Tag Archives: Hoffman Agency

About 1071 days ago Tools on Managing Technology

Five Ways to “Green” Small Business Tech

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The “green IT” movement brings an interesting layer of complexity to the IT function. Depending upon your political and/or social interests you will either embrace the extra work required to implement a successful green IT program or you will grudgingly check it off your “to-do” list like any other part of your job.  For small businesses like the one I work for, a PR agency based in Silicon Valley, the process of greening your IT can have its challenges, but it also has valuable rewards. If you are just getting started, it will be important to secure buy-in for the transition from the top.  This means you must have a strategy and ROI figures to rationalize the plan. The following tips should help smooth the process. Energy savings and power management One of the easiest and most all-encompassing areas to achieve cost savings is through energy and power management programs by replacing inefficient equipment with products carrying the now popular Energy Star seal.  Most people think of refrigerators and washing machines, but everything from light bulbs to electronics to building materials comes with the Energy Star seal.  Another tip I’ve been trying to evangelize throughout our offices worldwide is for employees to forget the screensavers and instead set their laptops to go into sleep mode after 20 minutes of non-use.  This will both protect your data and save a considerable amount of power.  The average cost of electricity was 12 cents per watt in the U.S. in 2009.  The average laptop uses 15-45 watts of power per hour.  Using a screensaver uses the same amount of energy as general operation, but sleep mode only consumes 1-6 watts of energy. What does this mean to a 20-person business? Here’s the math. Figure everyone in the organization spends a minimum of two hours per day away from their desks in meetings, on the floor assisting clients or out of the office on sales calls which breaks down as follows: 20 employees x 2 hours per day x 5 days per week = 40 hours of energy savings per week. (This accounts for the 20 minutes required for a laptop to go into sleep mode.) This translates into an average savings of $72 to $216 a week or $3,744 to $11,232 annually based upon the example shared. Trading in and greening up The transition to a green IT environment does not happen overnight and the cost savings are realized over time. In most cases we’re talking about swapping out desktop computers for laptops, trading in outdated servers for low-power blade servers, even implementing software that automatically turns off copiers and printers at a certain time and/or makes sure that standby modes are set correctly.  Every little update makes a difference, even if the changes occur over a series of months or even years.  The key is patience.  My company is simply following the lifecycle of products when it comes to going green with big-ticket items and we are still realizing the benefits.  One step at a time. Recycling office electronics Computers and printers create hazardous waste, so this is an absolute must, but it is a task that can take on a life of its own.  Being based in the Silicon Valley, we have turned to the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition (SVTC) for guidance in the disposal of electronics. First step is to make sure the equipment is cleared of sensitive business information before doing anything with it.  Some green recyclers will do it for you, but you need to do your homework to verify that they follow through on their promises.  For smaller items like laptops, printers and cell phones, I have found Best Buy to have the most comprehensive recycling program. Donating office equipment A simpler path for many organizations — once equipment is “clean” – is donating it to local nonprofit groups. Nonprofits such as The Salvation Army, Goodwill Industries or even local schools and churches accept and often resell used equipment without any charge to the company making the donation.  I have also found the website www.greatnonprofits.org to be quite helpful.  It allows you to sort by geography and need. Inspire a green workforce One of the biggest lessons I learned in implementing a green IT strategy is that unless you find a way to involve everyone in the company, you cannot be successful.  If you and/or your senior management aren’t ready to swap out the electronics yet, then begin with baby steps.  There are a lot of things a company can do at little to no cost that will have a positive impact on both the Earth and the staff. Institute a company-wide recycling program for cans and plastics.  Place recycling bins throughout the office.  Establish a place in the vending or kitchen area for sorting recyclables before they leave the building. Use recycled paper for internal and/or rough drafts.  If possible, set office copier defaults to print on both sides of paper to reduce paper waste. Consider programs that allow employees to work from home part of the time –the goal being to reduce carbon emissions as well as the need for space which reduces energy requirements.  Our office has created a “hoteling” program to facilitate reduced work space while promoting a telecommuting program.  Hoteling refers to several fully functional work areas for telecommuters to use when in the office. There are so many things we can do to help our planet. It’s all about taking that first step. Your IT department can actually lead the charge in engaging all employees to strive for greater sustainability. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.    

About 1182 days ago Business Software

The Promise of Cloud Computing

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The promise of cloud computing has been around for years. Like any new technology, it’s taken time for the vendor community to work out the kinks and get cloud computing ready for prime time. While cloud computing comes in numerous flavors, what I’m going to address and what’s typically most relevant to small or mid-sized businesses is software-as-a-service (SaaS). This means that applications are hosted by service providers instead of running on your hardware in the office. This is a big deal. My company — a global PR firm with offices across the United States, Asia, and Europe — depends on extremely high service levels from the IT function. As a one-woman band managing our technology operation, I’m always striving to simplify IT deployment, but it can’t be done at the expense of functionality. This is what led me to evaluate cloud computing for our office applications. After doing my homework, three options were left on the table: Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. We opted to go with Microsoft’s Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) solution which was best-suited for our size, reach, and 24×7 response requirements. This said, you should take the time to evaluate all three options because each provider offers a little different functionality. Microsoft BPOS is a fully deployed, cloud-based version of Exchange, SharePoint, Office Communications Online, and Office Live Meeting, which allows us to offload basic functions such as e-mail and Web-based collaboration tools. Why was this important?  For one, our e-mail servers were almost four-years-old — ancient in “hardware years.” The money saved by not purchasing three new servers was a “no brainer.” Furthermore, this approach meant substantial time savings for our IT department — i.e., that would be me. Microsoft now handles all updates and maintenance, and we no longer have to pay for applications to screen our e-mail for spam or check e-mail for viruses.  For context, consider that our users send and receive over 100,000 e-mails a month. Before moving to the cloud, it used to take on average 12 hours just to back-up our systems. Plus we used to spend $3,000 per year on Trend Micro’s spam filtering services.   Rounding out the picture, we were shelling out a chunk of change for collaboration tools such as eRoom (at $300 per license) and Citrix conferencing software ($1,200/per year for just three licenses).  Microsoft’s BPOS enabled us to eliminate these costs and ensure that we always have the most current versions of comparable software and a secure environment. The service also comes with 24×7 technical support including support for multiple languages. This last point carried some weight in our evaluation process. With Microsoft BPOS, our overseas offices now have quicker response time to e-mail and receive support in their local languages. I also can’t emphasize enough the value of engaging with a knowledgeable third-party IT consultant to assist with the transition to the cloud. Just the task of importing e-mails from the legacy system into the cloud application is not for the squeamish. You want to make sure you have someone at your side who has been through this exercise before. In our case, we partnered with firm called Zag Technical Services. Zag is a Microsoft Gold Partner, and their consultants helped us wade through all of the costs and steps involved in a successful transition, including the migration of 45 gigabytes of e-mail (which is why I used the term “not for the squeamish.”) As you would expect, our transition to the cloud did not come without its challenges. For example, even though our transition was completed six months ago, I’m still receiving feedback — prefer that word to “complaints” — about e-mail limitations. Employees who have been with the company for five, 10, 15 or more years used to have no limitations when it came to e-mail use. Now, all of a sudden they’re confined by such parameters as a 15MB limit to attachments and 2GB of storage space. And it’s worth pointing out that moving to the cloud has also meant that I had to relinquish some control. Simple requests to modify backend applications now have to go through Microsoft. Not a problem going through a service provider if the changes are made fairly instantaneously with a three-, six-, even a 12-hour turnaround. But we are currently looking at three days — a bit frustrating for an IT director who is used to doing everything herself in-house.  Nevertheless, from my perspective as well as from our CFO’s, the benefits far outweigh any downside. Our mantra for 2010 is “shaking up the status quo.” Our move to the cloud has IT leading the charge. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.

About 1182 days ago Cloud Computing

The Promise of Cloud Computing

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The promise of cloud computing has been around for years. Like any new technology, it’s taken time for the vendor community to work out the kinks and get cloud computing ready for prime time. While cloud computing comes in numerous flavors, what I’m going to address and what’s typically most relevant to small or mid-sized businesses is software-as-a-service (SaaS). This means that applications are hosted by service providers instead of running on your hardware in the office. This is a big deal. My company — a global PR firm with offices across the United States, Asia, and Europe — depends on extremely high service levels from the IT function. As a one-woman band managing our technology operation, I’m always striving to simplify IT deployment, but it can’t be done at the expense of functionality. This is what led me to evaluate cloud computing for our office applications. After doing my homework, three options were left on the table: Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. We opted to go with Microsoft’s Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) solution which was best-suited for our size, reach, and 24×7 response requirements. This said, you should take the time to evaluate all three options because each provider offers a little different functionality. Microsoft BPOS is a fully deployed, cloud-based version of Exchange, SharePoint, Office Communications Online, and Office Live Meeting, which allows us to offload basic functions such as e-mail and Web-based collaboration tools. Why was this important?  For one, our e-mail servers were almost four-years-old — ancient in “hardware years.” The money saved by not purchasing three new servers was a “no brainer.” Furthermore, this approach meant substantial time savings for our IT department — i.e., that would be me. Microsoft now handles all updates and maintenance, and we no longer have to pay for applications to screen our e-mail for spam or check e-mail for viruses.  For context, consider that our users send and receive over 100,000 e-mails a month. Before moving to the cloud, it used to take on average 12 hours just to back-up our systems. Plus we used to spend $3,000 per year on Trend Micro’s spam filtering services.   Rounding out the picture, we were shelling out a chunk of change for collaboration tools such as eRoom (at $300 per license) and Citrix conferencing software ($1,200/per year for just three licenses).  Microsoft’s BPOS enabled us to eliminate these costs and ensure that we always have the most current versions of comparable software and a secure environment. The service also comes with 24×7 technical support including support for multiple languages. This last point carried some weight in our evaluation process. With Microsoft BPOS, our overseas offices now have quicker response time to e-mail and receive support in their local languages. I also can’t emphasize enough the value of engaging with a knowledgeable third-party IT consultant to assist with the transition to the cloud. Just the task of importing e-mails from the legacy system into the cloud application is not for the squeamish. You want to make sure you have someone at your side who has been through this exercise before. In our case, we partnered with firm called Zag Technical Services. Zag is a Microsoft Gold Partner, and their consultants helped us wade through all of the costs and steps involved in a successful transition, including the migration of 45 gigabytes of e-mail (which is why I used the term “not for the squeamish.”) As you would expect, our transition to the cloud did not come without its challenges. For example, even though our transition was completed six months ago, I’m still receiving feedback — prefer that word to “complaints” — about e-mail limitations. Employees who have been with the company for five, 10, 15 or more years used to have no limitations when it came to e-mail use. Now, all of a sudden they’re confined by such parameters as a 15MB limit to attachments and 2GB of storage space. And it’s worth pointing out that moving to the cloud has also meant that I had to relinquish some control. Simple requests to modify backend applications now have to go through Microsoft. Not a problem going through a service provider if the changes are made fairly instantaneously with a three-, six-, even a 12-hour turnaround. But we are currently looking at three days — a bit frustrating for an IT director who is used to doing everything herself in-house.  Nevertheless, from my perspective as well as from our CFO’s, the benefits far outweigh any downside. Our mantra for 2010 is “shaking up the status quo.” Our move to the cloud has IT leading the charge. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.

About 1692 days ago E-Commerce

Embrace Social Networking in IT

If you associate social networking with MySpace, debatable language, and photos of kids drinking beverages in red plastic cups, it’s time to rethink the power of this tool. In short, social networking can facilitate greater connections for your company. These connections can range from internal — employee-to-employee — to suppliers to customers and even potential buyers. According to research conducted by Universal McCann earlier in the year, 43 percent of the active Internet users in the United States have created a profile on a social networking platform, and the numbers are even higher on a global scale. While the demographic of these users skews to the younger side, the concept has evolved to take in business professionals of all ages. You can think of social networking falling under two categories: the outside world and the organization within your internal corridors. Let’s start with social networking as a tool to strengthen your ties to the outside world and the ramifications for IT deployment. While a number of social networking platforms specifically target business professionals, I think it’s fair to say that the product called LinkedIn has the greatest traction with around 25 million users. The beauty of these products is that they won’t put a dent in your IT budget because there’s no charge. Furthermore, the powering of the application takes place in the cloud, i.e., someone else’s server, so there aren’t any operational costs either. Where IT can lend a helping hand is by guiding folks through the process of establishing a profile. Better yet, if you have staff members under 25 whom have grown up with these tools, ask them to help the “more mature” people in creating their profiles. An immediate benefit from a tool such as LinkedIn comes on the recruiting front. For example, roughly 70 million Gen Yers born between 1980 and 1995 are coming to the work force with a mindset that views social networking akin to how older generations saw the phone. Social networking tools allow you to connect with them in their language so to speak. Targeting potential employees through LinkedIn is made easy with an advanced search option that allows you to select your ideal candidates by a combination of industry, job function, location, job title, experience level, and specific company experience. Candidate profiles are earmarked for those interested in career opportunities to eliminate reaching out to those who would rather not be contacted. For $19.95 to $50 per month, you can purchase professional memberships that give you the ability to send up to 25 messages per month directly to candidates through InMail. We’ve found that we’re more likely to receive a response from a candidate made through LinkedIn InMail than through regular e-mail outreach. LinkedIn also offers an inexpensive way to advertise open positions. A single 30-day job posting will run you $195 — a far cry from the cost of running a print ad — and there are package deals that reduce that price to as low as $115 per job. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that several social networking products have evolved to straddle the line between personal and business networking, with the best example being Facebook. With this in mind, many staff members at The Hoffman Agency keep both LinkedIn and Facebook profiles. Here’s an example of the benefits that come from these connections. We subscribe to a terrific service called SWMS (Sam Whitmore Media Service) that essentially analyzes the latest developments in the media. When SWMS decided to distribute “bonus information” via its Facebook page, our employees on Facebook captured the information and distributed it to the rest of the company. To accelerate the process, we’re developing a company Facebook page to handle this type of situation. Turning attention to the internal side, a new class of social networking platforms has emerged that enables a small business to create what amounts to its own customizable social networking site. In other words, establish the same concept as a Facebook, but just for your employees. Again, a number of products such as Ning — which we’ve implemented at The Hoffman Agency — have been designed for this purpose. Like their outside brethren, these products are powered in the cloud, so there’s no operational impact. As for pricing, you can run with Ning at no cost if you’re willing to tolerate the smattering of Google Ads. With the exception of the periodic awkward ad — you can imagine the theme around Valentine’s Day — we’ve found the free version works fine. For another $7.95 per user you can get rid of most of the ads. These products provide another way to build a sense of community, especially for businesses in which employees are telecommuting or on the road. In our case, we also have employees in Europe and Asia, so the virtual world or what we call the “HA Hub” based on Ning is the perfect way to bring everyone together. It’s also worth noting that an internal social network offers a great forum for learning this mode of communications in the safety of your “home.” Of our 50 employees based in the United States, about 15 are older than 40 and had never used social networking before. Thanks to the HA Hub, they have gained experience as a prelude to venturing to the outside world with LinkedIn, Facebook, etc. With that said, there are some drawbacks with social networking starting with the potential of being deluged by spam. Fortunately, there are products out there as noted in a previous column. In our case, we use a firm called eDoxs (costs around $2.60 per mailbox per month), but there are other reputable firms out there, such as Emerald and LastSpam. Social networking can also distract an employee who has trouble focusing from the task at hand, but this issue transcends IT. Here’s how we look at it: It doesn’t matter whether you’re a Fortune 500 company or have 25 employees focused on a niche, the effectiveness of your overall communications impacts your success and failure. If you buy into this premise, it’s only logical to put all the tools — especially one like social networking that’s free and levels the playing field against the big guys — at the disposal of your employees. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.

About 1784 days ago Business Software

The Ultimate Bargain Bin of Software

I am more than a bit wary when it comes to free stuff. Experience has taught me that the four-letter word “free” doesn’t always mean free in the truest sense. Such a caveat emptor mentality should be applied to free software applications. As the IT director for a small company, I can appreciate the attraction of freeware. The idea of stretching your IT dollars offers the promise of a much-needed respite to one’s constant struggle to manage a tight budget. But here are a couple issues to consider. First, the Web is one giant virtual haystack of free stuff. Finding the proverbial needle — the one piece of software that suitably addresses your company’s requirements — is a daunting task. Two, there’s the issue of security or to be more precise the lack of security. Because anyone can access the free stuff on the Web, many viruses, worms, and spyware piggyback on them. Needless to say, free doesn’t look so free when you’re spending hours trying to cleanse your company’s computers and worse calling in an outside consultant. So when downloading freeware from the Internet, err on the side of caution. Read user reviews before you download freeware and make sure to get them from reputable sites. I recommend SnapFiles.com and Download.com which is part of the CNET empire. Not only do they have a huge selection of freeware, they also test these free applications before making them available to the public. Keep in mind some freeware sites require you to enter a network login and password. I encountered one of these sites which immediately triggered alarm bells. Never give out this information unless you are absolutely sure of the site’s reputation. Of course, you can always count on the marketing folks to stretch the definition of free. I once downloaded Version Tracker, a utility software that shows you the status of all the drivers in your computer and lists the ones that need to be updated. It did a good job of identifying the drivers that needed my attention but when it came time to correct the outdated drivers, I was asked to purchase the full version of the software instead. Applications like Version Tracker can cost anywhere between $19.95 and $75. In the end, I opted not to buy the full version. Apart from gaining nothing from downloading the software I was incessantly barraged by a window notification on my computer reminding me to buy the software and finally had to take the time to uninstall it as well. Another point to consider is just because it’s free doesn’t mean you need it. Think twice before you click on that download button. Ask yourself first, “Do you really need the software?” Check your computer for any hidden tool that can perform the same function you are looking for. It gives me no pleasure to plug Microsoft but the fact of the matter is Windows incorporates a raft of tools that never see the light of the day. It’s conceivable that Windows has already installed the needed application. You just didn’t know it. An example of this is Windows Defender a Microsoft product to prevent, remove and quarantine spyware. It rates in the top three of freeware for this type of removal.  Equally important, never act as your company’s Trojan horse. Resist the urge to share any freeware with your colleagues at work. We’ve had one such incident in our company where an employees decided to share this nifty ad-aware program he was using at home. When some users installed it on their PCs, the application caused problem, conflicting with a similar software program already installed on our servers. With those caveats out the way, here are three free software programs that I recommend: DimDim: Just like Citrix GoToMeeting or WebX online conferencing application, DimDim allows for both audio and video sharing. You have the option to host the application on your own server or use one of their servers. While the free version doesn’t come with all the bells and whistles, it is a web product that is truly free for a conference that has less than 20 participants. Skype: Working seamlessly with an Internet connection. Skype-to-Skype calls are free and feature video, chat, and teleconferencing functionalities. If you make a substantial number of calls overseas this is the way to go. PrimoOnline: With this freeware you can create high-quality PDF files from virtually any Windows application. It has the ability to optimize PDF output for screen, print, eBook and prepress, secure PDF files with 128-bit encryption, and add document information (e.g. title, author, subject, keywords) to converted PDF files. There is a free lunch in the software sphere. It just requires due diligence. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.

About 1845 days ago PCs, Laptops, and Notebooks

Reenergizing Sluggish Computers

Waiting for what seems like an eternity for your computer to boot up when you’re about to deliver a presentation to a customer can cause heartburn, to say the least. No one likes to wait, which is why many of us heap scorn on our computers every morning when we turn them on. It’s easy for your employees to blame degrading PC performance on age (i.e., grandpa moves slower than Johnny, so it stands to reason that a year-old computer will run slower than a newbie). Yet, buying new hardware isn’t the answer, particularly for small businesses that need to amortize the cost of the equipment over a good chunk of time. Fortunately, IT can put the zip back in computers through proactive maintenance. Taking such actions is not rocket science, but it’s easy for companies to put this off for the same reason we delay that annual dentist checkup. Much like cars, PCs need to be periodically checked and even tuned to maintain their best performance. As employees add files, install applications and change settings, PC performance gradually deteriorates to the point when it hits the aggravation threshold (or worse). Furthermore, all this additional stuff can be the culprit behind those delightful spontaneous crashes that inevitably hit coming down the home stretch of a deadline. Purging the TEMP folders Here’s one simple approach that’s guaranteed to regain performance. The vast majority of employees pay no attention to the collection of temporary files. Many Windows applications create and save files in a folder called TEMP. Often, these files get deleted the moment the application is closed, but in some instances badly designed programs leave these temporary files behind in the TEMP folder. In effect, the TEMP folder becomes a type of purgatory where unwanted files accumulate and aimlessly roam. The extra load dramatically bogs down the computer especially during start-up. One of our employees used to complain about the slowness of her PC. She would start her computer, prepare breakfast and go back to her machine only to find out that it has not finished booting. When I checked her PC, I discovered over 3,000 files lurking in her TEMP folder. Not good. By simply cleaning your TEMP folder on a regular basis, you can improve PC performance by anywhere from 25 to 50 percent. The same goes for temporary Internet files, downloaded program files and fancy fonts. Fancy fonts impact startup Yes, you heard me right. Those fonts, particularly customized ones, impact system start-up. As your computer initiates the necessary programs when you turn it on, it also loads all the fonts associated to your printer and stores them in the memory. So, if you find a system message warning you that your computer’s memory is running out of available space, chances are that fonts have clogged up this precious commodity. I strongly encourage IT to keep an image file of each employee’s computer so when there are files and unwanted fonts, you can delete them and easily revert to the machine’s original settings. Get on the defrag bandwagon Defragmenting hard drives on a quarterly basis is also a must. It’s easy to fall off the defrag bandwagon because the task takes hours of time depending on how many files are stored on the computer. The beauty of the process, though, is that human supervision is not required. All you have to do is help employees start the Windows Disk Defragmenter before they leave the office — or perhaps before they go to bed — and the computer automatically takes care of the job. I cannot stress enough the importance of defragmenting your hard drive. Consider the experience of reading a book if the pages were arranged randomly. Needless to say, making sense of such a book would take more time. When it comes to computers, files are saved in segments which don’t usually end up next to each other. When your PC reads a file, it has to skip from one location of a hard drive to another to access the blocks of data that are part of the file you are looking for. Deleting files makes matters worse as gaps are created in the hard drive, and that makes it harder for your PC to find a file. By defragmenting your hard drive, the chunks of data that are related to each other are moved closer to each other, thus making it easier for your computer to access files. Other pro-active maintenance Another action that we enforce at my company is Microsoft night, which happens every Tuesday. It’s a push strategy that leaves our employees no other option but to download new updates from Microsoft and install them in their machines. The last thing I want to talk about is computer peripherals — monitors, mice and especially keyboards. A University of Arizona study on bacteria in the workplace some years ago found that keyboards harbor 3,295 microbes per square inch. For context, the average toilet seat contains 49 microbes per square inch. While I’m not a scientist, I have to say that this finding doesn’t surprise me based on seeing how much dust, bits of food, grime and other sundry materials find their way into keyboards. The solution comes in the form of shaking keyboards once in a while as a way of removing the collected materials. A few good blasts of pressurized air can also do the trick (but only do this when the PC is turned off). Simply put, this type of proactive maintenance will extend the productive life of your company’s computers. It’s not the glamorous part of the job, but the payoff diffuses a pain point everyone experiences. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.

About 1906 days ago Mobility Tips and Tricks

Enabling the Mobile Workforce

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The success of today’s mobile worker largely depends on IT support. For anyone inclined to challenge this statement, consider the word choice that comes from your prototypical mobile worker when he or she can’t achieve an Internet connection. Exactly. My last column on the mobile workforce covered the importance of standardizing both hardware and software as well as establishing the rules of engagement. Now I’d like to delve into other issues – giving your mobile workers the tools and support they need while protecting your business and your business equipment and data. Work from home vs. on-the-go employees As you take a look at your employee base, it’s important to distinguish the true road warrior from the work-from-home (WFH) user — as if we need yet another acronym — scenario. The WFH user requires nothing more than an office environment in the home; i.e., a computer (laptop or desktop), printer, fax, phone, etc. This one is easy. The environment is static and controlled. On the other hand, mobile workers by definition are always on the go. Like the traveling salesman of yesteryear, they’re on the road, at home and on the customer’s site. They need the tools to be productive from a multitude of locations, whether it’s a Starbucks, library, or municipal hotspot. As my company, The Hoffman Agency, has evolved to embracing mobile working, my role has also evolved. The management team has not only turned to me to manage the flow of bits and bytes beyond our office corridors, but also for my perspective on what makes a successful mobile worker. They recognize that I’m the one on the front lines interacting with mobile employees. In short, I’ve found that four attributes characterize the person who successfully adjusts to an ever-moving office: Self Discipline: For some people, out-of-sight-out-of-mind brings out the worst of human procrastination. It takes a certain amount of mental toughness to maintain productive work habits in diverse settings without “the man” lurking. Organized: No question, working on the go puts a premium on organization skills. Resourcefulness: Mobile workers encounter the unexpected on a regular basis. If they call IT every single time something goes awry, you’ll need to add a call center in Bangalore. I’ve found that the person who can safely secure a cup of coffee while working on a laptop without a tabletop bodes well for this characteristic. Pack Mule: I know several people who carry so many laptop batteries that the weight exceeds that of the actual computer. If you can’t figure out an easy way to lug the stuff, you’re starting in a handicapped position. Tracking company-owned assets Related to this “stuff,” IT needs to track the assets of the company-owned equipment. And our employees sign a document of good faith that they’re responsible for the loss or damage of equipment from negligence or what we term lack of common sense. Checking a laptop computer as baggage, then discovering a cracked screen upon pickup is not normal wear and tear. There are a number of tools available that make the mobile worker’s life a lot easier. I’m a fan of a Web-based conferencing product called GoToMeeting that gives your mobile folks an easy way to pull together a virtual meeting. Attendees don’t need pro-loaded software on their computers in order to participate. They simply click on a URL address sent from the meeting host, and they’re up and running. I also find the unappreciated flash drive (or thumb drive) is a must-have tool for folks on the move. It plugs into your laptop via the USB port, becoming another storage drive and allows employees to carry electronic files from the office and home computer for easy access to their laptop. We can’t overlook the challenge of security. My last column touched on security between the home office and the outside world (via the Internet Service Provider). For flash drives, I strongly recommend using either an encryption and/or password-controlled program. The bigger security question lies in how you secure such a disparate “playground” associated with mobile computing. In the good old days — five years ago — users would dial into the corporate network via a modem. That made security easy, since it was controlled by our server in our office. Today, it’s much more cost-effective to let companies like Boingo, Dialer.net, or T-Mobile manage the connections. These come in a variety of flavors: dial-up, broadband or wireless, and the companies also handle the security issues. Because they require a login and password, they automatically encrypt all inbound and outbound Internet traffic (e-mail, Web, IM, VoIP call, etc.) on any access point you use in their services. It becomes more complicated when your users are connecting through hotels, Starbucks, etc. and you have no control over the “free” connection. This is a favorite vulnerability preyed upon by worms, viruses and hackers because they know it’s a potential back door to Nirvana. Here, you need to make sure you’ve installed personal mobile firewalls on all of your laptops. Windows XP and Vista include a basic firewall with the operating system at no extra cost. While it’s adequate, I recommend an industrial strength mobile firewall from companies such as ZoneAlarm, Comodo, and Symantec that protects you from both inbound and outbound traffic (the Windows product only addresses inbound traffic). Recently I was at the Denver airport and struck up a conversation with one of the security people who gave me a tour of the lost and found. At first glance, it seemed like Wal-Mart’s computer department. He told me they average roughly 100 laptops and 75 other mobile devices (cellphones, PDAs, etc.) every two to three weeks, with about half of these left when people go through security. It was a reminder to me that security for mobile users needs to come in two forms: technology and common sense. And if you come off as a nag in “nurturing” the common sense piece, so be it. Linda Wilson is the IT director of http://www.hoffman.com >The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.

About 1997 days ago E-Commerce

Three Words that Spell Disaster in Business

“E-mail is down.” Even writing those words causes a visceral feeling of imminent doom. There’s no question that e-mail has become of strategic importance in all aspects of business. In a sense, it has turned out to be the digital equivalent of the “Girl Friday.” Digital conversations are recorded and tracked. Appointments are confirmed and received. Even deals are made and broken over e-mail. I think it’s fair to say that e-mail has become the heart of most businesses, pushing, pulling, and cajoling information from around the country or throughout the world (for those companies with global operations). In looking at the numbers in my own company, The Hoffman Agency, we send out around 57,000 e-mails per month, with incoming e-mails hitting around 45,000 within that same monthly cycle. It reminds me of that scene in the movie, “Crocodile Dundee,” when Paul Hogan pulls out a massive knife and states the obvious, “This is a knife.” Well, that’s a ton of e-mail for a company with 120 employees. Of course, it’s not only the quantity of e-mails, but also the fact that the application falls under the mission-critical umbrella that causes heartburn for IT folks. In our case, with offices in the U.S., Asia, and Europe (combined with employees burning the midnight oil), the e-mail server is running literally 24×7 throughout the year. This brings me to the crux of the issue: how to improve the uptime of an e-mail system. If you’re looking to truly bulletproof your system — that calls for redundancy. Let’s start with security At the foundation level, I recommend Microsoft Exchange Server, which gives you control over what comes in and goes out. Without getting into the technical details, the product verifies the credentials of each person logging on and off, and that keeps the bad guys out. It’s not cheap. Figure on spending at least $18,000 between labor costs, hardware, and the software licenses to get Microsoft Exchange Server up-and-running for 100 users. The software license does scale down with pricing available for as few as five users. I recognize that there are a fair number of small and mid-size businesses depending on Post Office Protocol (POP) for their e-mail operation. While you can’t beat the price (i.e., free), the POP approach puts you at the mercy of your Internet service provider for security, which can be hit or miss. Plus, POP e-mail is stored on the local PC instead of on a central e-mail server. This means anyone in your company using a PDA, smartphone, BlackBerry, or the like essentially opens a door to your IT operation that you have no way of watching. And then there’s spam Of course, I can’t overlook that wonderful mass blast that brings enlightenment to our children’s vocabulary, known as spam. There are three approaches to stopping spam: on-site spam filters (typically installed on the e-mail server), client side filters (installed on the individual machine), and managed spam filter services. We’ve used both on-site spam filters and client side filters. I’m not a fan of either. Both approaches can be administrative-intensive. I saw a quote from Osterman Research last year stating that more than 50 percent of the cost in managing an e-mail system is in labor. I believe it. That’s why we turned to deploying a managed spam filter service in which our e-mail goes through a third-party for “cleansing” before heading to our staff’s computers. In our case, we use a firm called eDoxs (costs around $2.60 per mailbox per month), but there are other reputable firms out there, such as Emerald, and LastSpam. To give you a sense of the problem, eDoxs blocked 1,062,876 e-mails last month (not that we’re counting). Another point on spam: If you allow employees to make online purchases on the company computer, ask them to use a personal e-mail address from Yahoo!, Gmail, etc. We had an employee leave over six months ago, and I’m still cleaning up e-mails that can be traced to her purchase of a pair of shoes online. Stay on top of disk space Beyond staying on top of security, I recommend a constant monitoring of disk space. Running out of disk space is one of the most common points of failure in an e-mail system. Given that the price of disk storage has dropped so low, there’s no reason to max out disk utilization before adding more space. On the topic of storage, sending large files as e-mail attachments can also grind your e-mail system to a crawl. This issue has become more pronounced over the past couple of years as people dispatch digital photos from the kid’s birthday party via company e-mail. At the very least, consider putting a file limit on attachments. A second approach is to look to a new category of services that specialize in moving large files from point A to point B without depending on your e-mail roadways. These services go by clever names such as Sendthisfile.com, Yousendit.com, Box.net, and Dropsend.com, allowing you to upload the file to their websites by filling out a form. Once the file has been uploaded, the service shoots an e-mail to the recipient with the link to the file. Most of the basic packages come free with a modest cost added depending on variables such as number of files, size of the files, and number of downloads. When the laptops go home As more companies move to laptop computers, it’s natural that these same machines pull double-duty for personal use, even extending to family members. Guide your employees that if they’re going to allow Johnny to surf the net on the company laptop to complete his report on the history of Macedonia, they need to exit out of e-mail. As elementary as it sounds, this is another cause of “undesirables” entering the company e-mail system. These suggestions give you a fighting chance to keep the e-mail running on time. Linda Wilson is the IT director of The Hoffman Agency, a global public relations firm with 120 employees.