Have you ever avoided improvements and upgrades to technology in order to reduce costs?

Have you outsourced certain aspects of your technology?

Do you look toward technology as a way to establish or increase efficiency?

Have you leveraged document management tools?

Do you have a technology plan in place that is guiding your decisions for future investments?

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What is poor communication costing your company?

These days we have many modern methods of communication, including instant messaging, email, and phone systems. What if we could combine them into one manageable platform? Unified Communications & Collaboration (UC&C) is built to enable office workers to help customers while reducing issues for IT teams.

In today’s fast-paced, ever-changing world of technology, it is important to create a workplace that offers 1-great customer service, 2-supports growth and captivates new talent, and 3- engages current employees, all while integrating business processes. It is estimated that nearly 86% of customers would pay 20% more for an excellent experience. Due to the connectivity in this modern age, much of your customer experience will fall on the shoulders of your IT staff.

Combine all this with demand for faster ROI, increased efficiency, and better productivity to better achieve results. It can be challenging to get the right solution to fit your business needs. So what is best? Cloud, on-premise, a little of both? How do you choose? Can Unified Communications and collaboration really ease IT frustrations, such as integration and security, while remaining welcoming and uncomplicated? The answer is yes. In this article, we will explore the top 6 benefits of Unified Communications & Collaboration and how they can change the way your business communicates.

1 – It Promotes Collaboration

With UC&C everything can have interoperability. Communications such as text, chat, voice, and social media can be found in one spot. Data doesn’t need to be transferred from one program to another. This makes it easier to boost an overall customer experience.

2 – Cost of Operating goes down

A UC&C solves a couple of inefficiencies that help costs to go down. First of all, the licensing costs with one solution to cover all areas of communication efficiency. This means you can do away with paying excessive licensing fees. Secondly, businesses can save time and money because they need to travel less. Reliable and quick communication methods allow for fewer interruptions. Lastly, the IT costs will be reduced and downtime will be held at a minimum.

3 – It Guides Inspiration

When you have multiple people sharing ideas and expertise to create something inspiring you need a Unified Communications & Collaboration Solution to light the way to innovation. Unified Communications & Collaboration provides real-time connections with colleagues, suppliers, and partners so you easily share ideas, all while keeping things mobile and moving.

4 – It Encourages Stronger Working Partnerships

Collaboration amongst colleagues almost always leads to greater results than working in isolation. The better relationships staff have, the stronger the team is and the easier it is to achieve a higher standard of work. Unified Communications & Collaboration creates an environment to coordinate, and allows for others to know status, availability, and presence at any given moment in order to strengthen communication between coworkers…wherever they might be.

5 – It Takes Productivity to the next level

15% of work time is wasted by improper communication. Unified Communications and Collaboration allows for flexibility with an anytime, anyplace mentality and a more personable approach. This helps raise company morale and boost performance making it a win/win. One example of this would be that of instant messaging which allows colleagues to send quick and informal messages like “In a Meeting”, or “Call you back soon”.

6 – It Boosts the customer Experience

One of the most important things for a business today is the customer experience. One of the most important factors that helps a business gain its competitive edge is providing a great customer experience. Many businesses have an increase in revenue after merely improving the customer experience. With all the competition, businesses cannot afford unhappy customers as they will take their money elsewhere. Let Unified Communications & Collaboration step in and take your customer relations to the next level with the impressive ability to keep records of every single customer communication.

Plus Unified Communications and Collaboration offers smart solutions such as Chatbot for 24/7 contact, and desktop phones that can redirect to a mobile phone, so you never miss a call, even when you’re not at your desk.

Let Les Olson Company help you to choose which solution can help you reach all your goals. Get a Unified Communications & Collaboration solution that adapts to your network seamlessly and can be customized for flexible integration with your specific processes. Boost your business productivity and lower your communication costs today.[/cz_title][cz_gap height=”25px”]

The fact of the world we live in is, businesses will likely experience occasional security incidents, despite their preventative measures. Even though it’s not possible to secure your network with 100% certainty, there are a startling number of organizations that haven’t bothered to create a security incident response plan. This means when there is an incident, many businesses struggle to quickly respond as they frantically improvise a plan of action.

We don’t have to tell you that neglecting to prepare before an inevitable incident can have disastrous consequences. There’s no on-the-spot decisions you can make that wouldn’t be better if made thoughtfully ahead of time. What’s more, it’s easy to make silly blunders and bad decisions under pressure. Handling a security incident is a complex affair, and this article is by no means a comprehensive guide to creating your plan, but we can provide a few tips to help set your plan in motion.

Create a security incident response policy and plan.

Don’t be the business that hasn’t gotten around to it. Your plan doesn’t need to be a novel, but it is important to start somewhere. Start by creating a security incident response policy that includes a definition of what you consider to be an incident, the organizational structure for responding to an incident, roles and responsibilities of your response team, and reporting requirements. You can then use your policy to develop a response plan based on the items in your policy.

Determine your incident response team.

You will need to determine who is responsible for responding to an incident and what their roles are. You will also need to make sure that everyone within your organization knows who to contact in the event of an incident. You should create and distribute a contact list of those on your response team, their roles within the response team, and how to contact them.

So now that you know you need a response team, how do you choose who should be on it? First of all, you’ll need to determine whether you have the resources to create a team with only employees of your organization, or if you will need to supplement your resources by outsourcing some responsibilities. You also need to consider the expertise of those you select for your team. They will need specialized knowledge and experience such as intrusion detection, vulnerabilities, exploits, and other aspects of security. Members of your team also need to be available to respond to an incident at any time, even outside of normal business hours. You may also need to include individuals outside of your organization including legal representation, law enforcement, public affairs, facilities management, etc.

Determine your containment strategy.

Failing to quickly contain the threat can result in your resources being overwhelmed, causing additional damage that could have been prevented. Containing a threat gives your business valuable time to develop a solid remediation plan, but it’s important that you pre-determined procedures for containment rather than implementing them on the fly. Containment strategies should vary depending on the type of incident. When you develop your containment procedures, you should create a separate strategy for each major type of incident. You’ll need to consider various criteria including potential for damage and theft, the for evidence preservation, service availability, as well as the time and resources needed.

It can be useful to observe the attacker to be better prepared to defend against future attacks. Organizations will do this by directing the attacker to a sandbox where their activity is contained but they can continue to monitor their actions and gather evidence. It’s important to never simply observe the bad actor performing their attack without directing them to a sandbox, otherwise you could be liable for failing to contain them should they use your compromised system to attack other systems.

Pre-distribute contact cards.

Be sure not to rely on your regular methods of communication to spread the word of an incident. Your phone lines and email system can be interrupted due to an attack, leaving people to scramble to figure out how to contact each other. Create cards that outline who to contact during an incident and be sure to include their cell phone number. To avoid confusion, it’s a smart idea to list one or two people as the initial points of contact; they can then notify all others who need to get involved in responding.

Gather evidence and report to law enforcement.

A common reason cyber-criminals are never held legally accountable for their crimes, is that organizations forget to gather evidence in the heat of the moment. Another common reason is law enforcement is never properly involved. Your incident response team should make a point of becoming familiar with their law enforcement resources. It’s important to determine beforehand which types of incidents can be reported, how to report them, what evidence should be gathered, and how to collect that evidence. It’s a good idea to appoint one individual on your response team as the main point of contact for communicating with law enforcement.

Get your users involved.

Your IT team can’t do it alone. The goal is to keep incidents from happening in the first place, and that requires buy-in from all the users on your network. Make sure you have acceptable use policies in place so that users know how to help protect your network. It’s also important to provide training for how to spot and avoid attacks.

Get help if you need it.

If you lack all the resources and expertise you need to create and execute a solid incident response plan, you shouldn’t hesitate to supplement your weak spots with outside help. Les Olson Company has a large team of IT experts that can help you maintain your network security and respond in the event of an incident.

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Data Backup VS Business Continuity – what exactly is the Difference?

There’s no doubt you’ve heard the terms Data Backup and Business Continuity, but what are they? Are they the same thing, or are they different? Data backup gives you peace of mind knowing your data is safe and you can get your data back if there’s a failure. Business continuity takes care of quickly getting your business operating again after a system failure.

If you have to prioritize one over the other, getting a data backup solution is a great first step, but it’s important not to stop there. Business continuity is just as important to consider because it ensures your business can get back up and running in a timely manner if disaster strikes. If your server dies, you can’t quickly get back to work if you only had file-level backup. Think about how long it would take for your server to be replaced, software and data to be re-installed, and the whole system to be configured with your settings and preferences. This process could take days, right? Now you need to consider whether your business can afford to lose that much time.

Two terms you may not have heard of are Recovery Time Objective (RTO), and Recovery Point Objective (RPO). So what is RTP and RPO? Recovery Time Objective is the acceptable amount of time a business can be down after a disruption before experiencing unacceptable negative impacts. Recovery Point Objective is the maximum period of time a business can go without data after a disaster. Calculating the real cost of data loss and downtime for your business will give you the perspective you need to make an informed decision about data backup and business continuity.

We don’t have to tell you that downtime isn’t cheap, but it’s shocking just how expensive it can be. Each hour of downtime can cost between $9,000-$700,000, depending on the size of the organization. Downtime can happen to any business. Network outages, human error, and natural disasters can all bring your business to a standstill. In fact, the #1 culprit of issues that cause downtime is human error. If you haven’t prioritized data protection because you don’t experience many extreme weather events, you should know that the bigger threat to your data are the unpredictable humans inside of your company.

Local or Cloud Backup?

When it comes to backup, you shouldn’t put all of your eggs in one basket. Local backup makes it fast and easy to restore data back to its original location and keep the business running; but when the power goes out, the device fails, or the device is destroyed, you’re totally out of luck. This makes cloud backup look extra attractive, but it’s important to remember that even the cloud can fail, and restoring from the cloud can be more difficult and time-consuming.

That’s why you need to have a balance between local and cloud-based backups. Enter the hybrid-cloud solution. With a hybrid-cloud solution, your data is copied and stored on a local device but also replicated in the cloud. This allows you to quickly restore data from your local backup if needed, with the ability to backup from the cloud, just in case something happens to your device.

While most small businesses don’t have the same IT budget as larger businesses, the risks facing their data are basically the same. The good news is, that there are data backup solutions for businesses of all sizes, so implementing data backup and business continuity should be a top priority. Let Les Olson Company help you find the right solutions for your business.

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Taking Advantage of Digital Transformation is a Must for SMBs

New digital tools and processes have the potential to totally transform the businesses that adopt them. Three quarters of organizations feel that digital transformation is changing how business is done. Businesses everywhere can take advantage of new efficiencies, capabilities, streamlined operations, improved customer satisfaction, and cost savings. Many small and mid-sized businesses feel that digital transformation is just for the “big guys”, but the truth is, it has the power to even the playing field and make SMBs more competitive with larger organizations.

Where to Start?

If you’re ready to begin your digital transformation, it can be overwhelming to find a starting point. It’s important to have a measured and strategic approach, and the key is determining which core business processes will benefit the most from digital transformation. Here are the three top areas where you can see an immediate benefit:

Accounts Payable

Accounts Payable is a fundamental activity for all businesses that is often bogged down with manual processes and paper files. This can result in a labor-intensive AP process that leaves organizations behind their competitors. The purpose of automation is to reduce the manual steps in the AP process. By reliving the burden of day-to-day manual entry and other repetitive activities, organizations can save $16 per invoice, sometimes more. AP staff are then freed up to focus on more productive activities that add value to your business. On average, it pays for itself within 6-18 months.

Software systems like DocuWare can manage the entire AP process from electronic invoice delivery and document management, to workflow automation and analytics. There are a number of ways SMBs can see an immediate advantage to streamlining AP processes. You can take advantage of early pay discounts that are normally overlooked, ensure vendor satisfaction by processing accounts faster, and get better insight to predict financial outcomes.

Human Resources

Human Resources is yet another department that is buried in paper documents despite the increasing digitization of business processes. Unfortunately, paper shuffling claims up to 60 percent of the average office worker’s time, and can account for up to 45 percent of labor costs. This results in HR staff often spending far more time performing administrative duties, rather than hiring the best talent and maintaining high moral.

Managing any staff requires documentation that starts well before an employee is hired, and continues even after they leave the company, including applications, background checks, state and federal taxes, health insurance, employee reviews, and more. That’s not to mention things like workplace claims, training and certifications, and annual benefits re-enrollment. And don’t forget, when an employee retires or quits, there is even more documentation to keep track of.

There is great benefit in automating HR processes with document and content management tools. Luckily, developers such as DocuWare offer solutions that are specifically designed for these very processes.[/cz_title][cz_gap height=”40px”]

Sales

The buyer’s journey is so different than in the past. People find all of the information they need to research and choose a product on their own. By the time a customer contacts your business, they are typically already close to making a purchase decision. That means your business needs to be ready to move fast in order to close deals. Your sales team needs instant access to information and a great sales process is essential for customer satisfaction.

Give your sales team the modern tools they need, such as centralized, cloud-based document management and workflow automation.

Sales and marketing are dramatically enhanced by workflows that digitize documents and leverage workflow automation to route information to the right team. Once the deal is done, sales representatives can digitize, manage and share contracts with a workflow to facilitate collaboration between sales, legal, and executive reviewers.

Recommendations:

What are best practices? Here are some recommendations to consider as you move forward.

Evaluate Your Current Processes

It is important to thoroughly evaluate your current processes so you can pinpoint gaps in performance. Which areas can you save the most time? Which processes are causing opportunities to fall through the cracks? Take a hard look at your processes in their current state, and be honest about how they are falling short.

Establish Objectives

Now that you’ve thought long and hard about your current processes, you need to determine how you would like them to change. You can do this by determining specific expectations and objectives. For example, reducing the time needed for an invoice payment or reducing the number of hours spent on-boarding a new hire from 5 hours to 1 hour.

Evaluate Targeted Options

Many software solutions have solutions that are specifically made for core business functions like AP, HR, and Sales. This can be the quickest and most reliable way to implement an efficient solution.

Les Olson Company is a proud DocuWare partner. Our team of certified professionals can help your business implement the perfect solution to immediately start streamlining your business operations.

Source

AIIM Study “Digitalizing Core Processes”

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With the success of last year’s initiative, which focused on building a home for one veteran in need, FOX5 is expanding the scope of their Super Build project to also include a community playground. In 2020, FOX5’s Super Build was able to team up with Habitat for Humanity to build a new home for a United States Navy veteran who was deeply affected by the recession. Forced to relocate to an apartment with rising rent he struggled to pay, he called the opportunity to once again own a home “a new beginning.” In the first half of 2021, Super Build will focus their efforts on building a community playground in partnership with Make An Impact Foundation and PlayPower, which is expected to be completed just in time for summer break.[/cz_title]

As a company, it was easy for us to see that supporting the efforts of Super Build is a great opportunity for us to make a lasting positive impact in our Las Vegas community. We believe everyone deserves a comfortable place to call home, and all kids deserve a safe place to play. We truly look forward to being a part of this admirable project and getting our Las Vegas team personally involved in the builds.

Learn how your organization can get involved with Super Build.[/cz_title]

Business Environment Challenges

One of Les Olson Company’s clients, a large medical provider in the U.S. that covers multiple states and has more that 38,000 employees, needed an economical way to track, print and scan patient records, while keeping them secure and HIPAA compliant. Additionally, the need for frequent printer supply replacements kept services expenses high.

Like many other organizations in the healthcare industry, this healthcare organization had a committee studying ways to reduce print and document management costs. Their committee reached out to us at Les Olson Company for a Sharp solution to increase efficiency and resolve its current print management challenges.

Technology Solutions

The committee strongly considered Sharp from the start, because of the low cost of ownership. They focused on Sharp’s new like of monochrome printers and MFPs, which offered a much lower cost of ownership than previous models the organization had deployed.

They began by testing proposed models in their testing center. During the weeks of testing, the proposed models met or exceeded their requirements for their healthcare facilities. Most importantly, the MFPs and printers integrated and performed flawlessly with the organization’s internal software, as well as PaperCut technology, which allows for tracking of print job activity and enhanced security.

After testing was complete, Les Olson Company installed 170 Sharp MX-B355W copiers with integrated PaperCut technology. We also installed 70 Sharp MX-M450P printers to replace some of the medical center’s current fleet of printers.

Proven Results

Overall, the organization has significantly lowered its cost of printing. In fact, over a 12 month period, the Sharp MFP changes have resulted in a total savings of nearly $17k. Additionally, the common supplies for Sharp MFPs and printers have simplified the managing of toner and maintenance. Using PaperCut, employees at the healthcare organization have also decreased their printing volume. As a result, the organization is more environmentally friendly.

“The organization is literally saving thousands of dollars per year with the installation of the new Sharp devices,” says Chris Telesco, Les Olson Company’s Corporate Enterprise Manager.

Since these installations, the organization plans to continue working with Les Olson Company to replace more of their current fleet with Sharp Devices.

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Challenges

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Solutions

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#1 Regulatory Compliance Obligations

Federal and state laws effect virtually all organizations, but depending on your industry, and the types of information you deal with, you may have other strict regulations governing how you send information. From HIPPA and Sarbanes Oxley to PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) and others, violating regulatory compliance laws can result in major legal ramifications, including federal fines.

#2 Fax Machine is in a High-Traffic Area

Fax machines are commonly in open areas that are easily accessible to everyone in the office. That’s great for efficiency and convenience, but horrible for security. Having a fax machine out in the open means that anyone has access to the information flowing through your fax machine – whether that’s a nosy customer, an employee with bad intentions, or a suspicious visitor in your office. You can’t be certain that information won’t get into the wrong hands.

#3 Access After Hours

Many businesses forget to consider the security risk posed by people who access their offices after hours. You know the saying – out of sight, out of mind. You might not think about your cleaning staff, contractors, delivery personnel, or employees with keys to the building, but any time an individual is allowed access to your building with no oversight, it’s important to ensure that documents containing personal information aren’t laying around.

#4 Shared Fax Numbers

Fax machines can be expensive, so it’s likely that your employees don’t each have their own device with a separate number. Sharing one fax machine is economical, but increases the risk of exposing private information to the wrong person. Aside from the obvious security risk, there is also greater opportunity for mistakes like document mix-ups and misplaced pages.

#5 You Can’t Guarantee Security on the Other End

No matter what precautions you take to place your fax machine in a secure location, you have no control over where your faxes end up. If you’re sending information via fax that needs to remain private, you’re really rolling the dice by sending to an unsecured fax.

If any of this sounds familiar, all signs point to an urgent need for a Secured Fax Software Solution. Fax software is a very effective way to ensure the security of your sensitive information. We recommend implementing GoldFax’s Internet Fax Solution. Rather than sending and receiving faxes at a fax machine, faxes are sent and received via email. GoldFax is an efficient and economical way to meet compliance expectations for securely sending information. Let us help you implement a secure faxing solution today.

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The good news is that video conferencing applications are widely available to individuals and organizations of all sizes. Video conferencing is so powerful because it offers face-to-face interaction, even when you can’t be in the same room with one another. It also gives you the ability to record your meetings so you can re-watch them later, or make them available to those who couldn’t attend the virtual meeting.

The meeting hosts can share the content on their screens so everyone can see what they are looking at, and some solutions even allow you to hand over control of your mouse, which is great for virtual training. The solutions we will discuss below are excellent for both webinars and video conferencing, and allow you to get detailed analytics on the participation and engagement during your meetings. Zoom is perhaps the most widely used solution out there, but it’s not your only option. Here are the top video conferencing solutions, let’s compare:

• Zoom – Zoom is by far the most popular solution out there for both businesses and individuals. It’s accessible to anyone and simple to set up and operate and has all of the basic features you would expect. | Free for 100 participants, 40 minute time limit
• Google Meet – Formerly Google Hangouts – If you have a Gmail account, you have access to Google Meet. This is a great solution for personal use and community-based collaboration scenarios. It is very simple to set up and operate. | Free up to 99 participants
• Microsoft Teams – Replacement to Skype for Business – This video conferencing tool is specifically designed for businesses and is especially good for organizations that already use other Microsoft applications because it seamlessly integrates with their other Microsoft Office applications. | Free for up to 300 participants, no time Limit
• GoToMeeting – by LogMeIn – This solution is ideal for businesses already using other LogMeIn Products | $12 per month, up to 150 participants
• Webex Meetings – Ideal for businesses that utilize other Cisco products and/or require a solution with a heavy emphasis on security | Free for up to 100 participants, 50 minute time limit
• BlueJeans – by Verison Ideal for large enterprises that require a heavy emphasis on security | $9.99 per month, up to 50 participants

[/cz_title][cz_image id=”cz_90717″ image=”15316″][/cz_image][cz_title id=”cz_39777″ cz_title=””]Once you find the right application for your video conferencing needs, it’s important to know what the best practices are for both participating in, and hosting a meeting.

Best Practices for Attending a Virtual Meeting

#1 Find a Quiet Space

This may be easier said than done, especially if you have kids or pets around, but if you are able to participate in your meeting in a quiet room with a door, that’s the best case scenario.

#2 Keep Yourself on Mute Unless You’re Talking

This one is such a basic courtesy that it’s even becoming second nature to kids doing online school. You don’t want to be the reason everyone in your meeting is distracted. Whether there’s a lot of background noise in your house or office, or your snacking near your microphone, you don’t want everyone to hear that instead of the meeting conversation.

#3 Don’t look sloppy, still dress for the meeting

This can be hard when you’re working from home. You don’t always look your best to work from your home office, but if you know there’s a meeting scheduled, put in some effort to look presentable on screen. At the very least, don’t make your virtual appearance in pajamas.

#4 Test your audio and video beforehand

Being on time to a meeting, only to have the first 20 minutes dedicated to making everyone’s audio/video work correctly is incredibly frustrating.

#5 Don’t do anything during the meeting you wouldn’t want people to see

You’ve probably seen quite a few embarrassing virtual meeting gaffes circulating around social media. It can be funny to hear about when it happens to someone else, but would be humiliating if it happened to you. Never assume you’re out of view or out of earshot when you’re participating in a virtual meeting. Do not do anything during the course of your video conference that you wouldn’t feel comfortable doing in front of your co-workers in an office setting.

Are you in charge of hosting the meeting? You have a few responsibilities above and beyond showing up to the meeting. Here are some things you should consider as you plan your virtual meeting:

Best Practices for Hosting a Virtual Meeting

#1 Create an Agenda

Video conferencing can leave people feeling a bit disconnected from one another. As the meeting host, it’s your job to facilitate the conversation and keep things moving along by having an agenda. Attending a virtual meeting with no clear agenda or leader is often incredibly awkward.

#2 Sort Out the Technical Aspects Beforehand

You’ve probably joined a virtual meeting right on time, only to sit and wait for the host to work out some technical kinks for the first several minutes. If you’re the host, you should make a habit of getting into your meeting several minutes early so you can ensure your video, sound, lighting, and any on-screen materials you plan to share will work as expected. It’s also your responsibility to make sure you know how to use the features of your video conferencing application so you can help other attendees as needed.

#3 Be Punctual

As the host, you should always be the first person in your meeting. Failing to do so is like hosting a party at your home and not being there when your guests arrive.

#4 Eliminate Distractions

If you have a chaotic or cluttered home or office, try adding a virtual background to avoid distracting your attendees. It’s also a good idea to try to be in a room with a door, or use head phones with a microphone so there isn’t as much background noise.

#5 Start With Introductions

If you have a group of individuals who may not know each other, it’s your job to introduce everyone in your meeting before you get into it.

#6 Avoid Dead Air and Interruptions

Don’t waste your attendees time by making them wait around in silence. It’s also not the time to take an incoming phone call or read new messages. Keep the meeting moving along throughout its duration or you will lose your participants attention.

#7 Encourage Mute

After you get through with your introductions, and any other necessary housekeeping, ask your participants to mute their microphones unless they are speaking. This will prevent distracting audio interruptions.

We hope this information helps you navigate your new normal and have successful virtual meetings. We offer Microsoft 365, which includes Microsoft Teams, a great solution for video conferencing that we use within our own organization. Our Managed IT Services experts are here to help you implement a virtual collaboration solution.[/cz_title]

There’s no question that there has been a fundamental shift in how employees interact with IT. This transformation is driven by devices like laptops and smartphones, as well as services like remote access, social media, and Webmail. Without access to corporate data, it’s impossible to accomplish tasks in a meaningful way, but the days when a solid perimeter firewall was enough are long gone. Organizations need the right combination of tools and policies to minimize the risk of breaches that put sensitive information in the wrong hands.

The Consequences of Data Loss

A breach that leaves Personally Identifiable Information vulnerable can have far-reaching and devastating consequences for individuals and organizations. Examples of information hackers try to get their hands on include names, Social Security numbers, credit/debit card numbers, date of birth or health records. No matter how your company handles a data loss incident, it’s likely your security and privacy policies will come under intense scrutiny. Inevitably, customers tend to lose confidence in organization’s that have experienced a data breach, which means lost business.

The average cost of a data breach in 2020 is $3.86 million, according to a report from IBM and the Ponemon Institute. Not surprisingly, reputation damage and loss of business is the biggest single contributor to the cost of a data breach, accounting for 56% of the total cost for U.S. organizations. In addition to potentially catastrophic loss of business, there are costs associated with customer support, reputation management, productivity loss, data recovery, and legal fees. Organizations may also face fines due to laws and regulations meant to protect personal information, such as HIPAA. To reduce the risk of data loss and the associated costs, companies need a multi-layered approach to data loss prevention.

Implementing a Multi-layered Approach to DLP

A holistic strategy should start with content monitoring at data exit points, such as external hard drives and email messages. Your strategy should also include encrypting data to prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to sensitive information. Finally, a multi-layered Data Loss Prevention Strategy requires compliance from end users. This means your organization must create and enforce rules for proper data use. Prioritize management of data by choosing a solution that monitors and controls distribution of private information at exit points. You can simplify configuration, deployment, and management by implementing a solution that protects data at both the endpoint and the email gateway.

Controlling what end users can do on their devices is one of the easiest, most effective ways to reduce risks to your data. With this in mind, your organization should focus on managing the use of network-connected devices, managing access to websites, and controlling the use of applications, such as remote access, file sharing, cloud storage, etc.

Determining Your Data Loss Prevention Needs

Achieving a smooth Implementation of content monitoring, encryption, and policy compliance will require planning and preparation. You will need to have an understanding of the industry or government regulations that apply to your organization, and which laws/requirements apply to your business in your region. We highly recommend consulting a corporate attorney to make sure you have a clear picture of your obligations. As part of the planning process, you should define and document business drivers, regulatory/legal requirements, and objectives for your data security implementation.

As with any major project, you need to secure buy off from your organization’s executives. You will need their support for your strategy to succeed. Having a clear, well-researched plan will help you educate them about your goals and the benefits of implementing your plan. Since sensitive data is generated and shared throughout departments, you should organize a project team with representatives from across the organization. Consider including individuals from the senior management team, human resources, IT admin, finance, etc. A well-rounded team will help you identify sensitive information, determine where this data resides, and learn how the data is used and by whom so you can take appropriate action to secure it. This will help you understand the data’s role and who could accidentally expose data.

Along with your team, you should evaluate the risk and potential consequences of a data breach for each data type. You can then use that information to prioritize the data that poses the greatest risk if breached. Create policies for preventing loss of data, including what steps to take if your policy is violated. and remediation actions. Perhaps most importantly, you need to educate users of your policies, and their responsibilities. To ensure the success of your plan, all employees need to be aware of the policies if you expect to enlist their help in protecting the data they handle. Once users know the expectations, you can hold them accountable.

Best practices for Implementing a Data Loss Prevention Strategy

1. Begin with a transparent security policy. Give your users a document explaining the key aspects of your policy and have someone available to answer questions. Provide information on the types of data you’re trying to protect and make sure the organization’s motivations are crystal clear.
2. Deploy data protection technologies to prevent accidental data loss. Users are human and accidents will happen. Laptops can be lost, emails are often sent to the wrong address, and malicious links catch people off guard. You should be protecting against accidental data loss by deploying security solutions such as content control, device control and encryption to render data unreadable without a password.
3. Start with a small subset of prioritized data and slowly expand the rules. You can easily overwhelm your IT staff by implementing your entire plan at once. The process will go a lot smoother if you start small, and allow users to become used to the changes before implementing new ones.
4. Avoid accusatory language in notices, or you run the risk of making users defensive. Instead of accusing the user of purposely violating your policy by sending sensitive data, gently notify the user that it looks like they might be sending data in a manner that breaches policy.
5. Your goal isn’t to catch users breaking the rules, it’s to prevent behavior that puts your organization at risk in the first place. Educate users on the correct way to use and send data securely.

What to Include in Your Data Security Policy for End Users

Once you’ve determined your strategy, it’s time to create the policy that you expect users to follow. The information below can serve as a great jumping-off point for creating your own policy. You should outline behaviors expected of employees when dealing with data and link it to your Acceptable Use Policy and Information Security Policy.

Purpose

Explain the purpose of your policy, basically an opening statement about why you are implementing your policy, and your objectives. The goal of this section should be to create awareness about the importance of following this policy.

Scope

Include a list of individuals or user types that are expected to comply with your policy as well as a definition of the data it’s meant to protect. Identify the different types of data and include examples.

Employee requirements

Here are some requirements we recommend including in your plan. Please note, this is not policy document, and is not legal advice. This simply outlines some helpful items to include when creating your own policy:

1. Complete security awareness training and agree to uphold the acceptable use policy.
2. Visitors should be escorted by an authorized employee and restricted to appropriate areas. If an unknown, un-escorted, or otherwise unauthorized individual is identified in your organization, the appropriate person should be immediately notified.
3. Users should not reference the subject or content of sensitive or confidential data publicly, or via systems or communication channels not controlled by your organization.
4. All printed materials containing sensitive information should never be left unattended at user workstations.
5. Require use of a secure password on all company systems and create a password policy. You should require that work credentials are unique and not used on other external systems or services.
6. Require terminated employees to return all records ( in any format) or devices containing sensitive company information. Employees should be notified of this requirement during the on-boarding process, and should sign documentation to confirm they understand this requirement.
7. Require users to immediately notify the appropriate person in the event that a device containing in-scope data is lost.
8. Outline how users can notify the appropriate person to report suspected non-compliance with your policy.
9. Provide additional guidance to employees who work remotely and the precautions they must take when working outside of the office.
10. Ensure users never leave assets that contain sensitive data exposed to theft, for example visible in the back seat of your car.
11. Data transferred within your organization should only be exchanged via business-provided secure transfer solutions, such as encrypted USB, authorized file sharing, internal email, etc. Be sure to let users know who they can contact with questions about sending data if they are unsure.
12. Require that information being transferred on a portable device, such as external hard drive, is encrypted in line with industry best practices and applicable regulations.

Loss of sensitive data or proprietary information can cause permanent damage to your business. Your organization’s Data Loss Prevention strategy should consist of content monitoring, data encryption, and policy compliance. It may seem overwhelming, but data loss prevention doesn’t have to be difficult or expensive. Les Olson company’s team of IT experts can help your business find the right solutions and get them implemented and configured correctly. Request your free comprehensive Network Security Analysis to gain insight into your network risks and how to address them.[/cz_title]