Many business owners are looking forward to reopening after a long shutdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. Around Houston, Texas, and the rest of the country, things are slowly opening back up bit by bit.
But if you just walk into your building after six to eight+ weeks, turn on all your technology and think you’re ready to hit the ground running, you could end up running in to some big problems.
Over those weeks of shutdown, equipment has been dormant. If tech has been completely turned off, then updates and patches normally applied though managed services will not have been.
You may also find a layer of dust covering your IT infrastructure and find that you have workstations or customer-facing tech too close together to meet social distancing guidelines.
Ensuring six feet of distance for customers and employees is among the requirements for businesses to reopen.
We’ve put together a checklist of technology-related concerns you should address to ensure your reopening goes smoothly and without any tech problems.
It can feel like walking into a museum when you first open the doors after your office or building has been shuttered for two months. As you begin to breathe life back into the environment, these IT tips will help ensure an effective reopening for your IT infrastructure.
Dust built up in fans and areas of your technology that expel heat can cause equipment to overheat once put back into operation, which can in turn cause a hard drive crash.
You’ll want to use compressed air and a microfiber cleaning cloth to clean any built up dust off all of your equipment.
Even if equipment has been sitting so long that the virus would’ve been long gone, it’s still a good idea to sanitize your electronics anyhow.
This will instill trust in both your employees and customers, something that’s vital to a healthy reopening.
You’ll want to sanitize all computers, keyboards/mice, phones, printer/scanners, customer-facing tech, etc.
Tips for safe disinfecting of your electronics:
If your computers and other internet-connected devices have been shut off during the shutdown, before you begin using them, they need to have any waiting updates and security patches applied.
This includes operating system updates, application updates, and firmware updates for devices.
When your technology has been turned off for weeks, you want to make sure there are no hardware or software issues that need to be addressed.
It’s a good idea to have a professional, like Digital Crisis, service your equipment to ensure there are no hidden problems that might cause systems to go down shortly after you reopen.
For this item, you also want to have a pro helping you, otherwise you could end up with a serious mess of disconnected systems on your hands.
Per social distancing guidelines, companies need to have employees and any customer-facing technology, seating, etc. at least 6 feet apart. This may mean a major reworking of your office technology layout.
This isn’t something you want to do without having a plan. You’ll want to ensure that all your wired and wireless connections are still fully intact and that no weak Wi-Fi signal zones have been created by moving things around.
While many companies have already planned on regularly disinfecting touchable surfaces like doors, chairs, and desks, they may not have thought about their technology.
It’s also important to develop a regular schedule for disinfecting your electronics, including any customer-facing tech (like POS devices), keyboards, copiers, etc. to continue to keep your workplace safe and prevent potential spread of the virus.
Most businesses didn’t have much time to transition to a remote workforce, but they’ve been working with one now for several weeks. Now that reopening is on the horizon, some companies will find that keeping some workers remote part or full-time is an advantage.
Now is the time to evaluate your cloud services to see if they are still serving your needs well. Are they allowing you to smoothly coordinate on-site and remote employees, secure data, and integrate your business processes?
Streamlining your use of the cloud not only can make your team more efficient, it can also provide some much-welcomed cost savings.
Get the help you need to reopen smoothly by working with Digital Crisis. Our experts can help you ensure your computers and other devices are ready to support your business needs.
Contact us today to schedule a consultation. Call 713-965-7200 or reach us online.
