Swine Flu
Will home workers hog your IT resources?
While the shock headlines predicting tens of thousands of
deaths from the pandemic made us all sit up and take notice,
swine flu now seems to have slipped from the headline news.
But is the threat still there? Yes and no is the best answer.
It is thought that although around a third of the UK population
will be infected, the majority of sufferers will only experience
mild symptoms and should recover quickly – however they still
need to be quarantined at home. In the peak weeks during September employee absence rates are forecast to reach 12% of the workforce – some 3.5 million people.
For many businesses the reality of surviving with a reduced workforce is daunting. One option is to enable staff to answer their calls and emails from home while they are recovering or caring for a loved one, which shows a real level consideration and trust from senior managers.
Home working – the IT issues
However, this is not as easy for the IT department to achieve as it might sound. There are a number of issues to be considered:
• Security of corporate data
• Speed of access
• Reliability of access
• What corporate systems other users in the home may access
• How to support home users with a reduced IT staff
In our recent survey many IT managers cited remote users – with their additional support requirements, network security issues and speed of access concerns - as their biggest headache.
IT departments often find users are hesitant or unwilling to install work software on their home machines and on the flip side, once your corporate IT team installs software on the home machine they run the risk of becoming the home user’s personal support department for anything that goes wrong – ever!
As IT departments are forced to deal with regulatory and security challenges in providing remote access, CI-Net has developed flexible solutions that deliver the required performance to meet their needs.
SSL VPN – secure remote access
CI-Net has standardised on the AEP Netilla platform for SSL VPNs, which allows remote users to quickly and securely reach the resources they need, including Microsoft Outlook, Windows Terminal Servers and server-based applications, as well as client/server applications over an Secure Socket Layer (SSL) tunnel.
SSL needs no software or configuration on the client device and can easily be combined with two factor authentication to provide secure reliable access from any PC with Internet Explorer or Firefox. CI-Net Professional Services Team are adept at implementing and supporting SSL VPNs for our customers – one way to free up your limited IT resources for other support tasks.
According to Research Analyst Terrence Brewton at market research company Frost and Sullivan, "The primary benefit of SSL VPN technology is its capability to secure IP-based communication without the use of a VPN client. This gives SSL technology an added advantage over other VPN technologies such as multi-protocol layer switching (MPLS) and IPSEC."
The provision of CI-Net DSL services and routers allows business traffic to be differentiated and prioritised over other internet users within the home, ensuring that the best possible experience for voice and data is delivered.
Unplanned events of all descriptions can have a devastating effect on businesses of all sizes. Crises that force employees to stay at home, such as the current swine flu pandemic, fire or flood, can make it difficult, or even impossible, to carry out normal day-to-day operations.
Having a firm business continuity plan, which enables staff to work effectively from home, and the IT security and infrastructure in place to support them, can be the first step in securing your business from these unpredictable events. The main problem for IT Managers - as they decide whether to invest in future precautions – is that they are damned if they do and damned if they don't!
Call our Sales Team on 01865 856030 or send an email to find out more about our services to support home-workers.
