Teleworking - How to Make It Work for Your Business

Teleworking hosts many potential benefits for a business - increased productivity, lower overheads, increased employee satisfaction and a wider geographical area from where to find staff are just a few of the potential benefits of teleworking that may apply to your business.

However, to realise these benefits you need to ensure that you are strategic in the implementation of teleworking. If you are going to explore and implement teleworking in your business you need to ensure you cover all of the four bases mentioned below. Failure to do so will exacerbate your risks and limit your chances of success.

Have the policies in place- If staff are to work from home you need to ensure that your staff members understand that their roles and responsibilities. They need to understand what is expected of them when working from home and how they report their activities throughout the day.

Be realistic about whose roles will work through teleworking - New technology might bring with it the promise of a remote workforce but sometimes people do need to be in the office. Some roles are not suited to teleworking in your current business structure. You need to identify which roles may suit and for which roles you won't consider allowing staff members to work remotely.

Trial teleworking with trusted staff members - You cannot implement remote working procedures on an adhoc basis or with everybody in the beginning. A trial process is necessary and recommended. You need to offer a teleworking arrangement to trusted staff members who will provide you with the feedback you need as part of the teleworking process. You should also only trial teleworking with those staff members you expect to do the work.

Have the right technology in place to better ensure its success - Working from home is not necessarily a new phenomenon but it is becoming more prevalent as technology improves. If you want to improve your chances of success you need to ensure you have the right technology in place. You need to ensure that staff are equipped to succeed when working from home.

Teleworking has many advantages for business but you need to ensure that you plan for success. As they say, failing to plan is planning to fail. If you have your policies, if you test how it will work and you have the right technology in place there is no reason that you should fail.

At Best Business Deals we can help you implement teleworking procedures in your business by providing you access to the right technology and advice. Give us a call today if you would like to discuss empowering your team further.

Hamish Jones is the Managing Director of Best Business Deals, a premium provider of hosted PBX and other solutions If you are interested in finding out more about hosted PBX can help your business, get in touch with the team at Best Business Deals today.

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Future Proofing Your Business and Reduce IT Downtime With The Cloud

When you want to turn on lights in your house you don't start up your own generator. You connect to the power lines out the front of your house and pay for someone else to manage the power grid. Cloud Computing technologies can be thought of similarly. There are a number of companies out there investing significantly in IT infrastructure and cloud computing solutions so, for a small monthly fee, you can remove the stress and costs associated with IT infrastructure. You can almost certainly also guarantee that you will see massive increases in IT uptime.

Another great benefit of cloud computing is you can ensure the safety and security of your data. Your Cloud Computing provider will ensure your data is backed up regularly so you don't lose any of your information. In the current climate, information is critical yet many businesses not utilising cloud computing are not adequately protecting their information.

There are some issues with infrastructure and Internet access - you cannot access your files unless you have access to the Internet. But, the benefit of the Cloud is that if your Internet goes down (at the office for example) you can access your files on another computer that has Internet access - no matter where you are in the world.

Some businesses have expressed concern regarding data security - they want to know who owns their data and what laws users are bound by. It is important that you read the terms and conditions carefully to ensure your option is satisfactory.

Cloud computing is good because these businesses have bigger server centres than you do. They can provide you with uptime guarantees that you won't get from your own equipment - the reputation of these cloud companies depends on it. Navigating the minefield that is choosing a cloud IT service provider is complex. If you would like some no obligation advice about the options available then get in touch today.

Hamish Jones is the Managing Director of Best Business Deals, a premium provider of hosted PBX and other solutions If you are interested in finding out more about hosted PBX can help your business, get in touch with the team at Best Business Deals today.

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Communication Is The Heart Of Any Business

There is more than one way to communicate, such as letters, telegrams, telephone calls, and many more ways that two parties can speak to one another. However, while there are many ways to communicate, the problem is that these ways may not be as organized as they can be. A telephone company may offer a business features like the ability to make conference calls, but just being able to do that is not enough for a business that is growing and dealing with clients. With unified communications, a business can get many different sources of communication brought together so it can be used to make a business run even better than it ever has before.

Unifying Communications Systems Is Important

There have been many historical events all around the world that were shaped in one way or another by communication. Wars were won or lost all on the strength or weaknesses of a country's communication system. If communication made a huge difference between winning a war or not, then people can begin to understand just how important it is. With a unified communications system, a business can have all of their forms of communications together, and there are many benefits to this kind of system:

• Makes communicating easier: There are many forms of communications, like instant messages, conference calls, video conferences, and other ways that a business can communicate. Unified communications can combine all different forms of communication into one system, and with this one system, employees can find it a lot easier to be able to use this system.

• Better ways to communicate: Sometimes a business does not have ways to communicate and a unified communication system is going to give communication option that employees never had before. If an employee has a problem with something, and needs to talk to another department, they can use an instant messaging system or even a video chat to get whatever it is they need help with resolved. Using many different ways to communicate is going to make work a lot easier for the employees, and they can also be able to get in touch with the upper management or even the owner of the company thanks to the communication system.

• Many people under one system: Sometimes in an office situation, communication will not be the greatest, and things can get lost or misinterpreted. However, if everyone in the office is under the same communication system, there will be no more problems with things getting lost because there will be system that is safeguarding everything.

When it comes to a communication system, most businesses will look into what a telephone company has to offer in terms of things like email, instant messaging, video conferencing, and other forms of communication. However, though a phone company can offer any features, a unified communications system is much better than just telephone service because with one of these systems, all forms of communication are brought together, and employees can talk to one another any time they need to, which will help everyone work better and as one unit.

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Unified Communications

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Use iPhone in Business for Style, Comfort and Efficiency

They say that if you're really crazy about something, you are indeed a tad crazy. But an iPhone is probably the only thing in the entire universe that if you're not crazy about it, you better have another session with your shrink ASAP. Okay, jokes aside, but really.

Don't you simply love your iPhone? And don't you almost endlessly use your iPhone in personal life? So why not use iPhone in your business life too. Why not let Apple's appeal, style, and, of course, luck rub off on you and your business by using an iPhone for business purposes.

Using an iPhone for business lets you easily organize your tasks, attend meeting no matter where you are, keep track of projects, and get a quick overview of your business. The best thing about it is that you and your associates get to do all that and a lot more, while having the feeling that every day at work is a Bring-your-toy-to-work day.

Your iPhone makes organizing your work day a piece of cake...

iPhone's numerous out-of-the box tools and applications, as well as dozens of applications from Apple's App Store enable you to easily organize your work day, never miss a thing, and do everything right on schedule. Your iPhone lets you fly through your work day, easily managing your work tasks, effortlessly connecting and collaborating with associates and clients, and staying readily updated on meetings and their agendas.

Your iPhone lets you stay on top of your business...

Using your iPhone in business life lets you stay on top of all aspects of your business. Whether it's about monitoring data and analyzing business metrics, or keeping track of work performance, or retrieving critical information on the move, or sending and keeping track of invoices, or maintaining good customer relationships, there's always an appropriate iPhone app to assist you in doing so in the best possible manner.

Your iPhone lets you host and attend meetings no matter where you are...

With your iPhone you can host and attend a meeting from anywhere in the world. Your iPhone lets you host and attend meetings remotely via conference calls. You can also host or attend a web conference based meeting from anywhere using your iPhone. And not only that, you can also make PowerPoint presentations in these meetings.

So what do you think? Do you like the idea of using your iPhone for business purposes and doing business in style?

Mike Peric is with York Computer Services, a computer technology company helping small business owners manage, protect and grow their businesses. Office Phone: 416-900-3861 Web: http://www.ycsi.ca/

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