Cloud can reduce your overhead, increases your mobility and productivity and allows you to only pay for what you need, for as long as you need it.
The Cloud allows you to work smarter, not harder. That’s an end of the year plan that works.
