You've reached the point where you know your business needs some more sophisticated IT support than your current model can provide. You've evaluated the options, and are considering working with an outsourced IT vendor or managed service provider. An outsourced IT vendor can handle a lot of different functions for your business, but you're struggling to evaluate the return on the potentially significant investment you're about to make in their services.

Kelley Earnhardt Miller, Co-Owner / Vice President / Business Manager, of JR Motorsports, recently joined her brother, Dale Earnhardt Jr. on his Dirty Mo Podcast, to talk about childhood memories growing up together while their dad, Dale Earnhardt, was becoming a NASCAR racing legend. Before the conversation got started Kelley briefly described her ongoing IT problems and uttered a sentiment shared by many executives unnecessarily suffering from unproductive technology.She said, "everybody has IT problems.” It doesn’t have to be that way, Kelley!

Gone are the days of Nick Burns Your Company’s Computer Guy showing up at your desk shouting, “MOVE,” so that he can sit in your chair to solve whatever computer issue is keeping you from your work.

Most businesses launch their operations on a shoestring budget and manage the business on readily available technology.

"I'm having technical difficulties," is a phrase with which most professionals are all too familiar. While no IT system is ever 100% free from the occasional issue, the most successful business tech support professionals are the ones that keep business downtime to a minimum and implement IT systems that contribute to the company's bottom line. They know that the only effective way to minimize downtime is to proactively troubleshoot IT systems and fix issues BEFORE they cost the company money by impacting end users. Network monitoring systems are a tool that IT professionals use to stay ahead of issues. These tools allow your IT team to work behind the scenes fixing problems you didn't even know you had to keep the business network running smoothly. Your internal IT department can utilize a network monitoring system, or you can work with an outsourced IT vendor or managed service provider that provides a network monitoring service. Network monitoring is an automated piece of network management that audits all network components (servers, firewalls, shared resources, etc.) for failure and optimum performance. A network monitoring system notifies the network administrator of failures that have impacted or could impact the performance of the entire network.

If you're planning to upgrade hardware or networking infrastructure in your business this year, you may see significant cost savings by purchasing that equipment soon (i.e. this month) thanks to increased tariffs on Chinese imports.

From basic desktop computers to complex network infrastructure, all businesses need some sort of technology to operate. With the amount of technology necessary to compete in today's economy, how do businesses maintain margins and absorb ever-growing IT costs? Leasing is an option that reduces your initial investment and allows for the flexibility to adopt new technology based on your business needs and not capital budgets.

Do you have computers in your business operating on Windows 7? Do you feel like you just upgraded away from Windows XP? If that’s the case, you were most likely utilizing Windows XP beyond its April 8, 2014 end of life date and managed just fine without upgrading immediately. So, it makes sense that you are probably not too concerned about upgrading away from Windows 7 any time soon. You survived the last end of life date just fine, and you’ll get through this one too, right? Wrong.

National headlines about ransomware attacks crippling Baltimore City and Cleveland Hopkins International Airport might leave smaller businesses thinking that governments and large corporations are the only entities facing a real threat of attack. However, threats against businesses of all sizes have been on the rise. Malwarebytes Labs issued a Cyber Crime Tactics and Techniques 2019 Q1 Report stating that cyberattacks on businesses in general have increased 235% in the past year. Ransomware specifically is gaining rapid momentum in Q1 2019 with a 195% increase in ransomware attacks on businesses from Q4 2018 to Q1 2019.

When you think of email from a business standpoint you think of company announcements, junk mail, co-worker problem solving, and reminders that it's Jane's birthday. It is easy to get caught up in the flow of the business and overlook the full functions of this tool that you use every day. This is true even more so in health care because the focus tends to lean more on patient satisfaction than it does the technical aspects in the background. This is why email often gets overlooked when it comes to HIPAA compliance.