Resources: Productivity

With the many changes that have occurred since the start of the Coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent crisis, employers are facing crucial decisions on how to shift their workforce into a new workplace culture reboot. This is the ideal time for looking at what we’ve learned over the past year. It’s an opportunity to focus on inclusion and diversity, and to create a positive workspace.

Creating a positive workspace with a cultural reboot

When talking about an organization, we often think of the company ‘culture’ as the ways in which things are done. The culture embodies the company’s values, vision, habits and norms that drive workers’ behaviour during their daily tasks. Lots of work habits have shifted since the first quarter of 2020. Some companies have now made a great workplace culture reboot. As we all move towards a new definition of what constitutes a workplace – office and home – it’s the perfect opportunity to look at what employees need to get their jobs done.

Workplace culture reboot element considerations

When you make the decision to reset your company culture, there are many things you can consider:

Organizational purpose and strategy – re-confirm your company’s vision and mission post-Covid-19. Is there anything that needs to change? Do the behaviours and values pre-pandemic still serve their purpose or do they need adjusting?

Behaviours and values – what do you want your working environment to look like? How will you measure and define it? Is there anything that needs to be changed in this new environment and time?

Core systems and processes – with remote working, how have your processes and operations changed? Are there any systems or structures that can be improved to help embrace the differences between employees? How could your financial, operational and HR procedures be adjusted to meet your employees’ needs better? Is there a need for greater flexibility in working hours or places?

Recognition and motivation – Have you learned anything about the motivation and needs of your employees since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic? How can employees’ needs be dealt with by managers and supervisors to open a relationship built on trust? 

Employee input and engagement – how can your employees provide input into your company operations? Are there adequate ways they can give feedback? Recently, The Grossman Group ran a survey that found almost half of people who are working from home want to continue doing so after the pandemic. Not all people enjoy remote working, though, and many seek a flexible working arrangement. Being flexible can help employees be more engaged and committed in their work.

Cultural resilience – when deciding on a reboot, think about how much resilience you can build into the team. A more resilient team will be able to adapt easily whenever changes arise. According to a report by Gallup, to be resilient when the going gets tough, businesses need to make sure their employees have everything they need to work as best they can. It’s also vital to show them how their work is part of the bigger picture.

Simple ways of creating a positive workplace

As well as looking at the wider organizational structures and processes, there are some really simple ways of creating a positive workplace for a cultural reboot. Here are some ideas:

Have a healthy snack bar – Many people have suffered from their eating habits during the Covid-19 pandemic and are keen to get back on track. Having a healthy snack bar will not only be appreciated by colleagues but will mean they are ready to tackle their work with adequate nutrition behind them.

Team huddles – having a short morning meeting that is no longer than 15 minutes is a great way of starting the day. It’s simple and repetitive and gets people motivated and on task ready to start their day.

Team building – when your teams have a great relationship, everything else will fall into place. Consider investing in team-building sessions to ensure there are positive working relationships with team members of all levels. When you get on with people and respect them, you’re more likely to work harder!

Staff empowerment – employees will work better with less micromanagement. Hand tasks and responsibilities over and see how they turn out! Another way to empower staff is to give them the opportunity to contribute. Creating an open forum for suggestions is a great way of ensuring employees feel heard. 

Use lunch & learns – these are perfect opportunities for voluntary, informal conversations and learning opportunities amongst employees. They bring people together in a casual, low-stakes way.

Company-wide games – don’t forget to have fun! Create a positive workplace by having regularly scheduled company-wide games or quizzes.

Whatever the reasons behind your cultural reboot, the post-Covid-19 pandemic return to work is the ideal opportunity to embrace new practices. If you have any questions about getting a workplace culture reboot, contact us today. We are here to help. 

It’s fair to say that everyone gets a little distracted at work from time to time. Even with intentions not to procrastinate, it can be a real challenge to stay on task. It can seem almost impossible to avoid distractions. According to statistics, workplace distractions account for a sizeable loss in productivity. Typically, a manager has an interruption every 8 minutes. Also, employees will spend around 28% of their working time dealing with unnecessary interruptions. So, how can we work towards preventing workplace distractions? Let’s take a look at some strategies to reclaim focus. We’ll also look into the different distractions that can be problematic for remote workers and those in the office environment.

How to be distraction-free from your workplace

Having good habits and sticking to them is one strategy for eliminating distractions. Start by focusing on your working environment. Encourage employees working from home to organize their home office so that there are few temptations to get stuck on something other than work. This task isn’t easy, however. Given that most people rely on computers for work, it is easy to be distracted by non-work-related sites. It might be wise to consider using an app that blocks certain websites during working hours. 

For employees in shared offices or shared home working spaces, closing doors or using noise-canceling headsets can be helpful. Another idea is to put your phone somewhere out of reach and put it on silent mode. For those employees in open offices, it might be a good idea to try and move to somewhere quieter. Some studies show that workers in open offices report more distractions than those working in more isolated areas. 

Averting workplace distractions for remote workers

Given the rise in remote working, many people who managed to work in an office environment without distractions have found themselves with distractions they have never encountered before. 

For employees who shifted to work from home during the pandemic, many were distracted by their children. Some workers had to be full-time or part-time childcare at the same time as holding down their job. Thankfully, childcare has resumed, so remote workers are more ‘alone’ when working remotely. This fix doesn’t, however, mean that distractions have vanished. 

Many people working from home have partners who look after young children, so the distractions or potential for distractions remain. Other distractions include realizing some jobs need doing around the house, like laundry or cooking, pets, partners popping in for a quick chat, unexpected visitors, and parcel deliveries. 

One solution to preventing workplace distractions is making it clear to others at home that disruptions aren’t welcome. A simple ‘do not disturb’ sign might do the trick when paired with a noise-canceling headset. 

Preventing workplace distractions from your office work

After reading the above section about remote working, it might be easy to think that remote workers are more distracted than office workers. This idea isn’t the case, however. According to Airtasker, remote employees are more productive than office employees and are less distracted. So, what is distracting our office workers? 

More often than not, it is other employees that cause distractions for office workers. Co-workers who come over for quick chats, phone calls, Microsoft Teams messaging, Google Workspace, or even emails will all slow down employees. Other non-work-related distractions include switching over to check social media, time management, and even chatting in the breakroom. 

Some solutions that help to prevent these include:

Ensure employees are aware of workplace etiquette when it comes to talking to colleagues. Be sure they know your thoughts on how much chatting is allowed about non-work-related topics. 

Have communication policies in place with regards to emails and reply turnaround time. 

Consider using software to block certain websites that might cause distractions (like social media) 

Have a telephone policy in place so everyone knows your expectations when using personal phones at their desks. 

Teach your employees how to organize and mute notifications in Teams, M365, etc. 

Hold regular, but not too many, team meetings and discuss distractions and how to overcome them. It’s possible that there are communication issues that will never be resolved unless they’re brought to your attention.

Final thoughts on preventing workplace distractions 

While you cannot prevent distractions altogether, there are things you can do to help your employees stay on task. Don’t underestimate the importance of having an open working relationship built on mutual trust and respect. Many employees work their best when they’re trusted to complete their work without micromanagement. In a trusted environment, they might find themselves more focused on their work as a result. If you have any questions about shifting your current workplace, contact us today. We are here to help. 

We don’t want to think about possible negative situations when it comes to our lives or our businesses. Planning for disasters means that we’re able to quickly recover from their consequences. In our previous blogs on data disaster recovery, we’ve covered how to plan for disasters and what types of disasters to consider when writing a data recovery plan. In this blog, we’ll take a look at the main points as a refresher. 

The key elements of data recovery plans 

A good disaster recovery plan will have assigned roles and responsibilities to different team members in advance. Planning ahead should ensure there is no time wasted when a disaster occurs. Having clearly defined roles means that team members can get on with their tasks quickly to mitigate the effects of a disaster.  

Another important point is the identification of which assets are critical to operating the business. In a disaster, you need to know which things to protect and sort out first to enable business operations to continue. If someone spends too much time dealing with a puddle on the floor instead of dealing with customer calls, for example, your business could be in turmoil.  

Backing up data is a must for every business. You’re on a dangerous path if you don’t have a plan in place for regular data backups. After all, you can’t recover your data after a disaster if you haven’t backed it up. Businesses must also consider whether they need to back up their IT infrastructure using a ‘cold site’ (a basic version of their infrastructure off-premises) or a ‘hot site’ (up-to-date data backups). As you can guess, the more data you back up, the better off you’ll be. 

Types of disasters to plan for 

It’s difficult to plan for any eventuality; however, there are certain things that all businesses should consider.  

Disasters can include technological disasters like: 

Data breaches 

Hacking  

Ransomware 

Or natural disasters like: 

Earthquakes 

Tsunamis 

Volcanoes 

Flooding 

Tornados 

Pandemics 

The impacts of any of these disasters are huge. Essentially, they can result in a business completely folding. Depending on the type of disaster, there could be all sorts of consequences. For example, the loss of supply chains, loss of assets and buildings, loss of life or personnel, and the loss of data. Since these consequences can be disastrous, it’s important for all businesses, regardless of size, to have contingency plans for disasters. 

Planning for disasters 

Businesses need to have contingency plans for dealing with disasters of every possible type. Different companies will, of course, have different needs.  However, some things are necessary for all businesses to include in their data recovery strategy plan. These include data, insurance, finances, resources, personnel, technology, compliance requirements, and the supply chain. 

Types of disaster data recovery 

There are a variety of options when it comes to data recovery. Perhaps the simplest method is backup. Your data is stored on or off-premises, or both for extra safety. However, relying solely on data backup gives minimal protection for businesses. If there is no backup of the IT infrastructure as well, there could be even bigger issues.  

An effective data recovery plan needs strategies and procedures for backups. You should know who will perform the backups and how often they will be done. Those responsible for data backups must also work out the business’s recovery time. Calculate the amount of time the organization can be ‘down’ after a disaster and work from there. 

The data recovery strategy should be tested and updated continually to protect the business from new threats. In this way, the business will be able to navigate challenges successfully. Planning a response to a cyberattack ahead of time will make sure your team will know what to do. 

Final thoughts 

Whatever your business and size, the ultimate aim is to ensure you’re well protected and have plans in place for any type of disaster. If you’re struggling to finalize your plans or even start writing one, get in touch with us for a free consultation. 

You might be aware that disasters of varying types can have devastating consequences on businesses. The key to mitigating such occurrences is to have a data recovery strategy plan in place. This means that you have a structured and documented approach detailing how your organization can resume work quickly after an unforeseen disaster. This is an essential tool for your company’s continuity plan and applies to all parts of the organization that is dependent on your IT infrastructure. This data recovery plan will help you resolve any data loss and will allow the recovery of your system’s functionality. This means that you can continue operating your business with minimal disruption. 

Types of Disasters to consider 

Potential disasters are plentiful. We’re not just talking about hacking and data breaches, but natural disasters too. Being able to handle disasters efficiently means there will be minimal impact financially. Having a data recovery strategy plan will allow you to ensure that all requirements for compliance are met. The plan will also provide a clear recovery roadmap. Here are some of the potential disasters that might affect your businesses: 

Building disaster (Fire, power outage, etc.) 

Communication failure (Due to data breach, hacking or natural disaster) 

Application failure (Outdated hardware, viruses, etc.) 

Datacenter disaster (Hacking, data breach, natural disaster) 

City disaster (Earthquake, tornado, flood, etc.) 

Regional disaster (Power grid outage, wildfires, etc.) 

National disaster (Epidemic) 

Multinational disaster (Pandemic, computer viruses, ransomware) 

You can see that this list covers lots of different types of disasters. It’s worth noting, however, that it’s not exhaustive. When making data recovery strategy plans, businesses need to consider their potential individual circumstances. If you’re based in the Midwest, for example, it’s very unlikely that your business will be affected by a volcanic eruption. But there are other natural disasters like floods or tornados that are more likely to happen. With that said, the 2010 Iceland volcanic eruption had repercussions worldwide, so you never know! 

Considerations for your Data Recovery Plan 

A data recovery strategy plan should begin at the business level. You need to determine what infrastructure is most important to your organization. The plan should implement an RTO (a recovery time objective), which describes how much time each application could be down for as a target.  

A data recovery strategy defines your business’s plan for incident response. To determine your optimal data recovery strategy, you must consider the following issues: 

Resources (both facilities and personnel) 

Finances 

Insurance  

Data 

Technology 

Risks 

Compliance requirements 

The supply chain 

How to write a Data Recovery Strategy Plan 

A business can start its plan by prioritizing a list of contacts and vital software programs so that the most important information is easily and quickly accessible.  

The data recovery plan should define each team member’s role and responsibilities in the recovery process. This is so there is no panic or time wasted should an unexpected disaster occur.  

There are many important points to write into a data recovery plan. These include: 

A policy statement or statement of intent. 

Specific tasks assigned to staff. 

Goals of the plan. 

Passwords and other authentication tools essential to data recovery. 

Geographical factors and risks appropriate to the local, regional or national area. 

Advice on dealing with the media. 

Legal and financial information with points of action. 

A history of the plan – and any amendments that have been made to it. 

As you can see, being prepared for these events is not difficult, but it will take some time. It is, however, very important that you take the time to complete it. You should also run through the plan in a mock rehearsal. That way you’ll find out if you’ve missed any steps or if there are gaps in your plan. 

The bottom line is, you want to be as prepared as possible for any disaster that causes data loss. After all, keeping your doors open when other’s can’t sure makes you the popular choice over your competitors. 

If you need advice or want help to build your data recovery strategy plan, don’t hesitate to contact us. You can book a consultation at any time. 

The success of a business is often attributed to the strong decisions of its management. Yet, that is not the entire story. Often, both failure and success can be determined by how a business deals with situations out of its control. A business may fail because it wasn’t prepared for an unexpected event. Conversely, another business might be able to survive a natural disaster simply because it had a plan in place for such an event. 

All businesses, whether large or small, have lots of potential threats. If one of these threats happens, it can have devastating consequences. According to ZDNet, the top three threats to society include cyberattacks, natural disasters, and extreme weather. Interestingly, they put cyberattacks on the same level of devastation as extreme weather and natural disasters. It is unfortunately true. The consequences of natural disasters, breaches, and hackers lead to threats to businesses and data loss. Since many businesses rely on connected services and the internet, the damage from cyberattacks can be huge. It’s one of the biggest risks the world faces today.  

Types of natural disasters 

There are many types of natural disasters. All of them can affect businesses and data loss. Here are some examples of natural disasters: 

• Earthquake 

• Fire 

• Tsunami 

• Flooding or extreme precipitation 

• Hurricane, tornado, cyclone 

• Volcanoes 

• Lightning 

• Famine and drought 

• Landslide 

• Extreme temperature (heat or cold) 

• And, as we’ve seen, pandemics 

Impact of natural disasters 

Before we delve into exploring businesses and data loss from natural disasters, we can’t ignore the devastating results of these natural phenomena outside in general. According to Our World in Data, there are around 60,000 deaths from natural disasters worldwide. The deadliest of natural disasters is usually an earthquake. Typically, natural disasters affect poorer populations more heavily. This is often due to a lack of protective dwelling construction or adequate response to the event.  

How does disaster impact businesses?  

No one is ever 100% prepared for a disaster. Whether the disaster is an earthquake, tornado, or flood, an organization’s plans can be thrown into disarray. There might be a breakdown in supply chains. Maybe employees are unable to reach the premises. Or there may be damage to the facilities, equipment, or the power or internet may be down. In any disaster, including the technological kind, a business will need to find ways to deal with the situation at hand. This is why it is important for all businesses, regardless of size, to have contingency plans for disasters. It should be a priority. 

How can businesses plan for natural disasters? 

Businesses should ensure they look at their entire operation and consider how a natural disaster might disrupt every branch. It’s not just about planning emergency evacuation routes or having emergency supplies. Businesses also need to consider things like how to contact employees if connections are down.  

Depending on the business type, an organization might also need to think about how to sort out their supply chain if they are unable to access the major transit routes due to natural disasters. Having an alternative plan if facilities can’t be used is a must for survival. 

Natural disasters, data breaches, and hackers for businesses, and data loss 

While we’re talking about disasters that affect businesses, we must also consider technological disasters like hackers and data breaches. These can have just as much of an impact on businesses and data loss. In some parts of the world, these events are more likely than a natural disaster. According to Forbes, hackers and cybercrime are more devastating to business operations than a Transit Strike, a Fire, and even Floods for small and medium-sized businesses.  

Final thoughts 

While we can’t prevent any of these disasters from causing problems for businesses and data loss, there are steps that we can take to reduce their impact. The main takeaway is to plan for all possible scenarios. For the impact of events to be reduced, there must be a detailed process in place.  

One solution is an on-site BDR (Backup, Disaster, Recovery) unit. A BDR automatically backs up all your data every 15 minutes. It is connected to an auxiliary power unit so it can back up everything when the power goes out. 

There are also Cloud solutions that backup your data safely, in multiple locations. This ensures that your data is always available, no matter what happens. 

If you have any questions about Backup solutions or would like to change the ways you are currently saving your data, contact us any time. As your Managed Service Provider, the safety of your data is our concern too.