There's no doubt that home working is here to stay. While it may have initially been deployed at large scale out of necessity, in response to COVID-19, it is clear that we are witnessing the dawn of a fully distributed workforce. However, as organisations continue to invest in new solutions to drive this change, it's important to remember that these are still the early days. We've never seen home working at this sort of scale, which means we need to establish a new standard of best practice and - equally importantly - the technology to support this.
Throughout the past few months, we have seen organisations' internal teams forced to adapt their processes, infrastructure and strategies in ways that would previously have been inconceivable. Key to the success of this process has been the support of external service providers, who have complemented companies' internal expertise and freed IT teams to focus their attention where it is most needed. As it becomes clear that the distributed workforce is here to stay, such partnerships are going to be more important than ever moving forward.
Cloud adoption has been rising year by year for some time now, with Gartner predicting this trend to accelerate beyond 2020. It has long moved on from its earliest days, where it was largely regarded as an intriguing concept but unsuitable for enterprise-level applications. Now, with a wide range of options available - including Public, Private and Hybrid solutions - it has become a highly attractive prospect for organisations at all levels, especially against the backdrop of COVID-19 and the resulting advancement of remote working. While these trends are very much the latest stage in a long process of transformation, the pandemic has undoubtedly been the catalyst behind much recent Cloud adoption, as organisations accelerate their journeys towards a distributed workforce. So, where does that leave us in terms of the biggest question: "Is Cloud right for my organisation?"
It's been 11 weeks since the UK went into lockdown and for those of us that are lucky enough to be able to work from home, the novelty may be starting to wear off. As screen time reaches an all-time high, the reality of technology and phone calls being our only method of communication with our friends, customers, partners and colleagues can be tiresome.
The past few months have certainly been challenging for businesses all over the UK - from start-ups to established industry leaders. Organisations have found themselves adapting to the demands of a remote workforce virtually overnight, deploying communications solutions to enable their teams to engage with both each other and their customers. While it's true that this technology has been available for a while now, it has never been deployed at this scale before. This has presented a range of challenges when it comes to infrastructure, but these are only part of the picture.
"The world will never be the same after Coronavirus…"I kept hearing this phrase a few weeks ago and had no idea why people were saying it. Why would the world never be the same again? It didn't make any sense to me, surely once this is over it will all go back to the same way it was before, right? Wrong.
COVID-19 has forced organisations across the UK to re-evaluate virtually every aspect of how they operate, from policies regarding remote working, to the security of their data. There's no doubt that the IT landscape has been fundamentally transformed by these challenges, as new innovations have been unveiled and deployed at an unprecedented pace. None of this could have been achieved without businesses and IT providers working hand-in-hand to meet the challenges presented by the pandemic.
There's no doubt that Unified Communications have never been in such high demand as in recent months. The current global pandemic has meant the need for secure and reliable remote working tools has risen to an unprecedented level, with a wide range of solutions thrust into the limelight as a result. Platforms like Zoom and Microsoft Teams are now a...
Amidst all the stress of lockdown, it's been heartening to see some of the ways in which people have pulled together to support each other, and the work charities all over the UK have been doing to ensure the vulnerable are protected and the NHS receives the support it needs. However, as with many other sectors, COVID-19 has pushed many charities' IT infrastructures to their limit, as they are not only forced to adapt to the Government's remote working requirements, but also rethink their approach to fundraising.
The current global stay at home policy has fundamentally changed how we all work. Many around the world have become accustomed to the daily use of teleconferencing tools, instant messaging platforms and shared documents hosted in the Cloud.
Four months into 2020, and there's no doubt that home working is here to stay. Even before our current pandemic, we saw the number of people working from home more than double between 2008 and 2018[1]. Nonetheless, in the COVID-19 era, everyone has been thrust into what has often been called the "modern workplace". In spite of our early successes, this is still very much a work in progress, as both organisations and employees establish whole new approaches to the way we work, and new tools and processes arising in response to the challenges we face. But thinking exclusively in terms of the workplace is arguably ignoring the bigger picture. We're not just seeing a shift in how we work, but a large-scale transformation of how we connect and interact with each other.
A number of charities have their IT foundations built on historical infrastructure and systems which are hard to appropriately protect. Within the current climate, it is now vital that all solutions are accessible remotely, ensuring employees do not need to travel into offices. However, where does this leave cyber security? The Department for Digit...