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You already have a lot of work. There's no need to complicate your life with computer problems. Here we explore 4 ways to avoid troubles that won't cost you anything.

Imagine the following scenario:
A client contacts you for information. You try to access the system containing the information, but it just won't work. You ask your colleagues to see if they can reproduce the same problem. Horror! Everyone is down. Everyone starts looking for a solution. Meanwhile, the client doesn't have the information, and your employees aren't busy doing what they do best. For you, this system outage represents expenses for getting it back up and running, but it's also the wages of employees who couldn't be productive and the loss of revenue from unsatisfied customers.

This is a sign that the health of your IT is not optimal, and here are some solutions to improve technology management.

Tip #1: Use high availability.

Symptoms
– The systems stop working
– Employee productivity is affected, or worse, they cannot work at all.
– Serving customers during the interruption becomes difficult.

Sometimes, the downtime is short-lived or manifests as latency rather than a complete service outage. However, all these accumulated downtimes will burden the workflow, significantly impacting the profitability of your business.

Possible solutions
- proactive system monitoring
- Knowing your systems and your reality well.

If an employee excels above average in the field and takes on the role of part-time IT manager, it's good as long as you can rely on someone. The important thing is to consider the time spent on technical support in their workload. Have you asked this person, as well as other employees, about their quality of work-life balance?

Tip #2: Know who to contact

Which brings us to key contacts

Symptoms
- Prolonged downtime.

Challenges
Employees may be left stranded without technical assistance, without wanting to burden their already busy colleagues. Those who are more computer-savvy may also find themselves with unsolicited responsibilities.

In the end, all employees manage among themselves because they are all little ninjas who wear many hats. However, the group effect results in the opposite, where no one is responsible anymore.

Possible solutions
– Seek external assistance for recommendations and implementation of systems.
- When seeking help, it's always possible to inquire whether the firm offers training with the aim of maintaining autonomy in managing the IT infrastructure.
- Building a relationship with a reliable partner can lighten the load, knowing that it's always possible to ask questions when in doubt.

It's important to ask for help when needed and consider the actual workload burdening the employee(s). Whether it's a firm, a friend, an employee, or a contact, the important thing is to have someone to rely on.

Tip #3: Take cybersecurity seriously.

Symptoms
– You run the risk of sharing passwords for shared accounts internally.
- If there were a security breach, you wouldn't know what steps to take to mitigate the risks.
- Your insurers require you to implement solutions, but you don't know how to do it or even how it will help your business.

Challenges
Where to start ? there is the question.
Know that there are several solutions to meet the same needs. Some are universal (like two-factor authentication), but others require more customization, and not all proposed solutions are suitable for the company's needs. (Example: backup plans)

Possible solutions
– Use unique accounts for each employee.
- If not possible, use a PAM solution
- Use a password manager
- Don't reuse passwords across multiple platforms.
- Use SSO as much as possible (Single Sign-On).
- Use two-factor authentication.
- Never pay ransom.

These are some measures that can be implemented to mitigate risks. Cybercrimes are becoming increasingly sophisticated, and hackers are infiltrating with greater ease. To give you an idea, about 1 in 5 Canadian businesses experienced a cybersecurity incident in 2021, according to Statistic Canada.

Tip #4: Maximize your existing tools for workflows

Symptoms
- You have 2 to 3 main tools you work with, which complicates the process by switching from one platform to another.
- Accessing and organizing the file system is difficult.
- You find yourself working reactively to incoming requests.
– Les arrivées et départs d’employés sont coûteux en temps.

Challenges
Tools are meant to optimize our processes and workflows, but they can quickly become a burden when there are too many. If there's an application for every need, using each one adds complexity since some tools used may have similar functions, and the line becomes blurred as to which one to use in which context.

Furthermore, managing licenses and user accounts for all applications and tools needs to be taken into account, which requires additional effort when there are arrivals and departures. Is your team being solicited to grant permissions and create user accounts as they require specific access?

Possible solutions
– En configurant le SSO, vous pouvez donner accès aux multiples applications au même endroit.
– Utiliser des groupes centralisés ce qui simplifie la gestion d’accès.
– Documenter un gabarit d’accès et matériel requis pour un nouvel utilisateur sous forme de checklist.

Encadrer un nouvel employé alors qu’il manque de ressource interne n’est pas chose facile. MMO utilise la méthode du parrainage qui a été prouvée efficace à maintes reprises. Il s’agit d’assigner un parrain pour accompagner le nouvel usager dans toutes ses demandes et qui va s’assurer de son intégration complète au sein de l’entreprise. Il en va de même pour les départs, il doit avoir un processus clair afin de s’assurer qu’il y a une personne responsable du retrait d’accès, de la rotation d’inventaire, des licences, de la durée de rétention des données et d’archivage de compte.

Conclusion

All the points mentioned above encompass a common denominator, which is context switching. You know, when it overflows and we flit from one task to another, thinking that we're accomplishing several things at once. The reality is that it's just an illusion, and humans are not able to process multiple tasks simultaneously. In fact, we switch from one thing to another very quickly, which significantly reduces efficiency.

In summary, here are the main points that cause context switching at all levels:

- Complete or partial system shutdowns.
- Seeking or asking for a solution from our colleagues when downtime persists.
- Struggling between easy access to information and secure access to data.
- Constant notifications.
- Switching between tools repeatedly to perform the same task.
- All the solutions brought up here significantly reduce employees' context switching, which improves workflow efficiency for everyone and ultimately the profitability of your business.

MMO must regularly manage this reality, and we continuously refine our methodology to optimize our efficiency. Information technology is present in all sectors, and we share our passion every day by helping our clients find the best solutions that fit their needs on a regular basis.

Don't hesitate to contact us; we'll be happy to discuss.
MMO Techno Team