All about the Cloud | Security, Productivity, and Benefits

As things are changing at a fast pace, companies are looking for ways to help make their working lives more effective and efficient. Within the last year the shift to a more remote work environment has put an even larger spotlight on the Cloud and many of the top questions remain the same about security, productivity, and the benefits. In this blog post, we will go over the Cloud’s security, productivity, and benefits.

Security

According to a 2020 financial trends survey conducted by Protiviti, 80% of CEOs and finance VPs responded that one of their top priorities is security and privacy of data. Security is foundational for any cloud offering and Azure takes advantage of multi-layered security provided by Microsoft across physical data centers, infrastructure, and operations in Azure. Microsoft commits over 1 billion US dollars in the security of Azure, and they put time into researching and developing the best strategies for your data.

Privacy

In Azure, your data is private to you, controlled by you, has legal protection, and follows GDPR principles. Microsoft uses and enables the use of industry-standard encryption protocols, such as Transport Layer Security (TLS) and Internet Protocol Security (IPsec). Your data is secured by two or more encryption layers to protect against compromises of any layer.

Compliance

Microsoft has over 90 compliance certifications for Azure, including over 50 specific to global regions and countries. Often clients are concerned about where their data is stored, but clients can pick their data center as there are options in the United States and in Canada.

If you transition to the Cloud, you will be guaranteed a secure network infrastructure, full protection from ransomware, and an option to abide by multi-factor authentication (MFA). MFA is a process where a user is prompted during the sign-in process for an additional form of identification. MFA gives your data that extra layer of security, where Microsoft ensures that the person who is logging in, is the correct person.

Productivity

Does moving to the cloud have any positive effect on my business’s productivity? The answer is yes!

Productivity gains:

• Familiar and easy to use
• Collaboration
• Mobility
• Eliminate duplication
• Zero downtime

Over the past year, many of us have transitioned to working from home and have adapted to a new ‘normal’. We have learned to collaborate over Teams to get our project work done effectively. We have met up on Yammer to keep the social culture alive, whether we are wishing each other a happy birthday, or congratulating our team on good customer reviews. We have collaborated with our team and clients using Outlook to ensure our timelines are in place. Moving to the Cloud powers the remote work that we are experiencing.

Cloud enabled applications can be used on any device, anywhere, anytime. Cloud-based storage eliminates the need for duplicate files since employees can securely store files in the Cloud and share or access them anytime. There will be less overhead from managing the mundane IT tasks that are related to your own IT servers. Those tasks will no longer exist and the focus can shift to the more pressing matters of your business. No matter what happens, your business will be operational.

Benefits

Benefits of the Cloud include:

• Security
• Privacy and control
• Compliance
• Scalability
• 24/7 access
• Zero downtime
• Reduced workload on resources to prepare, maintain, support, and replace infrastructure

Moving to the Cloud means you’ll never have to:

• Buy infrastructure
• Do an upgrade
• Apply a service pack

There are many benefits of moving your data to the Cloud. As mentioned above, you will not have to manage your own IT servers anymore. Yahoo! Microsoft will do to for you, with a 99.9% uptime guarantee. Your data will be secure, private, and controlled by your team. It is scalable and will help your business grow in many ways, where rich talent can work remotely from anywhere in the world. You will have 24/7 access to your data, with no downtime, and you will never have to buy infrastructure again. Moving to the Cloud will empower and inspire your employees to be creative with collaboration. Overall, it will reduce your costs on overhead and IT.

To see a presentation about the security, productivity, and benefits of the Cloud, watch the video below:

At Encore, we’ve been helping clients adopt cloud technologies for years and continue to encourage clients to move to the Cloud, whether that is through business productivity tools such as Microsoft 365 or their ERP and CRM solutions. The future forecast is looking bright and sunny, and we want to help you get there to ensure you are ready to take on any challenge. If you would like to learn more about moving to the Cloud, please contact us or reach out to your Account Manager at Encore.