Photo Credit: #WOCinTech Chat
Cutting-edge tech is everywhere these days and you do not need to be running a technology-focused start-up to notice. Regardless of what your field is, your company employees need to be tech-savvy – and we are not just talking about the IT department. Having knowledgeable employees who are not afraid to work with novel technological solutions might go a long way towards improving efficiency, cutting costs, protecting against security threats and, ultimately, increasing your profits. And here is how.
Having a great, up-to-the-task IT department is a definite priority for companies nowadays when it comes to cyber security – they are the ones that will be called upon to fend off DDoS and similar attacks. However, in the much more common occurrence of ransomware attacks – who did not notice WannaCry and Petya this past year infecting thousands of businesses worldwide? – it is actually every single one of your employees that is your first line of defense. According to a study published on Statista, the primary cause of ransomware infections is spam and phishing emails, accounting for 46% of all threats, while insufficient employee training results in a further 36% of these incidents.
You will find more statistics at Statista
Insider threats are not necessarily malicious or intentional; they can be accidental, for instance when insufficiently trained employees access sensitive data through an unsecured connection or transfer it on an unsecured USB drive, or they can be compromised, when hackers use someone on the inside with authorized access as a way to break in – think malicious email attachments or phishing scams. Providing technical training and making sure that your staff is up to date will help you minimize exposure to cyber criminals.
Coordination and communication is the secret key to the smooth function of every successful enterprise out there. Making use of professional collaboration tools to facilitate coordination among and across different projects and teams might work wonders towards achieving better results; think Google Calendar or Teamup for example, which allows all users to see updates in real time, eliminating the need to email everyone in the office about that minor change in schedule. Yet you need your employees to have at least a basic level of technical skills in order to make it work.
Even more so when it comes to more powerful tools, like file sharing software (anything from an internal cloud to Dropbox) or an internal wiki section to help your employees access all the information they need and remain up to date on changes in policy. There are also comprehensive project management software solutions like Asana that help organize projects, share progress and delegate tasks – making your work more efficient.
Working from home has seen a 37% increase in the last ten years or so and is expected to grow even more, according to the 2016 Global Telework Survey by PGI. Companies might seem reluctant to adopt telecommuting for now, but the fact is that it is good for staff morale and productivity: employees report that they are happier and more efficient and six out of ten cite cutting costs as one of the benefits.
And according to PGI again, working remotely is good for business, too: companies on average save up on real estate costs $10,000 per full-time employee working from home, which rises to $11,000 if you add utility costs, or $700 billion annually for part-time telecommuters. But telecommuting means relying heavily on technology and software and employees need to have the proper technological skills for that.
Enterprises that are quick to realize these benefits need to work towards recruiting the right, tech-savvy people and honing the tech skills of their already existing personnel. It might require some investment in time and resources today but will yield rewards and profit soon enough.
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