If your roof is leaking and your kitchen is showing its age, both may need work. But only one of them is going to ruin your week. Your IT budget can put you in the same position. There may be plenty worth spending money on, but deciding what comes first isn’t always obvious.
It’s easy to feel confident about your IT budget in January. Everything’s perfectly organized and approved, and you have a clear picture of what the next 12 months of technology expenses will look like. Now you can focus on your work and not worry too much about tech until your next budget conversation or quarterly business review, right?
Suddenly, it’s summer.
If you look at any suburb this Halloween, you’ll see countless monsters roaming the streets. Vampires, creatures and ghouls all “wreaking havoc” (going to parties and trick-or-treating).
The real monsters, though, don’t look like this.
Every autumn, the medicine cabinet gets a little more crowded. There's cold medicine left over from last winter, vitamins bought in bulk, half-used bottles of cough syrup and a prescription that should have been thrown out months ago. There’s plenty of medicine there, but a full cabinet has never been a measure of anyone's health.
It’s 4:17 on a Friday afternoon.
An employee receives an email that appears to be from the owner: “Can you send me the updated banking information before you leave?”
The name is right. The tone sounds familiar. And with everyone trying to wrap up the week, the easiest thing to do is simply respond.
October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month and it's a good time to take stock of what you actually know vs. what you think you know when it comes to cybersecurity. Not all of the advice out there is accurate. Some has circulated for so long that it's taken on a life of its own and gets repeated until it sounds like fact, even when it's outdated or wrong.
Most businesses know they should have a disaster recovery plan. But few have one that’s current, tested and complete.
That’s not always because they lack initiative or will. Usually, the challenge is getting the first version down.
If you're like most business owners, you're always looking for ways to save time.
New software, AI tools and productivity systems all promise to help, but the businesses that run with the fewest interruptions usually have one thing in common: better habits.
There’s something impressive about how well families execute the back-to-school season. Backpacks are ready, bedtimes are adjusted and the route to school is planned out. Somehow, amid everything else going on in August, families manage to pull it together and show up ready on day one.
If an unexpected disruption hit your business tomorrow, would you handle it with confidence?
You may assume the answer is yes, but many businesses don't discover gaps in communication, decision-making and operational planning until they're responding to a disruption in real time.
