As we announced last week, the Nexthink ‘Through the Crisis’ series gives our customers a voice to talk about what the challenges of 2020 have been like for them professionally – working from home while trying to cope with the huge upsurge in demand and responsibility.
Though there is an entire industry devoted to telling you otherwise, most people prefer to work for large organizations. On the one hand, their appeal makes perfect sense. Big employers offer higher salaries, better benefits, and a longer employee tenure. Yet, there are some noticeable wrinkles that come with life in a large organization. Chief among them, bigger companies often exhibit a poor overall Digital Employee Experience.
For a lot of Nexthink’s technical professionals, 2020 has been one of the most challenging and rewarding periods of their professional lives. Our customer base was impacted globally by COVID-19, and we were honored to be able to support them whenever and however we could, working closely to leverage their existing investment, as well as developing and distributing tailored services for those that needed them.
After working in enterprise IT for over 20 years, I’ve come to the realization that most departments suffer from the same underlying contradiction. By nature, we IT professionals are a logic-seeking, detail-oriented bunch. Much of our work can take months, if not years, of meticulous planning and research. We find comfort in gazing upon complex, multi-colored scrum boards and searching for answers to problems that any sane person would avoid.
The catchphrase “shadow IT” has always been a bit misleading in the world of tech support. Is using Dropbox instead of Google Drive akin to committing some seedy act in a dark alleyway? Jokes aside, it seems tech support’s real problem has less to do with terminology and more to do with the way they approach shadow IT. Their aim is often near-sighted because their tools hold them back.
I have good, bad, and good news for you. Let’s start with the first good news: After three months of uncertainty, several countries are starting to reopen their economies and plan their way out of the pandemic. It appears there is finally some light at the end of the tunnel.
There has been a lot of talk about transforming employees’ digital experiences, but what does this really mean, and how can it be achieved? This is what Nexthink and its partner Fujitsu are solving each and every day. Employee experience refers to the evaluation that employees make regarding their work environment.
The recent shift to remote work has been anything but subtle for millions of people and their companies. And like many in IT Ops, our customers have been preoccupied with maintaining an error-free VPN experience. But that’s often easier said than done. Luckily for them, VPN issues that would normally take weeks to resolve are being turned around in minutes with Nexthink’s patented technology.
Most remote employees are probably familiar with a security practice known as multi-factor authentication (MFA), even if they cannot technically define it. If you’ve ever tried to complete an online purchase and were met with a string of security questions or received a one-time password (OTP) on your mobile device—then you’ve participated in an MFA process.
Close your eyes for a moment and think of the least tech-savvy person in your family. Ok, open them. This person, even with their limited tech skills, probably understands that the farther you stray from your Wi-Fi router, the worse your connection will be. Incredibly, Chris and I can count between us over a dozen customers whose IT support teams failed to consider this one factor. How could something so simple fly under the radar of enterprise IT?
