Archive for December, 2011

Working over the Holidays?

Sunday, December 18th, 2011

Are you working over the Holidays this year?

Rest assured that we are. Your Voodoo Networks managed computers will be ready to go when you are done celebrating with your family and friends.

Our staff and systems are already working to make sure that your computer and IT systems are updated, protected and ready to work over the Holidays, or more importantly when you get back to work after the Holidays. But we want to make sure that you know that if you are working then you aren’t alone. As IT people, we are truly used to working when others are off sleeping or celebrating. And we’re OK with that. It’s what we signed up for.

And if you or your staff need to be working, we’ll be right there to support you.

But we hope that you can take some time and enjoy the Holidays. And don’t worry about us – we’ll enjoy them too.

IT Outsourcing isn’t a four letter word

Friday, December 16th, 2011

All of us here at Voodoo Networks come from technical backgrounds, and all of us have either been directly affected, or know someone who was directly affected by the IT outsourcing craze of the 90′s and early 2000′s. Even today there is a lingering bad taste in our mouths when ever “outsourcing” is mentioned.

But now we are doing just that. What gives?

We aren’t looking to outsource existing jobs overseas to provide a couple of cents increase in the stock market value of a company. That’s the big one. And what we are doing is making sure that any work that is moved outside of your company makes complete sense, both to you and to us.

We also aren’t outsourcing our IT work overseas. Our staff is here in the US, and is paid a better than living wage, contributing to the local economy in ways that sending work overseas can’t.

Our goal is to provide you with topnotch IT services and support, using highly qualified and experienced people in your own timezone, working as partners with your company to provide you with exactly the services you need to grow your company and improve your bottom line.

See? Even people affected by IT outsourcing can learn that it has more than four letters…

IT person? Or IT Staff?

Thursday, December 15th, 2011

IT has become extremely specialized, far more so than most people recognize. We see that everyday in working with our clients. There is an almost universal feeling among the people that we support that anything related to technology is within every IT persons skill set. (There are some truly funny IT stories about that – fodder for a future posting.)

Now, while some of us have truly diverse backgrounds, both in and out of IT, not every IT person is going to be able to solve every issue, nor should they try to. For example, a programmer (very much an IT person) isn’t the person that you are going to call on to design a network. And a network guy isn’t the person you want doing desktop support. And most desktop support staff aren’t really going to be ready to design and build a server system for you. And don’t get me started on printers…

Before anyone objects too strenuously, I should say that there are people out there that can do all of that, but they are few and far between. And most likely they aren’t working for you doing full time computer support. Learning about all the different areas of IT is a full time job itself. And anyone trying to keep up with every advance in every field in IT would quickly run out of hours in a day.

Large companies know this. That’s why they have IT departments. In really large companies those departments are further subdivided: Servers, Networking, Telecom, Application Support, Application Development and Desktop Support (or operations). Those teams of people work together, sometimes shifting between areas, but they all have jobs that are fairly specialized. And they spend all their time learning about new systems and features, testing them and seeing what works and doesn’t before implementing or putting anything into production.

But in smaller companies, there isn’t the luxury of having an IT team with specialists in every field. You generally end up with the IT guy. If you are lucky. If not you have the office computer person (not an IT person, but someone who is more comfortable with computers than the rest of the office) attempting to do the work of an IT person. Sometimes with less than satisfactory results. You aren’t getting the knowledge base that a full team of IT specialists can provide you even with a dedicated IT person. And if you don’t have a dedicated IT staff, then you are taking other people away from their jobs to deal with technical issues, which is hurting your bottom line.

On the other hand, you can have the luxury of a full IT support staff. How?

With Voodoo Networks Full IT Support Services.

What we are doing is providing you with a level of IT expertise that you can’t get with a single in house person by using the benefits of scale and automation. And doing so at a far lower cost than you’d pay for a team that encompasses all of the expertise that we can bring to the table. We have decades of experience in all facets of IT. From networks to servers to support, we’ve got the experience on staff. And working on your IT issues.

While you might only get to know one or two people from Voodoo Networks, rest assured that everyone is contributing. From server specialists to networking specialists to IT strategy folks, we bring our entire team to bear for every client. Regardless of whether you meet them or not (they tend to be happiest in little dark rooms lit up by a dozen monitors…) they are there to support you with all your IT needs.

And all for a price that is often lower than having one IT person on staff, and is almost lower every time after you include your overhead costs.

Preemptive IT

Wednesday, December 14th, 2011

Using an outsourced IT provider like Voodoo Networks introduces many companies to a concept in Information Technology that they are very unfamiliar with, at least from an IT point of view: Preemptive IT.

What is Preemptive IT?

Quite simply, it’s making sure that any potential issues are resolved before them become problems that impact your ability to use your computers or other technology systems to conduct your business.

The best analogy that I can think of is maintaining your car in order to make sure that it works when you need it to. You don’t wait until your engine blows up to change the oil, but many people think that is the best way to deal with their computers, only using IT support after the computer has a problem.

Using a company like Voodoo Networks for Full Service IT support can insure that your systems are always up and running when your staff needs to use them. We use our decades of Enterprise level IT experience to create best practices for IT that we use as the basis for all of our clients. Some of the things that are included in that are operating system updates, application updates, antivirus updates, malware sweeps, cleaning up temporary files and monitoring for issues like drive space or potential hardware failures.

We use specialized tools to make sure that all of those things occur on the best schedules for you and your systems, and to reduce any chance of difficulty due to the actual update process itself. We work with you to create a maintenance window for you computers and do any updates that may require system reboots or interfere with your staff within that time window only.

Preemptive IT is the goal of every experience IT tech. We all know that preventing issues is better than fixing issues. Even with an on staff IT person, using Voodoo Networks to provide preemptive IT will free up that staff person to work on projects that can actually help your business grow, rather than just spend all day working on fixing computers. And if you don’t have an on staff IT person, but rely on an Office Manager or other employee to fix computers, outsourcing your IT will allow that person to do their actual job, helping your bottom line, rather than spend all day working to fix other peoples computer issues.

Which would you rather do? Wait until IT breaks, or know that it’s going to work when you need IT?