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Category Archives: Tech Trends

IT Outsourcing - How Can It Boost Your Productivity and Revenue
Posted on Author Roxanne Demakis Categories Tech – Business, Tech Trends

IT Outsourcing – How Can It Boost Your Productivity and Revenue

Pros and Cons of IT Outsourcing

In the world of business today, people around the globe attempt to improve and grow their businesses by many productive means.  Today we’ll be talking about one of those productive ways known as IT Outsourcing. IT Outsourcing is a very efficient and productive way in which a business will hire external service providers to manage IT-enabled business processes, provide service, and prepare solutions for infrastructure. In this article, you will learn more about Outsourced IT programs, outsourcing contracts, the benefits and the risks of Outsourcing that need resolution. 

IT Outsourcing - How Can It Boost Your Productivity

Time and Cost 

Outsourced IT programs are used to increase the productivity of businesses at a lower cost so if that cost were to exceed the set budget, it would be a total loss. In this article, we’re going to answer the most commonly asked question, “How do I increase the time without increasing the cost?”  

Here are a few tips: 

  1. Use modern, intelligent, and integrated tools.  This will help improve productivity in a small time frame compared to primitive tools. 
  2. There should be a remote infrastructure.  
  3. Increase efficiency and not just the number of employees. 

Strategies and Productivity 

IT Outsourcing - How Can It Boost Your Revenue

Let’s discuss strategic management and productivity from an Outsourced IT company. In simple terms, strategic management and productivity include strategic moves for the growth of a business that result in a productive outcome. The strategy is a plan that includes the analysis and assessment of the functions that are to be performed by the IT Company. The main goal of the strategy should be having modern and necessary tools and a team of qualified people who know what they are working towards. By improving service productivity you can help your business grow. Here are a few ways of doing that: 

  1.  Staff improvement; Set a “reward system” for your top employees. 
  2.  New services improvement.
  3. Educate equipment suppliers with “design reliability”. 
  4. Customer Interaction 
  5. Implement a formal planning and scheduling process that supports improvement. 

Process Improvement 

Some process improvement strategies include: 

  1.  Faster response time 
  2. Improvement of resource productivity  
  3. Cost reduction 

Improvement 

If a company invests in production improvement it will boost labor productivity by 50%. There are many examples of company improvements that can help with work efficiency. Some are listed below: 

  1. Provide regular feedback 
  2. Practice flexibility 
  3. Cultivate strong co-worker relationships 
  4. Provide clarification of purpose and strategy 

A business improvement plan is very helpful to have successful growth. Your business improvement plan should include: 

  1. Knowing your business’s needs 
  2. Implementing a new way and retiring the old way 
  3. Having a way of analyzing results 
  4. Understanding the process involved 

Back Office  

Back office outsourcing is a process in which the companies’ back-office tasks are operated by third-party providers. The most common small business back office outsourcing tasks are data entry, and accounting, etc. Small business back-office outsourcing can be very efficient and time-saving and most importantly money saving.  

Cost 

It’s important to know the when, how, where, what, and whom before outsourcing but the most important question is “how much”. It’s very important to know the costs of outsourcing support to have a successful outsourcing contract. Outsourcing contracts are legal documents of the agreement made between the service provider and the business company.  

Management 

Outsourced vendor management is a process that ensures that vendor management is done by third party experts to avoid making ill-informed decisions through flawed information.  

Benefits

The benefits of IT outsourcing are numerous and help businesses in many ways. Some of the benefits of IT outsourcing are: 

  1. Saving infrastructure and money 
  2. Faster and better services 
  3. Cost savings 
  4. Time zone advantage 

Pros and Cons 

IT Outsourcing - pros and cons

Considering the pros and cons is of the utmost importance before creating a successful contract.  

Pros:

  1. Reduced-labor projects 
  2. Time zone factors 
  3. Flexibility to manage projects 

Cons:

  1. Interruption with project communication 
  2. Slow response times  
  3. Language barriers 

Problems

Implementation problems with IT outsourcing can be harmful to the business. The primary problem with IT outsourcing is the lack of understanding of post-contract processes and decision rights. 

Risks 

Other risks of outsourcing are: 

  1. Inexperienced staff
  2. The loss of innovative capacity
  3. Epidemic Uncertainty
  4. Business Uncertainty

These risks can safely be eliminated by selecting the right IT company to outsource to.  Here at Demakis Technologies, we take pride in our staff which have been handpicked to ensure nothing less than professional expertise, creativity, and impeccable communication skills and response times. 

Conclusion

Today we learned about outsourcing that occurs between companies. We defined the terms Outsourcing contract and outsourced IT.  We also discussed the pros and cons of outsourcing and the benefits of IT outsourcing.   The strategies, cost management, and productivity of companies were also covered.  If you’d like to learn more about outsourcing your IT, contact us here at Demakis Technologies! 

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Why Leaders Need To Focus On Operational Excellence
Posted on Author Roxanne Demakis Categories Tech – Business, Tech Trends

Why Leaders Need to Focus on Operational Excellence

How to Achieve Operational Excellence

Operational excellence is when one business uses business strategies more effectively than their competitors. Excellence is based on results that show their brand is superior. Today, we’re going to learn about it, how to drive operational excellence, its planning, and more.

Operational Excellence

Leaders Need To Focus On Operational Excellence

You need to work towards operational excellence in order to make your business successful.

The principles that drive operational excellence are:

Respect For Every Individual

Every individual working in a business must be respected equally. It is crucial to respect every member because it will raise morale and bring out the best in them.

Inspire

Good leaders inspire, rather than demand.  Being a good leader means serving as part of the team, helping them execute tasks by facilitating the process.  Establishing a warm and welcoming work environment will be much more productive for your business than micromanaging and trying to constantly be in control.

Seek Perfection

Only in the pursuit of perfection, you can achieve improvement. Conformity only results in mediocrity.  If you strive for perfection, your products will also be at a higher standard, hence promoting your business.

Embrace Scientific Thinking

Scientific thinking will lead to new experiments and discoveries that may be beneficial for the business. You can come up with new strategies and work ethics that may be beneficial to your business.
 

Focus on the Process

Focusing on processes will help you identify errors so you can improve them. Finding errors and eliminating them is the key to success. It will help you run your business flawlessly. 

Following these principles will drive you towards excellence.

How to display excellence?

Leaders Operational Excellence

Displaying excellence is an overall reflection of how you work.  A few tips to display excellence are:

  1. Have a hunger for excellence
  2. Benchmark against the best
  3. Believe that you can do it
  4. Build a strategy and a plan
  5. Learn from the best
  6. Do not limit yourself
  7. Work hard to achieve excellence
  8. Focus
  9. Be adaptable to changes
  10. Never give up!

Excellence in The Workplace

When the workplace conditions have exceeded the normal standards of expectations it has achieved excellence in the workplace. It is the dream of every business to achieve excellence in the workplace. Excellence in your workplace will directly mean excellence in your products which will benefit your business. Though not easy, it is achievable by following the principles of operational excellence.

Pillars of Operational Excellence

There are certain foundations that need to be laid in order to achieve excellence. These are referred to as the pillars of operational excellence, and they are:

1. Organizational Alignment

  • vision
  • mission
  • organizational structure
  • roles and responsibilities
  • engagement

2. Asset Reliability

  • design for reliability
  • life cycle management
  • RAM modeling
  • parts management
  •  reinvestment

3. Regulations

  • safety
  •  PSM
  •  management of change
  •  environment
  •  validation

4. Manufacturing

  • lean manufacturing
  • product quality
  • yield rate
  • fixed/variable cost
  • operating procedures

5. Energy

  • energy efficiency
  • utility efficiency
  • process optimization
  •  water and waste minimization

Source {North American Association for Environmental Education ( NAAEE )}

Operational Excellence Goals

Focus On Operational Excellence

While striving for operational excellence there are certain parts of your business that are critical to maintain so you have a clearer vision of what you want to create.

Those parts are:

  1. Financial
  2. Operational
  3. Cultural/Workforce

Conclusion

Striving for excellence will drive you towards success in your business. If you don’t work towards excellence it will hinder your ability to work through opposition when it comes. If you follow the tips mentioned on operational excellence, and what drives operational excellence, you’re on the right track to reach it!

If you’re interested to learn more about how Demakis Technologies can help streamline your business’s IT, contact us! 
 

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New Modern Workplace Trends And Its Benefits
Posted on Author Roxanne Demakis Categories Tech – Business, Tech Trends

New Modern Workplace Trends and Its Benefits

How the modern workplace increases productivity

A modern workplace is the new digital workspace for the employees of a company. It is designed in such a way that it meets all the demands of the people working.  We’re going to be discussing modern workplaces, modern workplace specialists, and answer a few questions about the modern workplace. 

Modern Workplace Specialists 

New Modern Workplace Trends

Nowadays many modern workplace specialists are designing efficient places of work. The job of these modern workplace specialists is to design a space that encourages productivity and helps with concentration. They help create a place that is fun to work in and promotes good mental health. 

Modern Work  

Work these days has changed and continues to do so. The days of going into your office building and working only in front of your computer are gone. In this new era, there is modern work in modern style. Everything has been digitized and the workplace trends have changed. There are also certain characteristics of modern work; some are: 

  1. Fairness  
  2. Motivation and challenge 
  3. A common goal 
  4. Flexibility
  5. Room for growth 
  6. Supporting social initiatives 

Workforce Trends 
 

New Modern Workplace Trends and Benefits

Here are a few modern workforce trends that are booming now: 

  1. Technology favoring economy
  2. Collaboration
  3. Attracting millennials to fill the skill gap 
  4. Diversity
  5. Automation 
  6. Alumni labor
  7.  Independent working strategies 

Modern Working Environment 

In an era where work is evolving constantly, the workspace must also adapt to the changes. A modern workspace is designed in such a way that employees can adapt to the changes readily, can have more flexibility, and can arrange themselves according to work whenever necessary, both collaboratively and individually. A modern workplace is hence made to increase productivity. 

Modern Workplace Trends

  
Build Workspace 

While you build your modern workspace there are certain things to be kept in mind. 
 

 1. Understand what is required

It is essential to know the types of equipment you will be needing in your workspace. Once you’ve checked it, you can go to the next step. 

2. Investment

Investment may vary according to the size of your workspace. It is crucial to building the workspace keeping your budget in mind. 
   

3. Space Utilization

Make sure there is enough space for your employees to work freely and also enough space for them to take a break and relax for a coffee break. 

4. Sustainability 

 The workplace should be greener than earlier. It should be able to provide a sustainable environment to promote proper health. 
  

Contemporary Office Practices 

To ensure that you are managing your office properly there are few practices you can follow. 

  1. Using the cloud services 
  2. Automating office tasks 
  3. Accommodating a mobile workforce 
  4. Office management software 
  5. Computer-aided facility management 
  6. Activity-based working 
  7. Bring your device 

How To Be Modern In Business 
 

To modernize your business you need to follow the latest workforce trends, you need to implement modern work, follow contemporary office practices, build a modern workspace, and a modern workspace environment for your employees. Maximizing your workspace will boom your business to a great extent. 

Conclusion 

To cope up with big businesses you need to modernize your workspace, implement modern work, follow modern practices, and build a workspace that is pleasant to your employees. This will help you create a sustainable environment and a pleasant place to work and hence increase the productivity of your business. 

If you’re interested to learn more about how Demakis Technologies can help streamline your business’s IT, contact us! 
 

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What Is Machine Learning
Posted on Author Roxanne Demakis Categories Tech Trends

What Is Machine Learning

Getting Started With Machine Learning

What is Machine Learning? 

Gartner defines it as follows: “Advanced machine learning algorithms are composed of many technologies (such as deep learning, neural networks and natural language processing), used in unsupervised and supervised learning, that operate guided by lessons from existing information.” 

If you haven’t read my last post on artificial intelligence (AI), I recommend you read it here.  It will supplement this piece on machine learning core concepts nicely. 

In simpler terms, it is a method that gives a device or computer the capability to “learn” by mimicking human learning.  It gathers and learns patterns from massive amounts of data and uses it to make suggestions.  It is a subset of AI.   

Examples of ML

It is involved in a lot of the technology we use daily.  Some examples are Hulu, Netflix, Google, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Siri. 

The data it needs to collect so it can learn to make predictions are things like your search history, your watch history, your likes, links you click on, and so on.  It basically “learns you” and over time and consistency, it’s able to suggest things you will like. 

Types of Machine Learning 

There are 3 main types in the process flow and they are supervised, unsupervised, and reinforcement learning.  

  1. Supervised learning provides the machine with a labeled dataset that tells it what patterns to look for.   
  2. Unsupervised learning does not provide any labels.  It allows the machine to run through unlabeled datasets until it finds patterns on its own. 
  3. Reinforcement learning functions by trial and error.  It needs to be guided to help it reach its objective by means of a reward or penalty system.  This approach is used when creating a game.   

Machine Learning for Businesses 

Among the many uses in businesses there are automation, logistics, fraud detection, increased sales, and improved customer experience. 

Automation for digital and financial tasks can be extremely useful for a business in increasing its efficiency, saving time, money, and eliminating human error. 

Find out more about our ML solutions and how they can help your business become more automated by contacting us. 

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How To Ensure Safety While Working Remotely
Posted on Author Roxanne Demakis Categories Security, Tech Trends

How To Ensure Safety While Working Remotely

Tips On Working Remotely From Home

During this time of the pandemic, most people worldwide are working from home to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Employees don’t need to travel to their office premises anymore; instead they work from home. Today we’re going to discuss working from home, remote working tips, and working remotely. 

Remote Working Tips 

As most of us are working from home now, there are few remote working practices that will make your work much more efficient and safe. Here are a few tips on how to work remotely: 

Invest In Reliable Tech 

Apart from having a good internet connection, you should also have good tech in your hands. For example good noise cancellation headphones for a hassle-free work environment or a wireless mouse and keyboard. 

Designate a Workspace 

Set up a specific area in your home for your work. This way allow you to focus better. This could be any part of your home where you will not be disturbed during your work hours. 

Maintain a Consistent Routine 

Set up a work schedule for yourself. Wake up and go to sleep at specific times every day. This will keep your time table organized and will make time management easier. 

Over Communicate 

Since you’re not working from your office anymore, you need to communicate with your co-workers and managers regularly using various tools to get information about work and to know what is expected from you. 

Take Breaks 

In your office, you may have routinely dropped by your co-worker’s desk for a quick chat or a coffee break. While working remotely there’s no reason why you should stop doing the same. Take a break at times to keep your mind refreshed and remain productive. 

Challenges in Maintaining Cybersecurity 

While working from home you need to keep your security on check since you’re no longer connected to a secure network.  Here are a few challenges to tackle to maintain your cybersecurity: 

Unsafe WiFi networks 

Working from home, we use our home wireless network or any other WiFi. These are not secure or well protected. Attackers can easily bypass security and acquire your sensitive information. This is especially a major issue for IT workers’ network security. 

Information technology security 

Some home workers use their personal devices for work. All their work-related and personal information are present in such devices. A hacker can now gain access to both their work-related and personal information. 

Apps used for video conferencing 

The apps we use may not be secure either. Lately, there have been increasing security concerns with the use of “Zoom”, a video conferencing app. 

Control Measures While Working from Home 

A few measures to ensure order among employees during the work–from–home phase and increase productivity are as follows:  

Balance Flexibility And Structure 

Determine when and the number of hours your employees need to work. 

Avoid Micromanaging 

Trust your team and avoid excessive instruction every moment of the day.  Instead, seek to inspire your team and hold meetings at a reasonable frequency when needed.  

Set Clear Expectations 

Provide your employees with adequate instruction and information on the tasks assigned to them and what the final deliverables should be.   

Invest In Up-To-Date Technology 

Use the latest technologies to manage your employees and work. 

Work from Home in Cybersecurity 

There are multiple opportunities to work from home in the cybersecurity field.  A few of those opportunities exist in: 

  1. Demakis Technologies 
  2. Cybersecurity research 
  3. Security consultancy 
  4. Audits 
  5. Penetration testing 
  6. IAM analysis 
  7. Security architecture etc 

As cybercrime is increasing every day, there is also an increase in the demand for professionals who can protect companys’ digital space. There are abundant opportunities for working from home in cybersecurity. 

Conclusion: 

While working from home, it is crucial to keep your security on check to avoid undesirable situations. Follow the above remote working tips, practices, and consider the challenges in cybersecurity to enjoy a secure workspace! 

If you’d like to learn more about securing your home workspace and security, contact us here at Demakis Technologies.

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