A lot of professional services companies have settled into a post-pandemic “new normal” version of their workplace, and for many offices, that includes a greater flexibility to allow staff to work from home on either a part-time or full-time basis. Having this flexibility baked into the work environment makes a lot of sense for many businesses, allowing team members to work from home on those days when it makes better sense to do so.
There are downsides, though, and one of the big ones is the added complexity remote work creates for the IT staff to keep everyone productive and secure.
The Additional Risk Of Remote Staff
An IT professional’s job is substantially simpler when everyone does their work from the same office. All the computers are owned by the company, there’s one (maybe two) internet connections, and all of the cybersecurity hardware and software only has to protect the assets that are on the office network. But as soon as people start working remote, things change. Now, people are connecting to business networks and applications from all over the place, and companies often allow them to do so from personal devices. The combination of remote connections and random devices makes it much harder to keep everything safe.
Best Practice Tips For A Hybrid Environment
An IT system built for a hybrid workstyle may never be as secure as having everyone under one roof, but there are some things you can do to minimize your company’s risk and maintain productivity when you allow your staff to work from anywhere:
- Encryption and VPN: Every legitimate website and cloud service these days uses encryption technology, but when it comes to connecting remote staff to a local office resource, the only person who can enforce good encryption policy is the IT administrator. If you are having people connect to office resources from home, you’ll need a good business-class router than can establish a Virtual Private Network and securely encrypt the network channel.
- Consider Cloud-Based Solutions: Truth be told, there are fewer justifications than ever for keeping applications and databases captured in-house, especially for entrepreneurs and small business owners. If you can move your services to a reputable cloud-based solution, in most cases, that is the right move. Most application service providers are moving to the cloud because it’s the best way to provide a secure, cost-effective software solution.
- Limit Download Capability: Unless it’s absolutely necessary, staff should not be allowed to download information assets when they are working remote. While we all want to believe that our team is 100% trustworthy, giving everyone permission to download anything they want from the company database is asking for trouble.
- Use a Password Manager: Onboarding remote staff is tricky, and offboarding a remote team member can be a nightmare if the team is using shared passwords. Sharing passwords is a bad idea for many reasons, but the reality is that it’s a common practice. A good business-class password manager can allow you to “share” as many passwords as you need to with somone on your team, and unshare them all at the click of a button.
- Create A Collaboration Culture: Okay, maybe this isn’t strictly an IT thing, but putting the systems in place to ensure that your remote workforce can collaborate with each other effectively is essential to maintaining productivity in a hybrid work environment. Group chats, shared whiteboards, and a good task manager can go a long way toward keeping everyone engaged and on the same page.
A hybrid work culture can be the best of all worlds, giving employees a better work-life balance and allowing them to stay engaged with the office even when they can’t walk in the door. If you need help keeping your remote team happy, feel free to schedule a free consultation with me and I’ll be happy to work with you to ensure your IT solution is secure and efficient.
