CORONAVIRUS! 

Many businesses will completely shut down. Others  will suffer a significant loss of productivity. And some will keep  chugging along without missing a step. As a business owner, you have  several choices: 1.) You can shut down or staff down for the duration of the event; 2.) You can have staff work from home; or  3.) You can hope it’s not a problem for you.   

If you’re alright with the last option, I wish you  good luck. It’s not a great one. The first option may be a hard  pill to swallow, you probably have customers that need service while the  event endures. The second option is the reasonable choice for businesses that are able to work without an on-site  presence. Obviously food service, manufacturing, and customer site  activities are among the types of business that simply cannot take  advantage of this option. If your company can, you’ll have to consider these questions – how will I conduct business if my staff  falls ill? Or how will I conduct business if I need all work to be  performed remotely?

Secure data and communications are the keys to  remaining profitable while many or all of your staff are unable to work  on-site; however, if you don’t have a way to securely log into servers  or cloud resources, you already know this is a problem. Email traffic and collaboration on shared resources over home  or commercial networks leaves the communication, documents, and data  storage exposed to prying eyes. Your company’s data will be at high risk  of exposure without Virtual Private Networking and Multi-Factor Authentication. Remember: you don’t have to be  vulnerable, and you can still operate smoothly and securely with a few  simple and affordable measures.   

First, you’ll need to make a plan for continuing  operations. Next, you’ll have to communicate that plan to your staff and  customers. While the main goal of your plan is remaining profitable,  that’s not all – you stand the chance to gain market share when your competitors have not prepared as well.

Whether it’s a few key personnel or the entire staff  that support your business, they can all work remotely while maintaining your company’s information security.