What’s The Key To Cloud Migration Success? Flexibility!

what the key to cloud migration success flexibility

Cloud computing has exploded in popularity, with an increasing number of businesses turning to the cloud to meet their IT infrastructure needs. And the key to cloud migration is flexibility!

When selected wisely, cloud services are cost-effective and reliable. They increase your ability to work productively and take on more complex tasks and larger stores of data. They can also help your business become more resilient to IT disasters.

Making a good choice in cloud services, however, will work well for you only if you migrate successfully to the new platform.

key to cloud migration

What’s the Primary Key to Cloud Migration Success?

Flexibility is one of the most important qualities in cloud migration. The following are some examples:

  • Modifying plans when necessary. For example, let’s say your business comes up with a plan to migrate a certain number of applications to the cloud. You find on testing them that some of the applications won’t be sufficiently supported and will experience problems functioning. Are you flexible enough to change your plans – maybe choosing another cloud-based solution or refraining for the time being from migrating the subset of problematic applications?
  • Devising both strategic plans and last-minute quick solutions. Migrating to the cloud requires strategic planning and careful thought in advance. It also demand thinking on your feet. When problems come up during cloud migration, you need to quickly come up with alternatives, working as a team to brainstorm, think creatively, and implement solutions.
  • Migrating readily between platforms. A recent article from InfoWorld mentions how hybrid cloud solutions are often popular because they give businesses flexibility in combining both cloud-based and on-premises solutions for different components of their IT infrastructure. The article also emphasizes how businesses often like to migrate between cloud platforms “seamlessly,” depending on their needs. Cloud migration isn’t a one-time process; it’s something you should always be prepared to do to best work towards your business objectives.

Flexible cloud migration is essential for your business’s success. Please contact us for advice and for assistance with migrating to the cloud.

IT Service Management Companies: Help Your Business Run More Efficiently

it service management companies help your business run more efficiently

How efficient is your company? You probably have plenty of systems and procedures in place to maximize productivity but it’s possible that you are overlooking one vital aspect of managing a business: IT service management companies. Having strong IT service management in place can significantly increase efficiency and boost productivity. Let’s take a look at why that is.

IT Service Management Companies

IT service management companies free up your time for bigger picture concerns

Let’s face it, you can never have enough time to do everything that running a business demands. However, there are ways to free up your time to do more. One of the greatest benefits of having good IT service management in place is that it frees up your time to worry about bigger picture concerns because you are leaving the technology issues to the professionals. Let’s be honest, you don’t want to have to think about that stuff anyway.

IT service management companies will help with cost savings

Hiring a competent IT service management company will provide you with significant cost savings due to the consolidating of your technology systems. A good IT service company will be able to identify problems with your current arrangement and will help you find a more efficient and cost-effective way of running things.

IT service management companies will provide you with unparalleled support

If you have good IT service management in place you can spend less time trying to troubleshoot technology issues and more time focusing on big picture issues. This will free up your time and help you become more efficient and productive in the day-to-day aspects of your company.

If you have any questions about other ways we can help your business, contact us.

Backing Up Your Data: Analytics Help Manage Data Backup

backing up your data analytics help manage data backup

Businesses amass huge amounts of data. It’s all important, but it’s not all of equal importance. Working documents are more important than cache files, and the ideal strategy for backing up your data recognizes that. If the disk drive fails, it’s the live documents that need to be up to the minute. Analytics help a business define a backup strategy with priorities that reflect its needs.

Backing up your data

Retrospective analytics show how backups have performed in the past. Is the process keeping up with the file system? If it’s steadily falling behind, then it’s necessary to change the backup strategy or add resources. If it’s keeping up overall, it still makes a difference which files get priority. If important files get delayed because large downloads are hogging the duty cycle, that makes recovery harder.

Predictive analytics can warn of future shortcomings based on current trends. Perhaps the current backup storage is enough and the process isn’t falling behind, but extrapolating current trends may show that will change soon. Knowing in advance lets the IT manager add storage, request a faster data connection, or make changes in the backup process before there’s a crisis.

Keeping a history makes it possible to tell a one-time spike from a developing problem. If backing up your data is falling behind because of a huge chunk of incoming data, and that situation isn’t expected to persist, that’s not a major problem. If it happens often, it’s time to act.

More backup copies are better, but again there are priorities and cost considerations. Analyzing the backup data can help to identify the data that needs an extra level of protection. If a smaller volume is available for a secondary backup, what sets of files can it hold without exceeding its capacity? Which ones are most important?

Backing up your data is smart. Smart backing up is even better. Knowing what’s happening allows smart backup strategies. Contact us to learn how we can make your backups safer and smarter.

 

Office 365 for Business: 3 Reasons You’ll be So Happy You Switched

office 365 for business 3 reasons youll be so happy you switched

With all the advances in technology, many companies are working with outdated tech solutions even though there are great platforms available to them that offer more than the legacy tools they’ve used for years. Have you thought about Office 365 for business?

What they don’t realize is that, over time, support for these outdated systems will wane. Your organization will also lose its competitive edge. Lastly, your clients, partners and colleagues will expect you and your staff to be familiar with modern technology and to maintain similar levels of productivity when they deal with you.

Collaborate Better

Office 365’s featured project management tool, Planner, helps employees work together and stay organized. Professionals conference and collaborate in real time without having to refresh their screens to see edits or changes.

Office 365 also features the Yammer Enterprise Social Network, (ESN) app. Yammer configures with most other popular business platforms like SharePoint. Experts predict ESN’s will eventually be the main tools professionals use to search for talent, interact with colleagues and cut out the email clutter. Just like Facebook feeds keep you updated so will your ESN.

Save Money

Technology is expensive when you factor in the costs of buying hardware and software, updating, patches, maintenance and security. When you switch to Microsoft’s secure cloud, you reduce your maintenance costs. Your MSP and Microsoft work to maintain, update and secure your data and employee accounts as an integrated part of your package. Pay a monthly flat rate. Never pay for additional tech help again.

Plan for Your Business’ Growth

Scale your plan up or down whenever you want. Office 365 is affordable for businesses of every size. If your business grows, buy more OneDrive storage space and pay only for whatever additional services you need.

Contact us today at 4CornerIT. We help businesses just like yours migrate to the Microsoft Office 365 platform. It’s one of the easiest ways to finally manage and secure your company’s data properly.

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Computer Security: Don’t Use The Same Password For Multiple Accounts

computer security don t use the same password for multiple accounts

For the sake of convenience, many people like reusing the same password across multiple accounts. The password that gives them access to their email may also be the same one they rely on for social media, online banking, work-related tasks, or recreational activities. That is not smart computer security.

computer security

What they sometimes don’t realize is that if any one of these accounts gets compromised in a data breach, hackers will have the ability to use the password for multiple personal accounts, inflicting a broader violation on privacy and security.

That’s why our computer security tip of the day is a warning against using the same password for multiple accounts.

Computer security tips you should know!

How does Yahoo help illustrate this important point?

Recently, Yahoo announced that a massive cyber attack compromised data from more than a billion accounts. (Yes, a billion.) The attack, which took place in 2013, is a record-breaker, and it’s alarming that a few years passed without public knowledge of such an extensive breach in security.

The attack didn’t affect all Yahoo users in the same way. It also isn’t clear at this point what information got exposed from which accounts. However, hackers were able to get at data that included names, birthdays, passwords, and security questions.

Anyone who hasn’t updated their Yahoo password, and who uses the same one for multiple sites, is especially at risk. A similar vulnerability can arise for any password security questions that get repeated across sites.

Be sure to review your accounts and update your passwords, as necessary, not only to make them more complex but also to correct for repetition. For additional advice on coming up with strong passwords and managing them effectively, don’t hesitate to contact us.