Businesses and organisations of all kinds are thinking about the eventual transition back into the office environment. This experience will be different for each organisation. Some have been running essential services during the COVID-19 outbreak, and haven’t really noticed much change in this. Their experience will differ greatly from the business that transitioned to an entirely remote workforce in response to the pandemic—their needs are going to be more costly and drastic. Whatever your experience has been, or what your situation currently is, it’s time to start planning for what comes next. Are you going to return to the office life, like before the pandemic? Are you going to stay entirely remote? The answer to both of these questions is likely “no.” Most organisations would benefit from adopting the Hybrid Working Model.
The Hybrid Working Model (HWM) is simply a simultaneous adoption of in-office and remote work environments. We’re expecting to see a significant number of workers continue to work from home after the social distancing and quarantine restrictions are lifted, and we expect that number to stay fairly consistent. There are also good reasons for returning to the office: face-to-face collaboration can be more effective than remote collaboration, it’s easier to stay focused without the trappings of home, and there are social benefits to working in the office with other people. With these things in mind, we need to look at what businesses and non-profit organisations need to do to prepare for this kind of HWM environment.
Security is always important, but it’s even more important right now. Ransomware attacks have increased by 400% over that last three months as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic response. With businesses and organisations everywhere trying to function with a hastily-assembled remote work environment, hackers are taking advantage of the generally weakened cybersecurity. Your business needs to take steps now to solidify your cybersecurity solution and prepare for securing your HWM environment. We expect issues regarding file version control and virus corruption to spike as employees move back into the office, which can put company data at risk.
The quickest and most cost-efficient step you can take to shore up your security is to enable Multi-factor Authentication or Two-Factor Authentication across all of your accounts and devices. Requiring a secondary verification source (like a smartphone app or a text code) to access accounts and data adds a layer of defense that all but the most dedicated hackers and cybercriminals won’t be able to penetrate. Beyond that, Sensible is happy to work with you to refine and strengthen your cybersecurity offering.
When your team is split between the office and remote work, there are a few things that can make a positive impact. The first of which is establishing solid policies around transferring data between home and the office. The second one is to learn and leverage the full functionality of your current tools. We very commonly see people using great tools like Microsoft Teams, but not using it effectively. For example, Teams has a chat function, a collaborative file sharing function, video conferencing, and task management; a lot of companies only use it for communication. Leveraging your tools to the fullest extent, especially when on-site and remote workers are working together on one project.
We hope this article highlighted some helpful things for you, and gave you an idea of what you need to prepare for when implementing your Hybrid Working Model environment. If you’re interested in working with a trusted IT partner, Sensible is happy to help you figure out how to best meet your needs.
