Jackson Thornton Technologies News + Updates

Businesses use all types of sayings to try to draw in customers. One of the core selling points of managed IT services is that “it pays for itself”. This is more than just marketing. The multiple services that make up managed IT services all help a business save time and money, but when added together, it can really help the bottom line of a business more than most services they can use. In this week’s blog we thought we would go through the core elements of a managed IT services agreement to show how it really does pay for itself. 

“I just wanted to take a second to thank the sponsor of this video, [insert VPN provider here], for supporting the channel!”

If you’ve been on YouTube in the past few years, this message likely sounds pretty familiar. Virtual private network providers have been taking advantage of the trend of influencer marketing to spread awareness of their largely obscure product—often, offering an enticing deal. While we have and will continue to promote the use of a VPN for business purposes, we wanted to clarify something here: these are not the VPNs we’re saying you should use.

You’re probably familiar with the concept of a mission statement, particularly in terms of your business as a whole. Did you know, however, that you don’t need to stop there? You can—and we’d argue, should—establish more specific organizational missions for your different departments. Let’s consider how you can benefit from creating a mission for your IT team to uphold throughout its operations, and how you might go about doing so.

Business is filled with all types of relationships, and some of them are very challenging. Consider for a minute how challenging some of the interactions you have with customers are; or some of the vendor conversations that happen; or some of the give-and-take you get from your employees. Sometimes it is hard to believe that without these people, your business would be a complete flop. This month, we break down how sometimes the relationships you forge in business are the key to things breaking your business’ way.

Every business’ clients trust that they’re taking every measure possible to protect data, like personal information or financial records. However, with the number of businesses using electronic records continuing to climb, along with the rise of cybercrime, many industries have begun to impose regulations and compliances that are designed to keep personal information secure. Health and finance are two of the most heavily regulated industries, with the government having stepped in and set a specific standard of data security regulations that these companies must comply with. 

So much goes into proper network security that it can be daunting to know where to start. Thankfully, there are plenty of great ways you can, and probably currently are, protecting your business, even if it’s on a basic level. You can consider this a checklist of crucial network security tools that are important to have for your company’s success.

We’re no strangers to talking about artificial intelligence. It’s been a somewhat regular topic on our blog and in our newsletters. AI is interesting—it’s sort of this odd technology that for many years, the average person didn’t know what to do with it. Now, it feels like AI is the dominating new technology of the year. What happened? Will it stick? Can a business take advantage of it? 

Our blog last week covered how patience is an important part of the most successful and productive employees’ arsenal. This week, we want to cover how you can help your employees be more patient. If you know someone in your office who could take things down a notch, this is just the blog for you with four suggestions that might do the trick.

All jobs have aspects of them that are simply dull or unengaging. After all, nothing can be exciting all the time. This week we wanted to focus on these rote tasks and what you can do to make them less of an impact on your time and job fulfillment. Turns out, the key to solving this issue stems from technology, specifically the ability to automate said tasks.

If you become the victim of a hacking attack today, how would the hackers go about it? Would they try to find vulnerabilities in your network and infrastructure? You need to do what you can to answer the questions surrounding the strength of your existing network and infrastructure so you don’t have to deal with potential hacks. This month, we will talk about one really great way to find out where your security is light: by getting a penetration test completed on your business’ IT.

Business continuity is one of those topics that is frustrating to confront. It’s not terribly interesting and has very little practical value in the context of day-to-day operations, but it is intrinsically important to the sustainability of any business that happens to deal with problems. Consider for a minute how many businesses fared when the COVID-19 pandemic was in full force. There weren’t many businesses that had contingency plans for a “global pandemic.” The businesses that were quick to respond and adapt often came out on top, compared to businesses that struggled to commit.

The idea of a four-day workweek has been popular for some time now, to the point where it is actively being tested in practical settings. Let’s discuss how successful this approach has been (spoiler alert: it’s been quite successful indeed).

How many of your employees do you think hold a second job? This isn’t a particularly outlandish concept, but one thing that has come about as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and its surge of remote work is that some employees hold two jobs at the same time, and not in the way that you might expect.

No matter how big your business is, you’ll always have technology expenses. It’s just a fact of the current workplace, and your profits will be inexorably tied to how well your IT works for you. Furthermore, the more IT costs rise, the more impact small and medium-sized businesses will feel from them. Today, we wanted to address this issue and how you can minimize the frustrations that stem from seemingly uncontrollable technology costs.

Digital transformation is projected to make huge waves in the business environment, with an anticipated value of approximately $767 billion by the year 2026. It’s clear that businesses have lofty ambitions and expectations for their digital transformation initiatives, but there is a shadow that is cast on this number that holds many companies back: many of these initiatives fail, and fail hard. Why is this the case? We explore these reasons in this month’s newsletter. 

Let’s begin by making one thing abundantly clear—all businesses and industries could potentially be targeted by ransomware, regardless of their size or target audience. However, as of late, some industries have been targeted more and more. Let’s examine some of the commonly targeted industries that ransomware is frequently waged against.

When many businesses look to hire new staff, they typically have a series of qualifications they need each applicant to meet before they grant interviews. They make their selection, do their entrance training, and then expect that the new hire will settle in and be as productive as possible as soon as possible.

Let me ask you a question: is there anything in your office that doesn’t rely on technology in some way, shape, or form (and no, the old coffeepot that makes the perfect cup doesn’t count)? Increasingly, the answer to that question is “no.” Let’s review how much the average business nowadays relies on IT to really reinforce how ubiquitous technology has become.

Every expense that your business takes on needs consideration. When you are looking to keep your business productive, you need to focus on keeping downtime to a minimum. In order to do that you need to have tools that don’t take a lot of work-time maintenance and have professional perspectives available that can help keep operations running when issues with your business’ technology do happen.

When all is said and done, being a manager is a far different experience than being an employee. So, when you promote one of your team members to this position—or perhaps you’ve recently been promoted to management yourself—it is important that a few practices are incorporated into their new workflow. Let’s go over these practices, and how the right IT can help.