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complete computer support, inc.
March Newsletter...
"IT" ADMINISTRATION ISSUES
Some recent support calls have highlighted issues relating to the understanding of "IT" management including:
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How are your backups handled?
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Who is responsible for administering the information systems throughout your company?
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Do you have an appropriate budget for "IT"?
HOW ARE YOUR BACKUPS HANDLED?
Every year more information is collected on computers in our offices. If these are individual PCs, a company must consider a backup strategy to define where important documents are saved, and where duplicate backups are kept of these documents. A company must take a proactive approach to protecting their document storage to avoid common issues such as employees leaving with no record of their passwords, or, more often, hard drive or computer failure.
Sometimes casual sharing of computer files allows users to easily exchange information over the network. However, this can introduce security issues where careless sharing results in confidential information being available to unauthorized users.
With a centralized server running the accounting and major information systems, data is already centralized, and most clients have a good backup strategy for their database. Recovery of this data generally can be accomplished without too much difficulty. It is also quite common to activate a shared area on the central server so that important shared documents can be placed and included as part of the daily / weekly company backup process.
As this data grows, however, we face the problem of the media, on which we backup the information, no longer having the capacity to store all the data. If backups are scheduled automatically after business hours, we often have the impression that a good backup is being done and never realize it may be incomplete. This is not a problem when the backups are reviewed for accuracy and completeness on a regular basis.
Some of the biggest culprits which increase data file sizes on the central server are the extended use of archiving PDF documents, printing extensive daily reports to the spooler for a "digital" copy, and increased storage of image files.
Often, we realize that we have storage or backup issues when we receive an error message stating a logged file exceeds system file size limits, or when a hard drive fails. Then, we turn to our backup copy only to find out that is it not a complete copy.
WHO IS RESPONSIBLE?
"IT" management requires a plan and schedule. These tasks need to be assigned to an individual(s) to accurately manage and understand the administration issues necessary to keeping the system functional. Do you have someone on staff who will take this responsibility? Or is it something that needs to be contracted as part of the total systems approach?
DO YOU HAVE AN APPROPRIATE BUDGET FOR "IT"?
The most important question is "do you have budgeted funds to handle the ongoing administration needs of your computer and information systems as they become more central to the total functionality of your company?"
Very few of our clients actually include "IT" as a line item in their budgeting process. "IT" is often considered just one of the daily tasks assigned to a busy individual who already multi-tasks several job descriptions.
CONCLUSION:
Due to the complexity of these issues, asking your current staff to handle them along with all their other assigned duties may be reducing their productivity. On the other hand, hiring a full time "IT" professional is cost prohibitive.
We are always happy to provide advice to our clients, and it is apparent that we may need to expand our services to some, to cover greater administration of their systems.
If you feel that your company would benefit from some outside "IT" services and management, please contact us for a proposal.