Boost your Business with Microsoft Teams

We can be contacted in countless ways – by phone, mobile, text message, email and in person – to agree deadlines or set up meetings. It takes time to go to your calendar to input reminders or meeting dates and it’s all too easy to forget to do it or overlook an invitation from a team member to a critical meeting.

With the introduction of Microsoft Teams comes a number of solutions to help combat business communication, organisation and administrative issues. Automation of your calendar can pick out key dates from every communication tool, including chat, documents and video/voice calls, and create calendar reminders.

You no longer need to do this manually! Not only do these important dates appear in your calendar, they are automatically shared with all relevant stakeholders – saving time and increasing productivity. Everyone knows what is expected and by when.

Microsoft Teams breaks down silos and brings people together from anywhere, anytime, and on any device. Not only does this improve collaboration, it increases job satisfaction by reducing stressful encounters and increasing a sense of achievement. It’s also fun to use – which means users are inclined to use it more frequently and consequently work more productively!

“Successful businesses understand the need to continuously improve their business processes and supporting tools: to become more efficient and productive, and to respond to market changes faster while providing better service to customers.” -Entrepreneur

To put this into context, take a look at just a few examples of how Microsoft Teams can help overcome the business challenges you face on a daily basis.

A fun feature within Microsoft Teams is the “like” emoji that quickly acknowledges that an email or chat message has been received and the information within it is acceptable. That’s one less email to read, and it’s a fast and fun way of agreeing to a suggestion or idea. We do this in text messages – how useful that we can use it at work too!

OUT OF TOUCH WITH COLLEAGUES, UNSURE WHO IS AVAILABLE?
Microsoft Teams puts all of the communication tools you need in one place. You have total visibility on who is available for a quick instant message, a chat, video or voice call.

WASTING TIME PICKING OUT KEY INFORMATION FROM THE FLOOD OF DAILY EMAILS AND MESSAGES?

Whether it is in a chat, file or threaded conversation, you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for in one place – your relevant Microsoft Teams channel. You can also bookmark a conversation or even save specific parts of one. Microsoft Teams makes it quick and easy to track down the important project specific information you need.

LOSING VALUABLE TIME SWITCHING BETWEEN DIFFERENT APPLICATIONS AND TABS?

Microsoft Teams allows you to access all your files, apps, conversations and important business processes from with a single secure space.

MEETINGS ROOMS BOOKED, CAN’T FIND A PLACE TO CARRY OUT YOUR CONFERENCE CALL?

With Microsoft Teams you can meet from almost anywhere with full audio, video and chat. With blur my background, you can even eliminate distractions from the periphery so you can ensure that your team or clients remain focused on you.

STRUGGLING TO WADE THROUGH TOO MANY MESSAGES, JUST IDENTIFY THE ONES IMPORTANT TO YOU?

With Microsoft Teams you can filter your messages to easily identify the most critical to you. Just go to the Microsoft Teams Activity feed, select the funnel icon and filter for @mentions or responses to a message you sent.

Yes, businesses can (and do) collaborate without Microsoft Teams. They use emails, meetings, file sharing services – even Post-it Notes! The problem with these traditional methods is that even though they can offer instantaneous communication, they aren’t always visible to all stakeholders – it’s easy to forget to add someone to a distribution list or miss out on valuable input because a person is out of the office. Meeting space, travel and video facilities are additional costs and it takes time to physically move between offices for a meeting or to track down the person you need and, on the way, there is the potential for distraction. Digital collaboration is vastly different as it can securely connect internal users and external partners – allowing them to accomplish much more, in a more timely manner.

Discover how the introduction of Microsoft Teams can improve communication and productivity in your business.

Download our FREE Guide Here.

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It seems every day we are hearing about the latest loss of data, how companies and individuals have been “tricked” into handing over large sums of money and how our personal information is being used without our knowledge.

I am sure that many of these things have always happened, confidence tricksters and “con artists” have been with us for a long time, so why is it happening more frequently now?

Technology has indeed made it easier to communicate and move information around, but unfortunately, this makes it easier for the fraudsters too.

Over the last few months, I have seen a growing number of organisations caught out by such fraudsters. These tend to be smaller businesses where staff know the CEO or Owner and are used to taking informal instruction from them and do not question too much when this happens.

So, what can we do to combat this? One piece of advice I can give is to take an “old fashioned” approach.

This may seem at odds with today’s fast-paced world of technological marvel, but just think, in the past did shops give you something essentially on the promise that you would pay? It would have been interesting to go into a shop and tell the staff that their Manager before going on holiday, said that it would be okay for you to pick up the latest TV for free whilst they were away. And just to prove it, you have an unsigned letter with their name on it. I suspect you would have been politely asked to leave!

Adopting an “old fashioned” approach is one way to combat this. Don’t give anything to anyone until you have spoken to the person who has authorized it, either face to face or on the phone (and of course, you ring them, not vice versa). Always be suspicious if the authorizing person is conveniently on holiday or not in the office.

Be “old fashioned”, take your time, check and do not be hurried into making a decision. If the person doing the asking in the email is really your CEO, they should appreciate your thoroughness.

And if you are the CEO and have just received a quick phone call from your accounts person while you lie on the beach in the Bahamas, don’t be upset with them for double-checking. That few minutes of your time could probably be the best investment you have ever made. After all, where can you save £100,000 by taking a 2-minute call today?

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Unfortunately, it’s a sad fact that smaller companies are more likely to fall victim to cyber criminals than larger ones. You may think that because you don’t have a high turnover or a prominent public profile that you can escape detection from cyber criminals, but don’t be fooled. Criminals know that larger companies have significant security resources, thus making circumvention of these defenses much harder and this challenge often acts as a deterrent.

If they do manage to break-in, the payback may be substantial, but so is the risk. Spending three months trying to hack into an organization takes significant investment from a hacker and the risk of detection will grow each day. A large company is far more likely to report a breach to the authorities and try to recover its lost data or money.

Often it is easier to target 50 small companies, where the risk of detection is minimal. These small companies won’t have the skills or the resources to put in place complex defenses and 50 small targets can often be more valuable than one large one.

I often hear “well the hacker will get in anyway, won’t they? So why bother spending all this money when it won’t do any good!” A well-resourced hacker or sovereign state with limitless resources will indeed get in, but this is not what you are trying to defend against. Making your company less palatable, is the goal you want to achieve.

Most hacks, like thefts, are opportune. The hacker will scan thousands of IP addresses until they find a vulnerable one and then exploit it. They may even be in your system for months or years, gathering information before you are aware of it. On average, it takes 177 days for a break in to be detected, for every threat that is detected quickly, there are far more that are not. Your company could have been breached in January and you may not even be aware yet!

So, what can you do?

Well, you wouldn’t leave your car unlocked in the street, would you? Yes, we all know that if someone wants to steal it they will. You lock it to prevent the opportune thief and that is what you need to do with your IT systems.

If you’re not a cyber security expert, where do you start?

Luckily you don’t have to be an expert to make a difference. Schemes such as Cyber Essentials and Cyber Essentials Plus address the most common themes. Think of these as mini-audits of your IT systems against the most common ways hackers get in. If you carry out a Cyber Essentials certification, you will address 80% of the most common vulnerabilities in IT systems today. This may not be 100% foolproof, but it goes a long way in helping you to deter that opportune hacker, encouraging them to move on to the next easier target, the next car in the street.

So lock your car – show clients and hackers that your company takes information security seriously. Complete Cyber Essentials/Essentials Plus and help to secure your IT systems from attack

We’ve written a short guide to help you better understand Cyber Essentials Certification and how it can benefit your organisation.

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Before you take on a new employee, you interview them to find out about their experience and motivations. Employing a Technology Support Partner is no different – you need to find out about their business principles, working practices and other commitments before you make a decision to work with them. To do this, we recommend asking a series of questions which allow them to share openly and honestly with you.

Questions that elucidate, for example, about their specific industry experience and how they explain technology requirements to you, Let’s face it, for most of us, tech talk is a foreign language which needs to be translated into plain English – it’s imperative that you start these productive conversations before you make any commitments.

As well as being sensible, it’s important to remember that any Technology Support Partner will have access to all of your internal systems and data and, as well as the trust issues, they will play an integral role in your future business success.

To help SMEs have these very important conversations, we have compiled 10 top tips: questions that will help you ascertain if your prospective tech partner is the right fit for your business.

Read our full blog here and get talking. Employ the wrong partner and it could cost you dearly. Get it right and it will propel your business forward.

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As part of our ‘People First’ initiative, we’re proud to announce that we have recently gained the accreditation of Disability Confident Committed marking the first steps on our path to becoming a full Disability Confident Employer.

I’m sure you share our vision for a society in which disabled people and those with health conditions can work in good jobs to fulfill their full potential. The fact that 83% of people will acquire a disability whilst in work probably indicates we are already working alongside colleagues who could maybe benefit from some extra help or support.

The Disability Confident scheme helps organisations like ours with the skills and confidence needed to recruit, retain and develop disabled people who bring commitment and energy to an organisation.

We intend on launching a series of Cloud Workshops showcasing the hidden and often untapped features within the Microsoft portfolio specifically designed to help people with accessibility problems.

As a Disability Confident Committed Employer, we have committed to:

• Ensure our recruitment process is inclusive and accessible
• Communicate vacancies and offer interviews to disabled people
• Anticipating and providing reasonable adjustments as required
• Supporting any existing employee who acquires a disability or long-term health condition,
  enabling them to stay in work

• Promoting at least one activity that will make a difference for disabled people

Please look out for details of our forthcoming workshops and progress updates on our Disability Confident journey.

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The lack of multi-factor authentication helped criminals to steal usernames, email addresses, social media tokens and 4.7 million phone numbers from 21 million users of social media app Timehop. The app, based in the cloud, resurfaces old photos and posts by connecting to your social media profiles. “Access tokens”, which are allocated to Timehop by social media providers, were also taken and could allow criminals to view a range of social media posts without permission.

Multi-factor authentication is the process of confirming your identity in two different ways before access is granted to an account or service, such as a PIN or password, a secondary device such a key fob or card reader, or via biometric data such as a fingerprint. We recommend that all our clients implement a multi-factor authentication process to help protect they IT systems and data.

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