Increase Collaboration with These Technologies

By New Era Technology - 8 Aug, 2023
Collaboration & UC
4 Minutes Read

A decade ago, businesses sought to foster collaboration and camaraderie through open floor plans, tables over individual desks, and huddle rooms. Of course, with COVID-19, these became a thing of the past as companies shut down offices and employees started working from home. Even as the worst of the danger passed, businesses found that having teams working remotely allowed them to save money on office costs and hire from a much larger pool of potential workers while employees enjoyed the freedom, time, and comfort remote work provides.  

But as offices go from centralized to spread across the country (or even globe), the need to collaborate and communicate effectively becomes both more important but also more difficult. To keep your teams working closely with each other and with clients, even when they’re far apart, we’re sharing the business collaboration tools that you need to adopt.  

Cloud Computing Connects Your Team to Your Business 

By shifting your applications, files, and data to a cloud platform, employees can sign in and access work from anywhere with an internet connection. While you’re probably already relying on some cloud-based tools, expanding your infrastructure to a cloud-based model allows employees to access more operational features, data, and other company elements remotely.  

Additionally, cloud technologies are scalable so you can add services, storage, and structural elements as your organization grows, and they’re cost-effective as it eliminates much of the maintenance and replacement costs of physical, on-premise applications, software, and equipment.  

Video Conferencing Brings Your Teams Together 

In the early days of the pandemic, Zoom (or Skype, Teams, or other calls) were how we came together, and there were certainly some hiccups along the way. Of course, it didn’t take long for most people to ensure their connections were stable, their mics were on, and they had their background blurred or hidden by a digital backdrop. But while these solutions worked, they didn’t offer the seamless communication and high-quality experience that brought everyone closer together.  

Fortunately, video conferencing technology rapidly improved, and there are a wide variety of options for collaboration and unified communication available. High-definition video conferencing improves image and video quality, virtual conference rooms let users connect more securely from any device and location, and telepresence technology supports stronger interactions. The best part is that Microsoft Teams and other popular communication platforms can be used to deploy these features.  

File Sharing Supports Stronger Project Collaboration 

When your teams work together in the office on a presentation or project, it’s easy to edit, update, and build the project while keeping everyone informed of the changes. When the team is passing files, documents, or presentations back and forth, it’s easy for updated versions to get lost in the shuffle. 

Having a scalable, robust, and intuitive file-sharing system that supports real-time collaboration eliminates the confusion and keeps people aware of any changes while working on the most recent iteration of the project. We recommend Microsoft 365 with SharePoint, a cloud-based platform where your employees can create sites to share documents both internally and with clients while keeping files organized and easy to find. Even better, it integrates with PowerApps and offers added features and capabilities like news feeds and analytics.  

Strengthen Network Security 

With your teams sharing files, sending emails, and collaborating across a variety of platforms, having a secure infrastructure and adopting best practices to keep your software and platforms free of threats and vulnerabilities are more important than ever. Whether your company adopts a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) strategy or you supply phones, laptops, and other technology, you need to have security solutions in place. This can include:  

  • Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to encrypt data and mask IP addresses to minimize threats on a public wi-fi 
  • Two-factor authentication for your team members to use when logging in to company platforms and software, such as email, CMS, and CRMs 
  • Strong spam filters to reduce the risk of malware from suspicious files 

Working with a managed IT security company to help you recognize vulnerabilities and put together a strategy can be key to minimizing the risk of data breaches and allow your team to collaborate with confidence.  

Discover the Right Business Collaboration Tools to Accelerate Your Organization 

Whether you’re looking for cloud computing solutions, video conferencing improvements, or network security, New Era Technology has the technology to improve collaboration for your organization. Reach out to an expert today to start a conversation and learn how we can help you meet your goals.  

Author: New Era Technology