The new year is quickly approaching and there is no better time than now to plan for future business growth and development. Most businesses start the year off with the intention of improving operations. Since business operations rely so much on technology, it only makes sense to examine your IT environment carefully and that’s where a year-end tech review comes into play. A comprehensive IT analysis will help kickstart the new year with confidence.

Know Where You Stand

Great companies will take what they learned and use it to be better … moving forward. How do you make the jump from good to great? First, assess your current technology and take stock of how you’re conducting business using technology:

• What’s working and what’s not?
• What new technologies were implemented?
• What technologies are no longer being used?
• What has been the biggest frustration throughout the year?

From there, assess where there is room to grow:

• Did any processes become more efficient when done remotely?
• If you stopped using a technology, can you save money by continuing to live without it?
• What sort of solution would solve your biggest frustration?

Factors to Consider in a Tech Review

The goal is to take time to focus on improvements that can be made to boost your bottom line. As well as what tactics to take to reduce the risk of a costly cyberattack. Security, efficiency, automation and bottom-line considerations will be the key drivers for future initiatives. Some important examples include:

Technology Policies

Review all your company policies to see if any require updating to reflect new working conditions. When you update policies, inform your employees so they can be refreshed on important information they may have forgotten since their onboarding. Ensure you have an updated:

• Password Security policy
• Acceptable Use policy
• Application use policy
• Data Management Policy
• Wi-Fi Use policy
• Social Media Use policy

IT Pain Points

Survey your staff members on how they currently use technology. Ask them about their favorite and least favorite apps and their struggles. Let your employees tell you how they believe technology could improve to make their jobs better. Involving employees in the decision-making process not only increases productivity and morale, but also shows them that their opinions are valued.

Customer-Centric Technology

Remember to look at the customer experience portion of your technology infrastructure. go through your website as if you were a customer and consider how easy it is to navigate and get in touch. If you become frustrated with things such as load time, mobile experience, etc., your customers and leads probably do too. Include optimizations for customer-facing technology in your new year plans.

Modernization and Transformation Plans

To ensure a secure and successful upgrade, it is important to create a strategic plan that outlines the necessary steps to take. A vulnerability assessment provides insight into potential areas of risk impacting your company’s security, allowing you to address these issues before they become bigger problems. Additionally, by planning ahead for upgrades and budgeting accordingly, you will be able to avoid incurring unanticipated costs down the road.

Disaster Recovery Planning

When was the last time your business practiced an incident response simulation? Do you have a plan that staff can follow in the event of a disaster or cyberattack? Take the time to go over disaster recovery and business continuity planning for the new year. You’ll also need to set up some dates for preparedness drills and training in the upcoming months.

Cloud Usage

Assess the use of your cloud applications. How do you use this software? Are some apps barely used? Does your cloud environment have redundancies? It’s a good idea to have a set of applications that are approved for use. This list also needs to be maintained to ensure that employees at the company don’t deviate from this list.

Create a Lasting Impact

When properly executed and reviewed annually, technology can be your greatest tool to enhance company performance and competitiveness. A year-end tech review is an effective way to close out 2023 stronger and kickstart the new year with confidence. If your business needs assistance with an overall assessment, we can help create a plan for the future with a comprehensive analysis of your IT environment. Contact PointSolve today and let’s face the challenges of the coming year together.