Returning to the office doesn’t necessarily mean you will be abandoning all of your Work From Home set-ups. In fact, your workforce will likely consist of remote workers for some time to come. In addition, workstations in the office may have been sitting idle while everyone worked remotely. Your technology goal is to ensure your employees have what they need to do their jobs effectively while you ensure and maintain a safe and secure work environment.

Evaluate any new technology deployed during the crisis.

The tools your employees used to work remotely may or may not be required when you return to the office. Create a list, including any new devices, and decide if they stay or go. Evaluate how the new tech was implemented, determine what worked and what fell short, and if you still need all of the licenses you purchased. Examples include new Office 365 licenses, Zoom, new laptops, etc.

Evaluate any service providers you use to run your business.

Identify any vendor that was not able to achieve their SLAs, and determine the cause. Pay particularly close attention to those critical vendors and how they performed during the crisis.

For any employee who will continue to Work From Home, audit the tech they will be using.

Determine if the tech is appropriate, secure, and is sufficient to enable optimal productivity.

Run an audit on any workstations in the office.

An audit will help you determine if the workstations are properly patched with the latest OS and other critical updates.

Document a list of those employees who used their personal computers to Work From Home.

Develop an appropriate action plan to ensure the ongoing use of personal computers or devices complies with your company’s security standards. Consider requiring your employees to change the passwords on any personal devices.

Catalog items that were removed from the office.

Protect your business and intellectual property by ensuring any devices, technology, files, folders, contracts, customer lists, and documents, etc. are properly returned to the office. This list may include electronic files left on the employee’s personal workstation or device.

Conduct a gap analysis.

Document the technology gaps that were exposed during the crisis and create a plan on how to address them.

Schedule a review of your Disaster Recovery (DR) and/or Business Continuity plan.

What can be improved upon? What worked well? Were you able to easily transition from the office to Work From Home? How was your business impacted during this crisis? Update your DR and/or Business Continuity plan accordingly.

Schedule regular DR and Business Continuity testing.

This should be a routine part of your business. But given this recent crisis, regular DR and Business Continuity testing will be even more crucial moving forward. Don’t be caught unprepared.

Your MSP should be the primary figure in your business to ease in the transition from home back to the office. Properly assess your IT professional to ensure that these actions are being done to help reengage your network back to normalcy. For some companies, working from home may be a suitable option for their employees for time to come. Regardless, your IT professional should ensure that no employee is subjected to downtime. 

Transitioning back to the office, but don’t know what to do?

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