How to Manage Multiple Business Locations

Technological advances have allowed many businesses to shift to a remote work paradigm. Letting employees work virtually from any device creates flexibility and increases employee satisfaction, but it can also create challenges without the right tools in place. Find out how you can successfully manage employees across various locations while minimizing interruptions in productivity.

Here are some of the top challenges a remote workforce must overcome when managing employees across several business locations:

Staying in close contact with employees in different business locations and time zones is difficult. However, the right technology can boost virtual team communication. Today, remote employees can text, instant message, email, video chat, call and share documents thanks to advances in infrastructure and hardware.

Adding cloud solutions like Microsoft 365 combines the best communication tools with email backup and other convenient features to better suit your business needs and workflow. Start by creating a plan that best matches your business objectives and then add any additional services as needed.

Collaborating on certain types of tasks or jobs can be challenging in a remote environment. Foster a strong team mentality by setting up regular weekly meetings to check in with your employees and discuss upcoming projects. Leveraging video conference apps, such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams or WebEx, allows virtual employees to interact as if they were in the same room.

App-based online systems help improve remote employee productivity and ensure deadlines are met. These tools let managers easily schedule meetings and send assignments and reminders directly to individual employees on their mobile device or laptop. This increased visibility helps employees manage workflow.

As businesses rushed to enable remote work for their employees during the pandemic, security fell as a priority. Many businesses now are wondering if their workforce is properly set up.

Fortunately, there are several security tools businesses can implement to boost remote work security. Fully managed cloud-based solutions like Security as a Service (SECaaS) address vulnerabilities, help protect network data and safeguard businesses against cyber-attacks. While Identity as a Service (IDaas) helps businesses stay secure whether users are trying to access data and applications in the cloud, hosted environments or on-premises.

Use these tools to manage your employees across various business locations:

An intranet is an internal communications network, much like a virtual office space, where employees access a range of tools to support their work. Employees must log in to access their applications, collaborate on shared documents and schedule meetings. This easy solution streamlines processes on one platform and connects multiple business locations.

When Desktop as a Service (DaaS) is paired with SD-WAN, employees can securely access applications from any device with an Internet connection—even during emergency situations like natural disasters or power outages.

A VPN allows employees to securely share files with high-level encryption and access applications and information stored in your company’s data center or headquarters. To help protect from hackers, employees authenticate with login credentials creating a secure connection between their preferred device (laptop, tablet or smartphone) and your company's private network.

Moving your IT infrastructure to the cloud helps ensure business continuity during unpredicted events and safeguards important business data against malicious hackers. Managed services like Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) help provide a smooth transition as you scale your IT cloud environment securely and meet compliance requirements.

Cloud migration with an experienced service provider supplies many benefits when managing multiple business locations, including:

• Security. Hosting your IT infrastructure in the cloud means enterprise-level security, equipped with firewalls, encryption, access control and disaster recovery solutions.
  
• Flexibility. Employees can conveniently and securely access their applications, desktops and data from virtually anywhere, as well as easily add new users to get them up and running quickly.
  
• Cost Control. Creating a fully customizable plan with a monthly or yearly subscription allows you to only pay for what you use and add services as demand grows.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone services, paired with other collaboration tools like Microsoft 365, efficiently organizes communications through video conferencing, messaging, file sharing and more. Companies can easily use VoIP services to automate incoming call routing to remote locations and employees. Eliminate the cost of purchasing expensive hardware or tying employees to a landline by having them download a cloud-hosted VoIP app on their smart device as well.