What with snow ice cream to make, hills to sled down and a day off from the office, it’s hard not to love a good snow day.
This winter, however, has had more than its share of snow days. By early February, whole swaths of the U.S. have already been snowed under several times, and The Weather Channel is quickly running out of names for future 2014 snowstorms. These are no small storms, either: snowfall totals are regularly reaching into the double digits this winter. That spells trouble for thousands of businesses as employees are either incapable of getting to the office or unable to work from home.
There are a few companies, however, that remain largely unaffected by these snow days—these are the companies that choose to move their business operations to the cloud.
No More Snow Days
Cloud computing has enabled countless businesses to provide their employees with remote access to the office. For cloud savvy companies, remote access means much more than email and availability by phone. With Microsoft Dynamics ERP and/or CRM in the cloud, employees can access the applications they use to get their work done—accounting staff can run the numbers from their couches, marketing can track a lead from their kitchen tables, and HR can process paperwork in between sledding runs. As long as your employees have internet access and a computer at home, you can ensure that 15 inches of snow won’t stand in the way of their productivity.
Fret Not Over Power Outages
Heavy snows and thick ice can trigger nasty power outages. Just as hurricanes can wreak havoc on business operations, a big ice storm can shut down a business even if employees can make the trek to work. If your business applications, like your Microsoft Dynamics, are hosted in the cloud, you can rely on your cloud service provider to have provisions in place that will prevent major outages caused by ice, snow or hurricanes. Many cloud service providers leverage redundant sites (essentially, data centers in multiple locations) so that an outage affecting one site will not impact the customers served from that data center’s cloud environment. The end result? Your operations are operational, even if your physical office isn’t.
Some Considerations
Not all cloud services are created equal, so if a season’s worth of snowed-in employees has you thinking about the productivity benefits of the cloud, be sure to shop with service and availability in mind. Be sure that your cloud service provider offers 24x7x365 support (even in snowstorms), just in case your employees need to call for service or ask questions about connecting while they are working from home—this may be especially necessary the first time they connect from a remote access point. Remember, too, to ask about availability. If your cloud service provider can’t promise a minimum of 99.99% uptime, you could be taking a gamble as to whether or not your cloud-based applications will be available during a storm.
Want to learn more about cloud-based Microsoft Dynamics? Contact us to ask questions, or set up a free 30 day trial.