The practicalities

In the next section we're going to cover some innovative technologies to enable you and your staff to effectively work from home. Before we do so it's worth going over some of the personal, legal and practical ramifications of home working.

• Health & Safety - Even though staff may be working from home you are still responsible, as their employer, for their health and safety. This means you must provide the same standard of environment for them to work when they are at home. See business link for more info.

• Insurance - If you are providing IT or phone equipment to your employees you need to ensure it's covered by your insurance policy.

• Security - We couldn't go a whole issue without mentioning security at least once (it is important after all). If employees are taking computer equipment and confidential data home with them you need to ensure they are aware of the security implications and that you don't breach data protection regulations.

• Communication - It's even more important to ensure clear lines of communication if employees are working from home. Technology can certainly help in this respect but even so home working can be a lonely pursuit. Ensuring clear lines of communication are in place is therefore essential.

• How Data is accessed - You need to think about how your data is accessed. Will employees take data and programs home with them, for instance on a laptop, or will they use technologies to access the data in the office remotely whilst not actually taking the data with them. This may seem like an arbitrary distinction but it has serious implications in terms of security, monitoring, network speeds and licensing.

Although these topics are too large to cover in detail in this newsletter we are always on hand to discuss any of these in more detail.

Groove is one of our personal favourites in the office, because we use it everyday, and the biggest bonus is you may already own it. Groove comes as part of the Office 2007 Professional+ and Office 2007 Enterprise packages or can be purchased separately if so desired. Groove enables users to create automatically replicating workspaces. In English that means it's possible to create a shared directory on any number of PCs that automatically synchronise with one another across the internet. Users can collaborate and share files seamlessly and each copy will be kept up to date with the others via a standard net connection (no servers needed).

The benefits of Groove are too numerous for a short article but more information can be found here.

Getting Groove

The best bit about groove is it's far from expensive and you may already have it with your current Office package. Setting it up is a simple process and in a couple of hours you could be using a distributed, shared workspace all of your own.

For more info please e-mail us

Most people are now aware that it's possible to connect to a work PC from home if that PC is left switched on. This can be achieved through a number of means (SSL VPN Box, Small Business Server, LogMeIn etc).

The is fine if key individuals want to access their PC remotely but what if your entire organisation needs remote access? You can leave a PC switched on for every user but this costs a great deal in electricity and many organisations may have more staff than computers.

A terminal server is a server which presents a standard computer desktop to anyone who is authorised to connect to it. It can be configured with all your usual business tools such as Office, Sage and business databases and users can connect from anywhere in the world via a standard internet connection.

The benefits of a terminal server are huge. They allow everyone in an organisation to access a standard set of tools from any remote location,  they provide very fast remote access and they reduce the total cost of ownership as you're only using a single machine to provide a remote desktop to any number of employees.

Getting A Terminal Server

A terminal server can run as a stand alone server (if you don't currently have a server) or can integrate seamlessly with your current infrastructure (for those with servers in place already).

Whilst not a 'DIY' project, installing a terminal server can take as little as half a day to install and configure by a qualified engineer (depending on the exact requirements) so it needn't be a huge expense.

For more info please e-mail us

VoIP is a mixed bag when it comes to business telephony. At Geek-Guru we don't believe VoIP is mature enough to replace your entire phone system but where it is amazing is for home or remote workers.

VoIP technology allows you to take your business phone with you wherever you go. With a VoIP phone you can pick your phone up when you leave the office, plug it in to ANY net connection and receive calls as if you were sat at your desk. Your number will stay the same, you can re-direct calls back to an office extension and no one will even know that you're working remotely.

VoIP creates a full house for remote workers as they can now take their data, e-mail and calls with them wherever they go.

Getting VoIP

Although phone systems are available that provide VoIP out of the box, most businesses will not want to replace their entire phone system for one or two VoIP handsets.

For these cases Geek-Guru provide a very simple, affordable system that bolts on to your current phone system.

For more info please e-mail us

Video conferencing (VC) covers a vast array of technologies from expensive total immersion conferencing suites through to basic laptop webcams. For the average home worker a webcam, coupled with the right software can open up a world of opportunities.

One of the problems with flexible working is maintaining lines of communication with a distributed workforce. A well set up video conferencing system will allow your staff to talk face to face, will facilitate collaboratively working and will allow teams to share work and ideas in real time from anywhere in the world.

Modern VC systems provide the ability to share PC desktops between users, so work can be completed in collaboration, provide shared whiteboards, for users to brainstorm just like a real whiteboard, and provide a meeting place to discuss and thrash out ideas. VC is therefore the meeting room of the 21st century.

Getting A Video Conferencing System

Depending on your exact needs setting up a VC system does not need to be expensive.

Geek-Guru offer a simple, hosted VC system meaning you don't need to buy a thing to get going. As the system is hosted all the hard work is done on our servers and you simply pay a small monthly fee to use the service.

For more info please e-mail us