An office that can’t be taken with you isn’t just stuck geographically, it’s stuck in the past. Cloud computing is transforming the business landscape, and it’s time you took the leap and digitised your office. Rob Lith, Telviva’s Business Development Director, gives three simple but powerful reasons the cloud will transform your business.
Work on the go
The idea is simple: by hosting your operational tools in the cloud, you gain access to them from anywhere, at any time. That’s convenient for business. It’s also great for collaboration, enabling employees to work more effectively together from across the office or across the world without interruption, boosting productivity.
Being able to work from home, or the local coffee shop, is also a plus for work-life balance, something most employees are looking for and a requirement if you’re looking to hire the best talent available.
Have someone else pay your business’ upkeep
Software and hardware ultimately expire, and IT staff will always come and go, but for many businesses, those are problems best left in the past. Why spend money on the skills required to manage and maintain the software needed to run your business, or the expensive servers that host it, when someone will do it for you? That’s the premise powering cloud adoption.
Software as a Service (or SaaS) can manage your accounting and finances, security, sales, inventory, client/customer relations and so much more, and offer numerous advantages beyond mobility – collaboration, flexibility, scalability, etc. SaaS is also a much more cost-effective way of purchasing software, requiring you to purchase only the functionality you require, rather than entire suites. You also have access to the latest versions without ever having to repurchase license keys every few years.
On the hardware side of things, because the SaaS providers host everything on their end, requiring only login details and Internet access from your side, you never need to worry about upgrading hardware approaching end-of-life. That saves you money.
Secure your business against any eventuality
Of course, the cloud has always been good at one aspect of business – protecting it from disaster. Thanks to the speed of modern fibre connections, the cloud can mirror the data saved on your business’ mobile devices, desktop PCs and even local servers with the click of a button or at the end of each day.
Once secured in the cloud, you’ve effectively protected yourself against hardware failure, local disasters like fires and break ins and even many types of security threats. That’s if your new and improved security system doesn’t prevent incursions first.
Cloud-based security solutions are always up to date and always learning from the encounters thousands, if not millions, of businesses across the world are experiencing. It takes a lot of the pressure of securing your network off your IT staff and places it in the hands of experienced service providers – cyber security veterans – and highly sophisticated technology.
These are just a few of the advantages a virtual office has for any business looking to get ahead in today’s changing market place. Perhaps that’s the most powerful point of all, that this is just the beginning of the digital journey for your business.
