As a business leader, you don’t care what Microsoft calls its services as long as your programs work and fees don’t go up. The name change from Office 365 to Microsoft 365 doesn’t create any changes in your services or bill (as of this article’s date). But the name change does signal a great time to really understand what you’re paying Microsoft for and make sure you have the right subscriptions to match your needs. Before we move on, you should know that this article focuses on Microsoft 365 for business licenses and the enterprise license affected by the Microsoft 365 name change. These are some of the most common Microsoft/Office 365 plans for businesses with less than 300 users.

Technology is one of the most vital forces in the business world. From your email and phone system to your payroll processing and invoicing, your business runs on many IT systems. Learning to accept new technology into your business is a must to keep your systems up to date and stay competitive. But just like anything else, we often fear the change of technology or the "unknown." Just hearing the word "change" is enough to make anyone cringe. Learning new habits can be daunting or exhausting. Why add anything else to our already busy lives? If something is working, why change it?

As a business owner, you embrace new technologies that: Help your business grow. Keep your employees happy and motivated. Complete work better, faster, and cheaper. All facets of our personal and business lives are becoming more digital. More tools and technologies are available than ever before, many of which help achieve the business goals above. They automate processes, provide data to inform better decisions, and support employees doing their best work. We get instant answers from our personal assistants, automate our home or business temperature, and order products by simply asking for them out loud. All this technology keeps personal data about us, our habits, and our businesses. that information secure is paramount.

It’s overwhelming when you need to replace one of the computers in your business. With the average computer needing replaced every three to five years, you’re likely looking at different specs and maybe even a new operating system than the one you’re replacing. This can be confusing on your end, and frustrating for the employee who’s been using the same computer for years. In this article, we’ll walk through how to choose the best computer for your business. Since the choices in computer models are infinite, we’ll focus on the to most popular business computer brands on the market, Dell and HP.

Are you or your staff practicing social distancing and working remotely in response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak? We're all doing as much as we can to stay safe, which has meant making some quick decisions and quickly transitioning employees to work-from-home arrangements. Microsoft Teams is an incredibly powerful tool to continue collaboration and virtual face-to-face communication while your team works from the safety of their homes. If you're already using Microsoft Office 365, you may already have access to Teams and are maybe already using some of the features. Here is a brief video tutorial of some of the features we've found most useful as we at Innovative practice as much social distancing as possible.

You've been managing IT functions in your business on your own, or with some limited help. You're starting to feel like a more cohesive approach to IT could benefit your business. Your current "just fix it when it's broken" method isn't working. Managed IT services let you sleep better, knowing that an experienced business technology team is managing your IT infrastructure and systems. Managed IT services is the administration and oversight of the technology functions and infrastructure within your business by an outsourced, third-party provider, usually called a managed services provider (MSP). The most common managed IT services include: Network monitoring and management. Help desk support. On-site IT service. Remote tech support. IT consulting. Disaster recovery Data backup. Anti-virus and threat detection. Cloud solutions.

“Why are you so expensive?” This is one of the most asked questions by our existing and prospective clients. So, someone must answer it. Lucky me. We will discuss the difference between tech support and managed IT services and the cost associated with each of them. Here at Innovative, we are a managed IT services provider, but understand that our services aren’t the best fit for every business. As such, we are going to provide you with an honest assessment of the cost of managed IT services and break/fix tech support. The goal of this article is to provide you with the information necessary to understand the cost of managed IT services and break/fix tech support. With this knowledge, you can make the right choice for you and your business.

You’ve been working with an IT support company, freelancer, or managed service provider for a while. You like them. They’re great people. Maybe you’ve known them for years and they’ve helped you out of more than one bind. But lately, you’ve been feeling that things could be better. Your IT systems should be more in sync with your business. Your employees shouldn’t be dealing with nagging, unresolved problems. And your own, fairly new computer has been getting more sluggish by the day. Even on a good day when everything is working fine, you have a nagging gut feeling that the IT in your business isn’t great. You don’t even want to think about what might happen on a bad day when your server crashes or you get hit with a ransomware attack.

A managed service provider, or MSP, is a third-party that delivers an essential business function. Usually this refers specifically to IT functions. MSPs work under a subscription model, rather than a per-hour or per-call rate charged by on-demand or break/fix vendors. With on demand service providers, response to issues as they arise can cause unpredictable costs and outages. By contrast, an MSP is a business partner that proactively manages and assumes responsibility for an agreed upon set of services.

You have a gut feeling that something isn’t right about the way you’ve been approaching IT in your business. You’re not sure exactly what to do, but you’re afraid of what might happen if you continue the current path. Maybe you have one or two internal IT employees. You’re worried about what would happen if your network crashes overnight or while they’re on vacation. Maybe you contract with a freelancer or company to come to your business and install or troubleshoot equipment as needed. They do the work you ask, but you’re not sure if there are better hardware and software options available. If these are the things keeping you up at night, outsourcing your IT department might be the right solution for you. Managed IT is just one of the four main ways businesses approach IT support, but it is the only comprehensive outsourced IT option that will address your concerns. With managed IT services, an IT company takes on complete oversight of your network and support of your devices and end users. Managed IT services include both strategic and tactical services. You get the benefits of an IT strategy with a team of professionals handling the monitoring and maintenance of your network along with the day-to-day end user support.