Faced with limited resources, small businesses must work harder than their larger counterparts to remain competitive. One way of doing this is to seek out opportunities to become more efficient in day-to-day operations. Technological advancements have made it possible for business owners to streamline many management tasks that previously demanded manual time and effort. The digital workspace is just one example of where small businesses can find greater efficiencies. This blog post will explore what a digital workspace is, and discuss tips and strategies for optimization to help your business thrive.

What is a Digital Workspace?

A digital workspace refers to a framework of technologies that allow businesses to centrally manage, secure, and optimize all of their IT assets. This includes applications, data, and endpoints such as laptops and mobile devices. Establishing a digital workspace makes it easier for management to maintain visibility of all technology in use within an organization, and ensures employees can access the resources they need at any time, in any location.

Examples of Digital Workspace Technology

Common tools used in digital workspaces include network management platforms, Mobile Device Management (MDM), endpoint protection software, and cloud-based collaboration tools. These technologies provide comprehensive visibility, control, and security across the entire IT infrastructure. Let’s examine each in more detail:

Network Management

While traditional network management tools provide some visibility into the network, they don’t offer the comprehensive visibility and control that businesses need to manage their digital workspace effectively. A next-generation network management platform provides granular visibility into all network activity, helping businesses identify and resolve performance issues quickly.

Mobile Device Management

Another key component of a digital workspace is Mobile Device Management. This provides real-time visibility into the status and health of all devices, applications, and users in your IT infrastructure, making it easier to identify potential security risks or compliance issues. By implementing an MDM solution, you can also automatically deploy updates to all employee devices as needed.

Endpoint Protection

In addition to network and device management, it is also crucial to have robust endpoint protection in place. This includes antivirus and anti-malware software, secure web gateways, vulnerability scanners, data loss prevention tools, and encryption systems. With a comprehensive endpoint protection solution, businesses can effectively protect their digital workspace from various cyber threats and ensure compliance with industry regulations.

Cloud-based Collaboration

In today’s digital workplace, it is also essential to have strong cloud-based collaboration tools that enable employees to communicate with one another, and to access documents and applications from anywhere, easily.

Benefits of Digital Workspace Management

There are many benefits of implementing a digital workspace at your organization, including:

Enhanced security and data breach protection

Having full visibility of all IT assets and devices can help to simplify an organization’s cybersecurity, making it easier to detect and respond to threats, protect your business from costly data breaches, and mitigate user errors. This is particularly important in a remote or hybrid working environment, where employees may be accessing your network from multiple locations and devices.

Improved operational efficiency

By improving visibility and control over IT assets, digital workspace solutions can help to streamline operations and reduce complexity. Automation reduces the time it takes to perform routine tasks like software updates and patch management, freeing employees to focus on higher-value activities.

Enhanced employee experience

With a centralized digital workspace solution, small businesses can provide employees with a consistent working experience across all devices and applications. This can help to boost productivity and engagement by making it easier for employees to access the resources they need from any location or device.

Flexible technology options

Digital workspace solutions are available as on-premises, cloud-based, or hybrid deployments. This allows businesses to select the deployment option that best fits their needs. Whether you choose a virtual, SaaS, web, cloud, or on-premises digital workspace, you can be sure that your business will have the flexibility to scale its IT infrastructure.

How to Optimize Your Digital Workspace

There are a few key things to keep in mind when optimizing your digital workspace:

1. Define your business goals

The first step is to define your business goals. What are you trying to achieve with your digital workspace? Do you want to improve security? Increase operational efficiency? Enhance the employee experience? Once you have a clear understanding of your goals, you can start to design and implement solutions that will help you reach them.

2. Choose the right digital workspace solution

Next, it is important to select the right digital workspace solution for your needs. Consider deployment type, pricing model, and integration capabilities when choosing a solution. It is also important to stay up-to-date with the latest trends and best practices in digital workspace management, as this can help you stay ahead of the competition.

3. Implement a strong governance plan

A strong governance plan that outlines roles and responsibilities for managing IT assets is a critical component of your digital workspace, as are regular system audits. This will help you ensure that your digital workspace runs smoothly and effectively meets your business needs.

4. Monitor and adjust as needed

Finally, it is important to continuously monitor your digital workspace for performance issues and potential security threats. If you identify any problems, be sure to take steps to correct them as quickly as possible. Regularly review your digital workspace solution to ensure that it is still meeting your business needs and makes progress towards your goals.

Implement a Digital Workspace Solution at Your Organization

Getting started with a digital workspace can seem overwhelming, but the long term benefits make it a worthwhile investment. If you’re still unsure of the next steps to take for your business’s digital workspace, don’t hesitate to contact us. Our team at Toniolo specializes in helping small and medium-sized businesses to boost productivity and efficiency through IT, and can guide you through the solutions you need.

Technology is one of the most powerful drivers of success for small and medium-sized businesses. Effective use of IT is associated with increased agility, greater productivity, better data security practices, and enhanced employee collaboration.

However, the management of IT can be challenging, particularly as businesses scale. Without the right infrastructure in place, IT can quickly become a burden, rather than a facilitator of growth. This article shares some of the most common IT issues faced by businesses and how you can overcome them.

The Top 12 IT Issues for Businesses

Businesses can face an exponential number of IT issues, but the twelve challenges listed below are some of the most common – and some of the most problematic if left unaddressed.

Common IT Issues

In today’s workplace, the following IT issues can create significant problems for your business, and are becoming increasingly widespread.

1. Data Backup and Disaster Recovery

Having a data backup plan enables your business to protect critical files from loss or attack. However, the main challenge emerges when deciding what data needs to be backed up, how frequently, and for how long. In the event of a breach, companies also need to have an official disaster recovery plan to mitigate damage and recover lost data. Unfortunately, many small and medium-sized businesses overlook this need, which can lead to catastrophic IT issues in the long term.

2. IT Cybersecurity Risks

Cybersecurity is another critical IT consideration for SMBs. Modern-day hackers are ruthless and sophisticated, leaving businesses increasingly vulnerable. Cyber attacks can lead your organization to expose intellectual property, customer information and data, confidential communications, employee records, and more. In many businesses, the IT department is held responsible for cybersecurity, but limited resources and expertise can mean this issue doesn’t always get the attention it deserves. Unfortunately, this approach can leave you exposed to costly breaches and extensive downtime.

3. Password Management

Many organizations are guilty of recycling passwords or using weak passwords to protect their critical assets. Forgotten passwords and downtime due to password recovery are also commonplace among employees. This IT issue is one of the leading causes of cybersecurity breaches and associated data losses. Better password management and the use of multi-factor authentication (MFA) can dramatically reduce your vulnerability to attack.

4. Onboarding and Offboarding

Effective onboarding and offboarding of employees relies heavily on IT, from gathering and storing paperwork, to setting new hires up with access to company resources. Such processes are time-consuming if your HR department doesn’t have access to adequate resources, especially if they experience IT issues with existing systems.

5. IT Compliance

Research indicates that over 40% of small and medium-sized businesses lack the technical know-how to understand ever-changing IT compliance regulations. The same survey shows that 25% of SMBs have outsourced IT compliance work at some point. Navigating regulatory compliance can be complicated, but ignoring your obligations can have costly consequences.

6. Data Sprawl

Most modern businesses are grappling with data sprawl, which compromises the quality of data generated, and impacts the ability to extract value from this data. As companies produce and collect more and more data, the management of this vital resource becomes an even more pressing IT issue.

7. Device Procurement and Management

Having full visibility of all devices being used within your organization is crucial to maintain security and employee productivity. With the right solutions in place, IT teams should also be able to monitor the health of these devices, and remotely roll out patches and upgrades as needed. When IT issues arise in this area, it can seriously impact the output of remote teams.

IT Strategy and Management Issues

A fundamental point to note is that small and medium-sized businesses don’t just experience difficulties with the technical aspects of IT. In fact, IT strategy and management issues can cause even more problems than technical glitches. Some of the most common IT management challenges include:

8. Limited IT Budgets

As businesses scale, budgets can be tight. Often, leadership will opt to invest in product development, marketing, or other growth initiatives rather than vital IT infrastructure. While this may seem sensible in the short term, it can mean seemingly small IT issues worsen over time and generate greater challenges in the long run.

9. Competition for IT Talent

The competition for talent has never been higher, especially when it comes to experienced IT professionals. An inability to recruit or retain qualified IT workers can impact almost every aspect of your business, from ensuring employees have the devices and resources they need, to protecting sensitive data from cyber attack.

10. A Lack of Expertise

Even if you are lucky enough to have a number of IT professionals working for your company, that doesn’t necessarily guarantee they will have the specific expertise you need to scale and grow. If highly complex IT issues arise, you may find that your internal resources are unable to remedy the problem.

11. Competing Priorities for IT Teams

Another challenge for in-house IT personnel is that they typically have many competing priorities that pull them in multiple directions. This all-too-common problem can put pressure on existing resources and result in errors or incomplete work.

12. Out-of-Hours Support

Finally, most small businesses with limited in-house resources will struggle to deal with serious IT issues such as cyber attacks if they occur outside of business hours. Likewise, if a specific employee is sick or on vacation, your company can be left vulnerable while they are offline.

5 Benefits of Outsourcing to Overcome IT Issues

Many of the most common IT issues faced by businesses can be resolved by outsourcing to external experts. A managed IT solution can take care of a wide range of IT support services, including device and inventory management, security and compliance, network and server management, applications and cloud management, and real-time support. By outsourcing, your business can realize the following benefits:

1. Cost control

With the right partner, you will only pay for services you actually need and use. This makes budgeting easier, and spending more efficient.

2. Reduced labor costs

Outsourcing allows you to streamline labor costs that would otherwise be spent on hiring and training additional internal employees.

3. Enhanced efficiency

External specialists can enhance your business efficiency by ensuring you get the most out of your IT solutions and reducing downtime.

4. Reduced risks

Having access to dedicated cybersecurity professionals significantly reduces your risk of cyber attack and data breaches.

5. Enhanced compliance and security

Partnering with an external specialist ensures you have access to the latest knowledge on industry regulations.

Don’t Let IT Issues Impact Business Growth

While technology undeniably contributes to innovation and growth, managing IT in-house can be an overwhelming task for small and medium-sized businesses. To learn more about how you can overcome common IT issues and streamline your organization’s IT, contact Toniolo today. Our IT Solution supports your business at the network, application, and device levels, and features IT capabilities that are proactive, comprehensive, and customized to your needs.