The catchphrase “shadow IT” has always been a bit misleading in the world of tech support. Is using Dropbox instead of Google Drive akin to committing some seedy act in a dark alleyway? Jokes aside, it seems tech support’s real problem has less to do with terminology and more to do with the way they approach shadow IT. Their aim is often near-sighted because their tools hold them back.
I have good, bad, and good news for you. Let’s start with the first good news: After three months of uncertainty, several countries are starting to reopen their economies and plan their way out of the pandemic. It appears there is finally some light at the end of the tunnel.
There has been a lot of talk about transforming employees’ digital experiences, but what does this really mean, and how can it be achieved? This is what Nexthink and its partner Fujitsu are solving each and every day. Employee experience refers to the evaluation that employees make regarding their work environment.
The recent shift to remote work has been anything but subtle for millions of people and their companies. And like many in IT Ops, our customers have been preoccupied with maintaining an error-free VPN experience. But that’s often easier said than done. Luckily for them, VPN issues that would normally take weeks to resolve are being turned around in minutes with Nexthink’s patented technology.
Most remote employees are probably familiar with a security practice known as multi-factor authentication (MFA), even if they cannot technically define it. If you’ve ever tried to complete an online purchase and were met with a string of security questions or received a one-time password (OTP) on your mobile device—then you’ve participated in an MFA process.
Close your eyes for a moment and think of the least tech-savvy person in your family. Ok, open them. This person, even with their limited tech skills, probably understands that the farther you stray from your Wi-Fi router, the worse your connection will be. Incredibly, Chris and I can count between us over a dozen customers whose IT support teams failed to consider this one factor. How could something so simple fly under the radar of enterprise IT?
The phrase just a few months ago has never seemed to cover more ground than it does today. Well, just a few months ago, Nexthink commissioned a study with Vanson Bourne to find out the real state of the Digital Employee Experience. Vanson Bourne reached out to 3,000 IT leaders and employees across major markets in the USA, United Kingdom, Germany and France.
Right now, millions of people are working remotely for the first time, and they’re doing so on company laptops and mobile devices. And with millions of these devices now offsite, this throws but one more wrinkle in tech support’s security plans—in addition to worrying about insecure networks and malware attacks, IT must also safeguard against physical theft. Yes, device encryption is the logical fail-safe for such a scenario and a must-have for any remote IT setup.
Missed our webinar on remote work digital experience? Watch the recording here. It’s no secret that many IT departments are scrambling to support hundreds, and in some cases, thousands of new remote workers. Last week over 700 IT Operations leaders and professionals registered for our Remote Work digital experience webinar because right now these people are facing unprecedented pressure to keep their companies productive and their employees free of technology disruptions.
