Technology. Love it or hate it, it’s a necessary part of business today. Some business owners feel investing in technology is a waste of funds. Others think technology works well for other business owners, but can’t make it work for them. Here’s a list of the top 10 mistakes business owners make that leads to the cost of inefficient IT adding up. Read it and avoid the same pitfalls.
1. Is IT a part of your strategic business plan? If not, why not?
If not, your company will be unnecessarily challenged in meeting strategic goals.Technology is complicated, confusing and intimidating, but also closely tied to the success of an ever increasing number of businesses in today’s marketplace. All you need is a good IT Advisor to work with you, make recommendations based on your goals, and deploy those recommendations on time and on budget. Don’t think it’s important? Well let’s review that for a moment.
Your client info is stored on computers
Your sales efforts, leads etc are stored on computers and require advanced software to track.
Your employees work on computers, and are more efficient with file and printer servers installed as part of the network.
Your communications rely on email, antivirus software, cell phones and SmartPhones and syncing them all back to office computers and so on.
All your data needs to be protected, backed up and available for recovery should disaster strike.
If you haven’t thought about just how important a regular IT audit & review is for your company, you’re leaving too much up to chance. IT is an integral part of your business. Give it the appropriate focus, budget and consideration and see how it can add value to the overall strategic plan.
2. Does your technology match your business plan or did you try to make your business plan fit with whatever technology you had?
If your growth strategy requires a team of independently operating sales reps, make sure your IT supports that in the most cost and time efficient way possible. If your work flow is more of a process that must go from person A to person B to person C, then your IT design should match your work flow. If it doesn’t, it’s costing you time and money.
Don’t make the mistake of making your business strategy fit into your existing IT set up. That could be a devastating move for your business. With the help of a trusted IT Advisor, you can find and implement solutions that support your business needs, add value to your company and simplify daily operations for your entire team.
3. Is Your Technology Secure?
Your threats might include:
A virus
A network wide virus
A fire
The failure of your single back up drive
Employee theft of data
And just plain ol’ we hack for the fun of it hackers Your technology should be secure. Many businesses under invest in this area and too many come to regret it. One unfortunate incident can prove to severely outweigh the cost of investing in appropriate security.
4. Are You Using Business Optimizations Tools?
Another way that technology can halp and also another reason why you shouldn’t shy away from it is because it can help you optimize your processes and make your employees more efficient. The best example of this is a work time track solution such as Workpuls, which can track time on tasks and detect which tools your employees use. This way, you can make necessary changes based on accurate and precise performance data.
