As the business world prepares to reopen, there are many new things owners need to consider in order to do so. Unlocking the doors and turning on the lights isn’t going to fly in the face of a 2 month+ shutdown and COVID-19 regulations now imposed on every business.

When it comes to moving your technology back from a remote work environment, to the office setting, it is important to consider the time it will take to reintegrate your team back to their new normal environment.

Many companies may continue to have employees working remotely and both business models need to be prepared to provide as much business continuity as possible.

Here are our Top 9 Activities to Prep Your Tech for Reopening:

(1). Your tech team should be the first person on-site before other employees return to the office. Give them time to check on systems that were left in the office and make a list of issues that need to be addressed. In fact, we should recommend that any PC that has been left off for extended time should be turned on at least one or two days before returning to work so that the machine has time to perform lots of updates.

(2). If you have outsourced your IT to a third party, be in constant communication with them to help you get up and running. While you may need someone to physically turn servers and devices on, your IT Partner can remote in to do much of the updates and virus scanning you need.

(3). Clean and dust. Make sure to take the time to clean computers of dust and debris on a regular basis. Additionally, dust that collects in the air vents of the PC could cause overheating, so be sure to move CPUs and clean the back of them.

(4). Inspect power supply and devices. Most offices more than likely use surge protectors or similar devices to power their computer. It’s crucial to make sure these devices are in safe working order.

(5). Probably the most important is updates. Turn machines on, make sure everything boots up then start running any necessary updates. Shut down or restart the computer at least weekly and whenever the program tells the User to in order to install updates. This helps to make sure software and security updates are properly installed.

(6). Run antivirus. It is possible that computers may have vulnerabilities that clients haven’t noticed if they don’t have security or an IT person that may have been monitoring this over the past few months. It’s important to run a antivirus scan weekly to make sure any changes made or files downloaded have not compromised their system.

(7). Don’t respond to email, instant messages, texts, phone calls, etc., asking for passwords. Only click on links from trusted sources. This includes any link where they can’t tell where it will take them. Don’t open unsolicited or unexpected attachments. If they can’t verify an attachment is legitimate, delete it.

(8). Folks coming back to work are going to forget all their passwords. Now is a great time to develop a new password security policy and add password security software to your systems.

(9). Check the batteries!!! It may seem silly but keyboards, mice or other peripherals lying around untouched for weeks may need new batteries!

Your IT protocols may need to change moving forward.  For businesses who will have remote workers, work with your IT team and partners to design the best remote working solution for your staff.  Your solutions need to provide workers the right tech to stay productive, but also security and compliance.

If you find that your IT provider has closed, or isn’t open for business when you are, or perhaps your IT employees aren’t returning to work just yet, don’t hesitate to reach out to the EMCO team for a free consultation.