BlackCSI Blog

Now that we’re in Q3 of 2023, it’s time to start planning out your budget for the next fiscal year—including your IT services budget. Let’s go over some of the considerations you’ll need to keep in mind for this remarkably important aspect of running your business.

Running a business is hard enough without having to think about cybersecurity. Your business faces existential threats from cyberattacks every day it’s operational, as data breaches truly do have the power to bring your business down if you’re not prepared for the fallout. A zero trust approach can help to mitigate many of the risks that come from cybersecurity threats, and it’s all thanks to the principle of least permission.

Anyone who has spent a considerable amount of time in a professional occupation knows that meetings come with the territory. After all, running a business requires a lot of coordination, communication, and teamwork, and meetings are opportunities for employees to gather and discuss important business-related ideas. However, the amount of time wasted and misused on unnecessary meetings is a topic of concern.

Remote work is now more common than it has ever been before, so we want to ensure that you are informed about the security implications of switching from in-house operations to remote or hybrid operations. Let’s discuss some practical ways you can implement remote work security policies and procedures.

Remote work doesn’t come without its fair share of issues, but with a little creativity and ingenuity, you can help your remote employees overcome them. Let’s examine structured problem solving, a particularly helpful approach to issue resolution that can help your team be more productive throughout the workday.

AI is a major topic lately, whether it’s on the topic of new and upcoming chatbots that are capable of generating text or making art that can compete with even the most skilled of artists. AI is commonly targeted as a culprit in stealing jobs, as well, and with these applications becoming more sophisticated over time, it’s no wonder people aren’t sure how to react to these developments.

The past several years have brought about innovations in artificial intelligence, or AI, that has workers worried for their jobs—especially as it moves into more practical and usable mediums. This can all be tied to the Turing Test, a way of measuring the intelligence of a computer, created by one of the most notable minds behind computing, Alan Turing.

Have you heard the term “quiet quitting''?” It’s been going around lately, and it can be a problem if it isn’t addressed. Let’s examine what quiet quitting is, what it means for your business, and what you can do to solve it.

Most people will spend about one-third of their lives at work. Naturally, this large amount of time spent away from home can lead to a lot of stress. Emotions can overwhelm your employees and lead them to experience negative side effects that could impact their physical and mental health. Let’s examine some ways you can minimize the workday stressors that your employees may suffer from.

It’s no shock that business executives are already busy enough, but you need to add “knowing more about your IT infrastructure” to that list if you haven’t already done so. It’s critical that you are on the same page as your IT staff, and this relationship will fuel productive relations with both your technology and the staff utilizing it.

Customer relationship management software, or CRM tools, are not just for use by large corporations with a large workforce. They can be used by small businesses, too, and there are several benefits for an SMB to use one. Here are some of the many benefits you can expect to receive from using a CRM for your organization.

Virtualizing your business’ software is pretty much just keeping it in an online environment, as compared to your own network infrastructure. This means that it lives in the cloud, delivered to you through the Internet. This approach has proved fortuitous for a great many businesses, so it only stands to reason that virtualizing hardware is a reasonable next step.

If nothing else is certain, then you can bet that the need to improve circumstances or processes gives birth to innovations of all types. Technology has proven this time and again, as new solutions have emerged to solve previously unsolvable issues and challenges not only in the workplace, but in society as a whole. Let’s examine how economic difficulty has driven innovation, specifically in the technology sector.

Managers and employees might work for the same company, but the reality is that their responsibilities and experiences are two very different things. When you promote someone new to management, or if you join their ranks for yourself, you’ll have to keep certain practices in mind. Let’s go over some of these practices and how IT can ease some of the burden.

Remote circumstances have forced businesses to ask themselves some hard questions, specifically in regards to network security and cybersecurity. We all know that it’s important, but a zero-trust model takes things to a whole other level. Let’s take a look at this concept and why it might be just the model you need to guarantee maximum security for your company.

News flash: the workplace is somewhere work needs to get done. Unfortunately, it’s not always as easy as this. There are plenty of factors that can influence an employee’s productivity. You can make things easier for them by creating a productive environment. Here’s how you might go about doing so.

For many companies, their first experiences with modern collaboration tools came about as a result of the unfortunate circumstances surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic. Some were forced to go entirely remote, while others completely halted operations for an indefinite period of time. While collaboration tools are designed to bring people together, it might come at a cost.

It doesn’t take a genius to understand the importance of IT maintenance and management, but it’s often easier said than done to make sure it happens properly. A new survey from Gartner suggests that this might get even more challenging, as IT employees are increasingly more likely to leave their place of work than other, non-IT employees.

We work with a lot of businesses, but one in particular may surprise you. Let’s talk about how our services made a certain organization’s critical processes a lot easier to manage during their busiest time of year:

There is a lot to say about having the right IT, but at some point, you have to ask if you are receiving diminishing returns on your investments. Implementing too much technology can be a very real problem, especially in terms of the software you choose to implement. Let’s take a look at some of the warning signs and see what you can do about them.