Posts

Your 2025 IT Checklist – The Next 3 Items

/in

IT Checklist

The Next 3 Items on Your 2025 IT Checklist

As we move into 2025, our businesses face a new set of challenges. Political and economic changes, rapidly emerging technologies, and increasing security threats will all demand our attention.  Where we focus, and the decisions we make, will impact our businesses, customers, and employees. Is your 2025 IT Checklist ready to help?

Your information technology services remain critical to your business operations. Pragmatic, thoughtful planning and decisions now, will empower your team and enable your business to address the coming challenges – and opportunities.  Here are the next three of six key areas to explore as you build your IT goals and objectives, and your 2025 IT checklist.

4 Enhance Security Measures and Compliance

Evolving threats and regulatory requirements keep cybersecurity a top priority for businesses. Beyond protection and prevention, focus on resilience. Ensure your business can maintain operations during and after a crisis.

  • Benchmark your security profile against recognized frameworks, like CIS or NIST, as well as industry standards and regulatory requirements. 
  • Conduct regular security assessments and penetration tests to identify vulnerabilities, scope risks, and prioritize solutions 
  • Implement a phased approach to security improvements; start with high-impact, low-cost changes. 
  • Educate employees on security protocols. Emphasize their role in maintaining a secure environment. 
  • Update your security profile, risks, and priorities over time with periodic assessments and penetration testing.

5 Streamlining IT Infrastructure for Efficiency 

As your IT environment becomes more complex, inefficiencies and costs will escalate. Simplify your IT systems and services to reduce redundancies and enhance productivity.

  • Identify and eliminate duplicate services to reduce license, admin, and support costs.
  • Focus on removing apps and tools that duplicate capabilities in your Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 services.
  • Identify and eliminate shadow IT services to lower costs and prevent data loss.
  • Address mismatched systems that may hinder productivity. Lack of integration between cloud and local applications, for example, requires extra time and effort to store, share, and secure files and information.

6 Prepare for the Future: Trends and Innovations

Stay ahead of technology trends to ensure your business remains competitive. 

  • Keep an eye on innovations in areas like cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI), communications, and cybersecurity.
  • Invest some time to regularly assess how these trends might benefit your business – strategically or tactically.  
  • Invest in employee education and training so they can adapt quickly to technology and business changes. 
  • Prioritize building a flexible IT infrastructure and services that will adapt and incorporate future innovations. Ensure your business remains resilient and agile in an ever-evolving digital landscape.
  • Foster a forward-thinking culture. Anticipate challenges and capitalize on new or different opportunities.

Next Steps

For help with any part of your 2025 IT checklist, or to tap into our expert guidance, book a complementary  intro  call with our Cloud Advisors.  Ask for an IT Assessment Referral Code and request your IT assessment. 

About the Author

Allen Falcon is the co-founder and CEO of Cumulus Global.  Allen co-founded Cumulus Global in 2006 to offer small businesses enterprise-grade email security and compliance using emerging cloud solutions. He has led the company’s growth into a managed cloud service provider with over 1,000 customers throughout North America. Starting his first business at age 12, Allen is a serial entrepreneur. He has launched strategic IT consulting, software, and service companies. An advocate for small and midsize businesses, Allen served on the board of the former Smaller Business Association of New England, local economic development committees, and industry advisory boards.

The First 3 Items on Your 2025 IT Checklist

/in

IT ChecklistAs we move into 2025, our businesses face a new set of challenges. Political and economic changes, rapidly emerging technologies, and increasing security threats will all demand our attention.  Where we focus, and the decisions we make, will impact our businesses, customers, and employees. Is your 2025 IT Checklist ready to help?

Your information technology services remain critical to your business operations. Pragmatic, thoughtful planning and decisions now, will empower your team and enable your business to address the coming challenges – and opportunities.  Here are the first three of six key areas to explore as you build your IT goals and objectives, and your 2025 IT checklist.

1 Navigate the Windows 10 End of Life Transition

As we approach 2025, one of the most pressing IT challenges for businesses is the transition away from 

Windows 10 reaches end of life on October 14, 2025. Microsoft will no longer provide updates, support, or free security patches. Now is the time to prepare. The move to Windows 11 will impact your IT planning, budget, and operations.

  • Inventory all devices running Windows 10, including laptops, desktops, and any embedded systems in manufacturing or distribution equipment.
  • Evaluate each device for Windows 11 compatibility and identify machines that require replacement.
  • Determine if compatible machines can/should be upgraded or replaced to ensure performance.
  • Subscribe to the Extended Security Update program for systems that cannot or will not be replaced in time.

As you assess your needs and plan replacements and upgrades, be mindful of potential supply chain issues. Expect the current political and economic climate, and increased demand for new devices, to impact pricing and availability.

2 Maximize Your Productivity Suite Utilization

Your productivity suite – Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace – is the backbone of your business operation. And yet, studies show that over 65% of small businesses leverage less than 40% of their productivity suite’s features. 

Unlocking the full potential of these tools can drive efficiency and collaboration.

  • Encourage a culture of continuous learning and sharing within your organization. Share shortcuts, tips, and best-practices.
  • Help your team explore, utilize, and gain comfort with new features.
  • Identify and share ways new features can streamline existing workflows and tasks.
  • Set expectations for team members to learn and use their systems more efficiently and effectively, and to adapt to updated workflows.

3 Integrate AI Effectively into Your Business Operations

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is becoming a cornerstone of modern business operations. Beyond the hype and hyperbole, AI can benefit your business when part of realistic, practical use cases.

In 2025, prioritize practical AI applications while safeguarding data security and managing costs.

  • Refine your data governance policies to protect sensitive information. 
  • Identify and prioritize use cases for AI, such as automating repetitive tasks or enhancing customer service. 
  • Explore AI capabilities in your existing systems before investing in new solutions. 
  • Provide thorough training to ensure employees understand AI tools and their role in streamlining workflows.

Next Steps

For help with any part of your 2025 IT checklist, or to tap into our expert guidance, book a complementary  intro  call with our Cloud Advisors.  Ask for an IT Assessment Referral Code and request your IT assessment. 

About the Author

Allen Falcon is the co-founder and CEO of Cumulus Global.  Allen co-founded Cumulus Global in 2006 to offer small businesses enterprise-grade email security and compliance using emerging cloud solutions. He has led the company’s growth into a managed cloud service provider with over 1,000 customers throughout North America. Starting his first business at age 12, Allen is a serial entrepreneur. He has launched strategic IT consulting, software, and service companies. An advocate for small and midsize businesses, Allen served on the board of the former Smaller Business Association of New England, local economic development committees, and industry advisory boards.

Picking the Right Google Workspace Subscription for Your Business

/in

Google Premier PartnerTo meet widely varying customer needs, Google offers five core subscription options spread over two tiers. For larger organizations with frontline and deskless information workers, Google offers additional, specialized license options. If you are looking at a Google Workspace subscription for the first time, considering an upgrade, or looking for Gemini AI features, you’ll want to choose the subscription and licensing that meets your needs without overpaying.

Subscription Tiers

Business Tier

Businesses with fewer than 300 employees typically select one of the Business Tier subscriptions– Workspace Starter, Standard, and Plus. These subscriptions limit the number of users and focus on the features and security most appropriate for smaller organizations.

Enterprise Tier

Larger businesses, as well as those requiring more advanced capabilities and security, often opt for the Enterprise Tier subscriptions– Standard and Plus. The Enterprise Tier also includes specialized license versions for frontline workers and knowledge workers with other email services.

Selection Criteria

When selecting a subscription, most businesses focus on a few key capabilities, such as:

  • Storage capacity and shared drives
  • Vault archiving/e-discovery
  • Google Meet features
  • Select security capabilities

With AI now integrated into all Google Workspace subscriptions, you should take time to understand the Gemini features included in each plan. A deeper review of security features can also help guide your selection.

Here is a deeper look at key selection criteria.

Storage

Since September 2024, all Google Workspace subscriptions use pooled storage.

Vault, the compliant archive/e-discovery service, covers Gmail, Drive, Groups, Chat, and Calendar, is available for all Enterprise Tier subscriptions and Business Plus.

The amount of storage, allocated per user and pooled, is as follows:

Business Tier

  • Starter = 30 GB
  • Standard = 2 TB
  • Plus = 5 TB

Enterprise Tier

  • Essentials = 1 TB
  • Standard = 5 TB
  • Plus = 5 TB

Meet

Google Meet is a robust meeting and collaboration system that generally negates the need for third party solutions.

Google Meet with Business Standard and Plus

Meet Features in Business Standard and Plus Subscriptions

All Google Workspace licenses include a core set of features:

  • External participants
  • Secure meetings
  • Screen sharing
  • Mobile app
  • Dial-in (US & international)
  • Digital whiteboard
  • Hand raising
  • Reaction

At the Business Tier, Meet features scale up  as noted in the table.

The Enterprise Tier includes live streaming and additional security features with all licensees.

Participant limits increment as follows:

  • Essentials: 250
  • Standard: 500
  • Plus: 1000

Gemini AI in Google Workspace

The following matrix summarizes the Gemini AI features in each of the core Google Workspace subscriptions.

Google Workspace Gemini AI Features

Security

Google Workspace provides a comprehensive set of security features and tools. With too many settings and options to list here, we published a Google Workspace Security Feature Matrix as an eBook. 

Review security features against your regulatory, industry, and business requirements.

Selection Process

When evaluating Google Workspace subscriptions, it’s essential to assess the details. Part of your selection process should include determining whether selecting a higher subscription tier or upgrading is more cost-effective than integrating third-party tools to provide the functionality you need.

For example, while Google Workspace’s Standard Data Protection includes email sandboxing, the feature does not offer the same capabilities– such as QR code analysis– as many third-party email threat protection services. 

In many cases, upgrading your Google Workspace subscription provides the needed capabilities at a lower cost than using a third-party tool. This is often true for Google Meet compared to third-party web meeting tools like Zoom.

For other capabilities, however, a third-party integrated solution may still be required.

Your Next Steps

For help assessing your needs and options, please contact us or schedule a brief intro call with a Cloud Advisor.

About the Author

Bill Seybolt bio pictureBill is a Senior Cloud Advisor responsible for helping small and midsize organizations with cloud forward solutions that meet their business needs, priorities, and budgets. Bill works with executives, leaders, and team members to understand workflows, identify strategic goals and tactical requirements, and design solutions and implementation phases. Having helped over 200 organizations successfully adopt cloud solutions, his expertise and working style ensure a comfortable experience effective change management.

PC Continuity Means Business Continuity

/in

PC ContinuityIn today’s fast-paced business world, the ability to maintain continuous PC operations is crucial for your business. With limited resources and manpower, you cannot afford to lose data or prolonged downtime. A crashed laptop can take 4 or more days to repair (or replace) and rebuild. The impact on your ability to serve your clients, manage marketing and sales, and invoice will be operationally and financially disruptive.

Backup Covers the Basics

Backup solutions are foundational to business continuity, particularly for small enterprises. A reliable backup service ensures your critical data is secure and recoverable. Having backups off-premise, or in the cloud, extends your protection to physical hazards that can damage local backup systems.

Backups, while essential, come with challenges.  Before you restore, you need to repair or replace damaged equipment. This takes time. Restoring from the cloud is limited by bandwidth. This takes time.  Repair and restore gets you your data back, but slowly. Meanwhile, you will struggle to run your business.

Unique IT Challenges

As a sole practitioner or other very small business, you face unique IT challenges. With limited devices, a single computer failure can bring your business activities to an abrupt and extended halt.

Unlike larger businesses, you likely don’t have the budget to keep spare equipment on hand or to quickly purchase replacements.

As a small business leader, you want, and need, to strike a balance between risk, protection, and budget.


Connect with a Cloud Advisor

A Solution Set for Smaller Businesses

Fortunately, you have service options that help minimize your risk for business disruptions due to PC problems. 

PC Continuity

You can overcome the challenges and limitations of backup/recovery solutions without breaking the bank. PC Continuity solutions enable you to keep your business running while your PC is repaired or replaced and restored.

PC Continuity captures full images of your device multiple times per day. When needed, the image loads and runs on a virtual desktop in a cloud data center. You can access your system’s image from any device with a web browser or a thin client agent.

With PC Continuity, you can return to work quickly. For a small incremental fee above your backup/recovery service, your business keeps running.

Monitoring and Management

Ensuring your computers are current with respect to patches and updates helps ensure optimal performance and security.  Monitoring for system performance can also flag hardware issues before they cause damage or fail.

Remote monitoring and management services track the health of your computer and can alert your IT service team to issues and conditions before they become problems. The service allows for managing system and software updates and can provide remote access to your IT support team when needed.

Lifecycle Management

Larger companies use lifecycle management to manage their computer purchasing and upgrade cycles. For small businesses, lifecycle management focuses on extending the lifespan of your devices and understanding when it is best to upgrade or replace aging systems.

Besides tracking age and warranty status, these services can include extended warranty and accidental damage coverage plans.  These coverages provide repair or like-device replacement.  Having extended warranty and accidental damage coverage reduces the risk of maintaining older systems. In the event of an expected failure or accident, you can avoid early replacement costs.

Some lifecycle management services include certified electronics disposal, helping you avoid e-waste compliance issues and disposal fees.

Your Next Steps

Understanding the risks and impact of PC/Laptop problems, you should decide the value of the various levels of protections.  While protection and continuity services come at a cost, a single incident with your PC or Laptop can cost you in days of lost productivity, damaged or lost data, and thousands of dollars.

To assess your risks, protections, and business continuity needs, please contact us or schedule a brief intro call with a Cloud Advisor.  The assessment is free and without obligation.

About the Author

Bill Seybolt bio pictureBill is a Senior Cloud Advisor responsible for helping small and midsize organizations with cloud forward solutions that meet their business needs, priorities, and budgets. Bill works with executives, leaders, and team members to understand workflows, identify strategic goals and tactical requirements, and design solutions and implementation phases. Having helped over 200 organizations successfully adopt cloud solutions, his expertise and working style ensure a comfortable experience effective change management.

7 Steps to Build Your 2024 IT Strategic Plan

/in

2024 IT Action PlanIn our 3T@3 Series event in December, we discussed creating your 2024 IT Action Plan. During the session, we walked through a proven process for building a feasible plan for the coming year.

Here is a breakdown of 7 key steps in the process

1 Define Your Business Drivers

Your first step is to assess your business drivers.  What are the conditions, internally and externally, that you expect to impact your business over the coming year?

External drivers are generally beyond your control or influence: changes in the economy, evolving customer needs and priorities, shifts in business conditions in your target markets, and changes to the competitive landscape.

Internal drivers are within your control. What are your goals and objectives? Which are priorities, needs, or wants?  Do you have defined business plans and targets for investment?

Many of your internal drivers may be responding to external drivers.  Identifying these drivers, and their priority, will guide business and technology solutions over the coming year.

2 Review Your IT Lifecycle

Review your hardware and software inventory, and where each item sits in its lifecycle. Document applications or systems due upgrades; catalog servers, infrastructure, and user devices due for replacement.  Use this assessment to schedule necessary expenditures.

Also, consider if now is the time to upgrade or replace older systems with managed cloud-based solutions or services. Doing so can reduce capital expenditures and may provide more scalable resources and services.

3 Define IT Initiatives

Having planned for scheduled hardware and software refreshes, use your priorities list of business drivers to create a finite set of IT initiatives.

Your business drivers should trigger business decisions, actions, and plans. Analyze these plans for how IT services can enable or support the desired actions and outcomes. This strategy and analysis becomes your IT requirements for the coming year.  The priority of your business goals and objectives will set the priority for your IT initiatives.

Your IT initiatives are defined, manageable projects that meet your IT requirements.

4 Benchmark Your Security CPR

Security CPR is our model for pragmatic protection for your business.

  • Communicate & Educate
  • Protect & Prevent
  • Respond & Recover

Your IT initiatives will, without a doubt, interact with your security services.  Take a step back and review your security protocols and systems.

  • Verify that you remain in compliance with legal and industry regulations
  • Validate that your IT initiatives will do no harm, or will enhance your security profile
  • Adjust your security services to changing risks, priorities, and threats

5 Set Clear Priorities

Your budget has limits.  With security considerations in place, prioritize your IT spending. We recommend prioritizing within three distinct categories:

  • Lifecycle Events – Replace and upgrade aging hardware and software
  • Operating Expenses – Ongoing costs for cloud, services, and resources
  • Investments – Your IT initiatives

6 Build Your Budget

Allocate your target budget to each of the categories.  Fund items in each group from highest priority on down.

One key to building the budget is to facilitate some give and take.  Moving budget between categories can be done, carefully, in ways that benefit each aspect of your IT spending.

For example, moving to Remote Desktops in a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) cloud can extend the life of desktops and laptops by 2 to 3 years. Delaying system upgrades can be a safe move if your initiatives are working towards replacement.

7 Create Your Schedule

While it is natural to want to get everything done right away and all at once, thoughtful scheduling increases your likelihood of success for your 2024 IT Action Plan.

Scheduling starts with actions: the what, when, how, and how of your IT initiatives. Smart scheduling will also include consideration of dependencies and resource availability.

Going one step further, review your business cycle limitations. Avoid scheduling projects, particularly critical paths, that conflict with more intense periods within your business cycle. You may have a busy season, or need to be careful not to impact your quarterly close and reporting. Whatever demands your business cycle creates, adjust your planning and schedule around them.

How Cumulus Global Can Help You

We focus on helping clients get the most value from their current IT services and new, cloud forward solutions.  As you build your 2024 IT Action Plan, we can help. With a history of strategic IT consulting services, we can help you build your plan, review plans you have drafted, or simply discuss options.

Click here to schedule a call with a Cloud Advisor or send us an email. There is no cost and no obligation.

About the Author

Bill Seybolt bio pictureBill is a Senior Cloud Advisor responsible for helping small and midsize organizations with cloud forward solutions that meet their business needs, priorities, and budgets. Bill works with executives, leaders, and team members to understand workflows, identify strategic goals and tactical requirements, and design solutions and implementation phases. Having helped over 200 organizations successfully adopt cloud solutions, his expertise and working style ensure a comfortable experience effective change management. 

 

Webcasts

Data Loss Prevention (DLP) for SMBs

/in

(02/18/25) – If your business must comply with government or industry regulations covering disclosure of protected information, Data Loss Prevention (DLP) can be complex and expensive. This session coves affordable, effective DLP solutions for small and midsize businesses, like yours.

Read more

Your 2025 IT Checklist

/in

(01/21/25) – 2025 will be a year of change.  Expect new economic, political, business, and technology opportunities and challenges. Smart IT spending requires upfront planning. A 2025 IT Checklist for creates a roadmap for cost-effective IT decisions that yield better results.

Read more

A Techy Look at 2025

/in

(12/17/24) – Technology, the economy, and governmental policies will each impact our businesses in separate and intertwining ways. Consider these 5 technology related Issues as you make your 2025 plans

Read more

IT Safety for Sole Practitioners, Startups, and Smaller Businesses

/in

(11/19/24) – Your computer, and your IT services, are your business lifeline. Manage, protect, and secure them to protect your business. Here are affordable solutions to protect you and your business.

Read more

Google Gemini Quick Start

/in

(10/15/24) – The value of Google Gemini depends on how well you are able to use it. This Gemini Quick Start gives you an overview of your options, shares more than 11 ways you can use Gemini, and covers Gemini’s limitations.

Read more

Cybersecurity: Enough is Enough

/in

(9/24/24) – Beyond industry and regulatory requirements, your cybersecurity should match your business’s risks, needs, and budget .. and nothing more. This event focuses on affordably scaling your cybersecurity.

Read more

Check Your IT Blind Spots

/in

(7/23/24) – Blind Spots evolve when we fail to reassess decisions as technology, business, and other factors change over time. Checking your IT Blind Spots will identify opportunities for savings, security, and improvements.

Read more

Select Your Managed Cloud Services

/in

(01/16/24) – The right managed cloud services can significantly impact your team’s productivity. You can ensure your systems are secure, you team is productive, and that you are protected against cyber attacks and other disruptions. Just as important, you can protect your budget.

Read more

Your 2024 IT Action Plan

/in

(12/19/2023) – When planning for the upcoming year, we often forget to consider the role our technology and services can play in supporting our business goals and objectives. Align your IT plans to best support your business goals.

Read more