Tag: information technology

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Centralize and Secure Business Applications and Data

laptop drawingThe portable computer is an essential business tool for day’s mobile workforce, having the power and portability to meet the demands of executives and professionals working away from the office.  While executives and mobile professionals get the applications and data they need to keep productivity high, carrying business data on devices outside the network introduces significant business risk.

There are studies which estimate that as much as 80% of the data a small business owns (data like customer files, contracts, product information and financial data) is copied to or stored on portable computers.  When valuable business data is lost or stolen, the business can be exposed to a variety of problems – loss of revenue being just one. Losing track of business data can create legal issues, too. Customer privacy may be compromised, sensitive information could be exposed, or confidential plans might be made public if a business doesn’t take the right steps to secure its data.

It isn’t just the possibility of loss or theft which increases risk when data is copied to portable computers – the increased vulnerability of the information sits with the likelihood that the user will access unsecured networks, launch non-corporate applications, access private email accounts and perform other non-business related tasks with the computer because they have more access than with a fully secured corporate in-office desktop.  User behavior is often what puts corporate data and assets at risk, regardless of the policies that might define correct and acceptable procedures. It is very easy for workers to unknowingly lose and leak data, and when the data is present on the portable computer it gets even easier.

A 2014 study commissioned by Cisco Systems found that employees around the world continue to engage in “risky” behaviors that put business and personal information at risk:

  • The majority (70%) of surveyed IT pros believe that as many as half of their data loss incidents are due to authorized program installations
  • 44% of employees share work devices with others without supervision
  • 39% of IT professionals have dealt with employees trying to access unauthorized parts of the company’s network
  • Almost half of the employees admitted to copying data between work and personal computers when working from home
  • 18% (up to 25% in some regions) of employees shared passwords with their co-workers

Companies must not only protect their data for their financial well-being, but must recognize their legal obligation to protect much of the information, as well.  The risk extends beyond the walls of the enterprise, to vendors and customers and consumers whose information may be stored in the company data. Additionally, portable computers exposed to malware and virus attacks are likely to pass the bad code to other systems they come in contact with, introducing not just risk for the recipient but liability for the infected laptop owner.

Where mobile computing brings huge advantages to today’s business, owners would do well to consider the benefits of enabling mobility through the use of server-based and hosted computing models. Rather than installing software and copying data to PCs and mobile devices, workers should be able to access a central system where the applications actually run. IT management is more efficient and security is easier to enforce when applications and resources are contained exclusively within the corporate boundary, even if they are accessible from without.

Virtual desktop and remote application solutions offer features that address a variety of potential risk factors as well as enabling improved management and security of IT assets.  Centralizing and securing applications and data resources at the server allows businesses to deliver the mobility and functionality users need while enabling the information security and management the business demands. This is a foundation upon which remote desktop and remote application technologies were built, allowing users to have the real-time access to applications and data with full functionality and desktop modality, but without the requirement to install, manage and secure applications and data on the individual devices.

Make Sense?

J

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Licensing for Hosted Application Services: Why it costs what it costs

Licensing for Hosted Application Services:

Why it costs what it costs

Application hosting services are experiencing resurgence in popularity these days, due to the prevalence of messaging about the benefits of a “cloud” technology model.  While hosted application services aren’t really cloud (according to cloud technology purists, anyway), they can look and feel and be paid for just like cloud solutions, so the name fits OK.  Hosted applications are desktop or network applications you access via the web, where the software is implemented and managed by a 3rd party application service provider (the host) rather than being installed on your local PC or LAN.  Some software products may be rental-licensed by the ASP, and when combined with the hosting service, the entire subscription service is more like SaaS (software-as-a-service) than the old “purchase and install” approach.

An important supporting program for application hosting service providers is the Microsoft Service Provider License Agreement program. Under a formal agreement with Microsoft or via an SPLA reseller, service providers and independent software vendors are able to license the latest Microsoft software to provide software services and hosted applications to customers. With the SPLA, service providers and ISVs can lawfully license Microsoft products on a monthly basis to host software services and provide application access for their customers. The SPLA supports a variety of hosting scenarios to help providers deliver highly-customized and robust solutions to a wide range of subscribing customers, and it’s the only valid means for obtaining subscription-based provider licensing for these products.

Because the software products being hosted are essentially desktop or LAN-based products, the underlying technology to “deliver” those applications is generally of a similar foundation.  In cases where the provider is offering hosting of Windows-based QuickBooks desktop editions or Microsoft Office applications, for example, the platforms and servers used by the service provider are almost certainly Windows-based.  This operating system, as well as the rights to allow remote user connections to it, is licensed to the provider from Microsoft under the SPLA.  These elements are referred to as “user” licensing elements.

An aspect of Microsoft reporting and licensing which is not well recognized (or frequently complied with) is the difference between user and application licensing.

User licensing, which includes the Windows server access license as well as the remote desktop user license, is a named user access license. This means that the provider need only report and settle for the user license if the user actually accesses the system during the reporting period (usually each month).  Not quite like a concurrent user model, where only the high count of users is reported, the named user model requires that the license for each user be paid if that user logged in at any time and remained logged in for any length of time during the reporting period.

Application licensing applies to the application software license acquired through and governed by the use-rights provided for and granted under the Microsoft SPLA. Rental application licensing is assigned to a specific, named user, and is to be reported fully on a monthly basis regardless of whether or not the user accessed the software. This is in direct contrast to the named user access licensing described above. Providers are required to report and settle on a monthly basis the total number of subscribed application licenses available to users, including Microsoft Office applications, Exchange, SQL and others, regardless of whether or not the user actually logged in and used the products.  The license is assigned to the user and is therefore required to be paid.

Being an application hosting service provider is a complicated business, and there is a lot to consider when developing subscription services for broad customer delivery.  Pricing is one of the complaints customers voice relating to these services, but the reality is that it takes quite a bit in terms of system resources and licensing to provide an acceptable hosted application experience.  This is one of the areas where SaaS and true cloud solutions benefit from a scale economy – where the application is designed for the platform, and one instance of the solution and platform can serve a large number of customers more affordably.

When working with a hosting service provider, it is wise to recognize that the platform and software licensing costs are there to support the type of applications being hosted.  If you have an SQL-based application, you will need the SQL licensing to support it, just like you have to pay for licensing of an Exchange mailbox or a hosted copy of Word.  Enabling only a portion of the total business software requirement may make it difficult to cost justify hosting just one solution.  However, if the business utilizes the host to manage all the desktop applications and data, the cost-efficiency of the approach can increase dramatically.  Regardless of whether the business elects to continue to run software on local PCs, or if it decides to outsource IT to a host and run it there, the company will have to pay the price for software licensing.

Make sense?

J

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Improving the Business of Art: Making Beautiful Business Decisions

There is a lot more to managing and maintaining an art collection than simply collecting.  In the art business, knowing where something came from, how it got to where it is now (and what it cost to get there), and keeping track of it thereafter requires software and systems to store and manage the information.  A professional art collection management solution will do much more than simply keep an inventory list of items.  This solution must store all the relevant information about the work as well as gather information while facilitating the various business processes relating to activities around the work. The first step to improvement is ensuring all the processes are being facilitated.

Acquiring the item, transporting the item, preparing the item, showing the item, maintaining the item, selling the item… all of these business activities performed must not just be accounted for, they must relate back to the work of art and become part of its historical record. Art tends to move around. Traveling from collector to collector or to different galleries, works of art may change location and ownership or custodial care frequently.  The origin of a work and the tracked purchase history, as well as the history of placements is among the critical information to be stored with each item. This most valuable data is part of the legacy of the work that any professional system should address. If information is power, then better retention and management of information regarding a work makes the entire collection stronger.

The location or exhibition of a work, its purchase history, the related museum and contact records – all this and more must be maintained and managed with each and every item in a collection.  Essential data such as provenance, condition and value is certainly kept for each work, but the key to making a truly useful system for collectors and artists both is the ability to get all the needed data in a single view or report.

Having the inventory information available for invoicing and reporting is one thing, but also being able to connect or identify individual works and collections with relevant contacts is surprisingly valuable. Tracking other information items like costs associated with shipping or framing, or storing both an appraised value as well as an insured value, provides for a comprehensive record of the work and its properties and makes forms and documents preparation not only more accurate but more efficient and useful, too.

Art businesses are like many other “product”-based businesses in that they have e-commerce needs, they build websites to show off their catalogue, they use mobile applications to display items, and they find much higher efficiency and agility when the websites and mobile applications work with the same real-time inventory data that the rest of the system works with.  The goal is to achieve measurable results through improved efficiencies, and that comes from improved information management and integrated systems.  Centralized computing models and connected cloud services establish the foundation.

Cloud hosting, remote access and mobile technologies, and location-based solutions are all part of the package for businesses involved in the business of art these days.  Implementing a hosting solution which enable anytime/anywhere access to business applications and information is often the first key to unlocking the better and more efficient art business.

Whether it is collecting, selling or showing, users involved in the business of art need secure access to all their information whether they’re in the office or not so they have the data needed to support making beautifully intelligent business decisions when it matters most. The rest is just pretty pictures.

Make Sense?

J

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Mobility Solutions to Support the Booming Home Health Services Market

The market for home health care services is growing rapidly and is not likely to slow any time soon. The expanding need is due in large part to the aging of the baby boomers, those born between 1946 and ‘64.  The boomers were once the nation’s largest living generation, defined by a notable increase in births in the United States following World War II. As this generation ages, it is creating a boom of sorts in the home health services industry.

Roughly 10,000 baby boomers turn 65 every day, and increasingly these seniors wish to continue living in their own homes rather than being moved to nursing homes or assisted living facilities.   According to AARP, nearly 90 percent of seniors want to stay in their own homes as they age, referred to as “aging in place.” Most seniors (up to 82 percent) would prefer to stay in their homes even as they need daily assistance or ongoing health care.  Few seniors say they would prefer to move to a care facility, and even fewer identify living with extended family as a desirable option.

The rate of home ownership among boomers is higher than with the rest of the population today, which is one of the primary reasons for increased demands for home care services.  Reports reflect that 81% of seniors today own their own homes, compared to 68% for the rest of the population. The majority of these seniors live alone or with a spouse – we’ve already established that living with extended family isn’t a frequent choice, possibly due at least in part to reduced home ownership rates. There are also suggestions that the reduced economic status of later generations has similarly reduced the capacity for extended families providing the long-term care for their seniors.

Projected to double by the year 2050, the number of Americans requiring daily help with living at home is expected to grow from the current 12 million to 27 million.  Older adults will make up almost 20 percent of the population, if not more.

These and other factors are driving rapid growth and expansion in the home health care field. Projected job growth for home health providers and personal care aids is expected to reach a whopping 70 percent by 2020. Larger than any other occupation grouping in the country, direct care workforce is projected to exceed teachers from kindergarten through high school (3.9 million), all law enforce and public safety workers (3.7 million), and registered nurses (3.4 million). Between 2010 and 2020, the fastest growing occupations in the country are projected to be Personal Care Aides and Home Health Aides.

Home health care businesses providing in-home senior care, hospital after-care, veteran care and numerous other specialized and general services are supported by a number of specialized software solutions designed to meet the specific needs of this segment of the healthcare industry.  The software used to support the business generally includes specific functionality for managing client and patient records, caregiver and provider information, scheduling and dispatch, payroll and HR, billing, and other back office and accounting processes.

Many of the industry-specific solutions available on the market address different or unique aspects of operating the home health care business, integrating data from their system with separate accounting and finance applications (such as QuickBooks desktop editions) for the rest of the functionality needed.  This allows the developer of the line of business application to focus on the valuable features and capabilities that will make the practice more efficient, compliant and profitable, leaving general accounting processes (payroll, accounts payable, general ledger and reporting) to the accounting software.

With greater frequency, the applications servicing the home health care industry are SaaS solutions, crafted with online access and mobility in mind.  This industry in particular has a specific need for remote and mobile access to information, as it is a “field service” operation at its core with healthcare rolled in.  The requirements to manage not just scheduling and services, but to deal with compliance, privacy and other factors involved with healthcare information complicates matters, placing an additional focus on the security and mode of access to the software and information.

Businesses using solutions such as Kinnser ADL, Shoshana Rosemark, Kaleida eRSP and Generations Homecare System rely on the software to streamline their operations.  Not only designed to support a remote and mobile workforce, these application services also provide business owners and managers with the ability to access essential business data at any time.  At issue is the rest of the software and systems which support the business operation and its processes.  Word and Excel or other productivity tools are almost certainly used at some level, and QuickBooks is in use, too.  These applications and their data typically reside on the desktop computer or local network.  As desktop applications, these solutions deliver the best power and performance for the business in terms of features and usability.  While some users may consider moving to web-based versions of these products, those who favor performance and functionality over framework often return to the feature-rich desktop applications that do the full job required.

In order to give business owners and remote workers the access they need to desktop applications and data, secure remote access solutions are required.  When the software and systems reside in the locked office of the business, the people operating outside aren’t usually able to access them in a way that is useful – or useful for more than one person at a time.  Remote control solutions that broker access to a PC cannot provide the multi-user support, application security or overall performance that most businesses require.  Attempts to implement simple RDS solutions or use similar products to create access often expose the business to unnecessary risk and limited capability while introducing heavy technical and licensing expenses.

With an offsite option, where the applications and data reside with the commercial hosting provider, business owners and line managers benefit from being allowed to focus on operations and not on managing the underlying software and systems. The business outsources the provisioning, management and protection of primary IT resources to support users, software and data, but the business should retain the capability to administer their own cloud as personnel changes impacting information access can occur at any time.

Whether their software and data are hosted on-site with existing equipment or offsite with managed hosting, home health care businesses need to have an easy-to-use solution for administration of user accounts, application access and secure filespaces.  For the home health care business, this is critical functionality that can mean the difference between spending too much time in the office handling general business and software matters versus meeting with clients and managing caregivers and revenue-generating activities.  In a fast moving, fast growing and highly mobile business, getting to information at anytime from anywhere using any device means being able to meet booming business demand.

Make Sense?

J

https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2014/cb14-84.html https://www.ioaging.org/aging-in-america http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/04/25/millennials-overtake-baby-boomers/ http://www.iyhusa.com/AginginPlaceFacts-Data.htm http://economistsoutlook.blogs.realtor.org/2012/01/13/homeowners-by-age/
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Channel Partners: Selling Telephony With a Side of Remote Access and Cloud Hosted Applications

Channel agents and telephony resellers are facing stiff competition these days. Line access or voice service isn’t as easy to sell as it once was, and the convergence of digital voice and data has made things even less simple. Business customers demand comprehensive solutions that can address a variety of business problems, and they tend to seek out those solutions from the advisors they trust. The “advisor” could be a software reseller, an accounting professional, the local IT guy, or the professional that delivered great telco, voice or network access.

Convergence isn’t only for voice and data solutions; convergence is the combining and compressing of channels delivering those solutions. MSPs and “pure” IT resellers are also feeling the squeeze, finding telecom agents and channels among those challenging the VARs and MSPs operating today. Marketing budgets are increasing, but differentiation is not.  Reselling is a crowded space and everyone has become a service provider. Having the right messages to win new customers and retain existing ones is essential not just for success, but for survival.

Once a channel partner or provider has established a solid customer relationship, it is important to capitalize on that goodwill (and develop even more) by delivering the other value-added services the customer needs. Access, connectivity and voice solutions are just a start when it comes to servicing small and growing business customers. Having come from an application hosting background, I am very aware of the demand for mobility and “always-on, always-available” computing services among businesses small and large. When the partner is working with the customer and is solving connectivity and telephony problems, the likelihood of successfully selling additional IT solutions to address mobility is quite high. The challenge has often been with the investment required for training and certification; development of new competencies which are viewed as diversions from the core business. Evolution of technology, markets and demand suggests that offering a broader base of solutions isn’t a diversion any longer, it has become a core requirement.

Secure remote access to on-premises systems, managed hosting on cloud servers delivering always-on service or disaster recovery, and collaboration tools that keep everyone on the same page – these are the solutions that savvy businesses are looking for, and which represent the additional value channel partners and service providers could be delivering to their valued customers. After all, if the customer can’t get what they need from their trusted reseller/advisor, they will find somewhere else to buy, removing their “advisor” from the mix. Most business owners would agree that it takes less to nurture and maintain existing customers than it takes to find new ones, so the investment in offering and delivering value-added solutions is well worth it.

The best way for channel partners to retain their customer relationships is to offer a full range of solutions and value-added services to meet the variety of needs of their business clientele.  MyQuickCloud, for example, is a highly successful partner solution and add-on for resellers of IP telephony services and line access. MyQuickCloud offers very flexible and affordable secure remote access and cloud hosting solutions that do not require investments in training or certification to resell, giving channel partners and telecomm agents the right stuff to beat out the competition and keep small business and growing enterprise customers happy and coming back for more. Partners leverage their expertise and creativity in developing solutions with MyQuickCloud, resulting in cost-effective and powerful network, application and continuity services not previously available.

MyQuickCloud secure remote access creates a secure business cloud from on-premises systems, with hosted or co-located cloud servers, or any combination of on-prem or offsite hosts. The on-premises capability leverages investments in existing infrastructure and adds value and capability to locally installed systems, a benefit which is not available with traditional hosting models. Able to be positioned as simple remote access, managed hosting or complete disaster recovery, MyQuickCloud gives channel partners a simple yet comprehensive approach to meeting customer computing needs regardless of the applications in use or mobile devices to support. MyQuickCloud is also used by installers and support technicians, enabling remote access to client on-prem systems, turning service and support into a more streamlined and efficient effort and improving customer service and retention.

I wrote an article a while back about how it all comes down to 3 applications for small businesses… applications to address fundamental business requirements. Among those requirements is the need to communicate.  Whether it be via voice or electronic mail or other means, every business communicates and every business needs communication tools.  Chief among the communication tools is the voice service (telephone), whether it be on-premises or hosted, digital voice or IP (not much analog out there anymore) or some combination of all of the above. Extending telephone systems to service a remote and mobile workforce or to connect multiple business locations is a high demand business and has proven to be very lucrative for many partners.  Adding value to these solutions by delivering remote access or hosting service simply increases the overall value of the system and allows business customers to take full advantage of mobile, connected and integrated working models.

Make Sense?

J

 

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Technology-Enabled Practice is Profitable Practice

A profitable accounting “firm of the future” is not out of reach for even the smallest of professional practices, because it doesn’t take a lot of people to develop a highly efficient and profitable operation.  The key is having the right business foundation – the technology and the concentration on structure and process – which will serve the business for years to come. Profitability is really about effectiveness and efficiency… delivering more value and doing it in a more intelligent manner than the next guy.  This is how the practice not only stays profitable, this is how it beats the competition.

Powered in part by efficiency created with technology-enabled business, professional firms find that they are able to realize increased revenues by billing for services, not by the billable hour.  Data processing and performing the “mechanics” of the bookkeeping process is going by the wayside, with artificial intelligence and automation taking the lead in these areas.  This creates the opportunity for professionals to broaden their scope of service and involvement with business clients.   The higher value work, the tasks that most professionals would rather spend their time on, is now available because the lower value data entry and tabulation is handled electronically.  When accountants are able to spend less time on entering information and more time on evaluation and analysis, business clients find greater value in the insight delivered from the engagement.

It is more than possible for the professional to develop new competencies in business technologies without having to invest the entire practice and put the client base at risk. Hosting and remote access solutions, for example, bridge the gap between on-premises computing and the cloud, delivering the benefits of mobility and anytime/anywhere working models without the complete transition to SaaS applications and web-based frameworks.  This allows the firm to streamline production by taking advantage of connected systems and real-time data, which is at the core of efficiency in business.

The small business market is the economic growth sector, and the number of opportunities being presented to smaller firms is increasingly significant. With the correct technology and approach, small firms are able to compete at levels previously available only to their larger counterparts.  The business of accounting is changing because the technologies supporting it are evolving more rapidly than ever before.  The firms that embrace these changes and use them to improve and streamline practice performance are the firms that will achieve and sustain the highest levels of profitability.

Make Sense?

J