If fire, flood or theft hits your office then insurance should cover your tangible assets, but no amount of money can recover lost data. That is why backups are so crucial as your data insurance.
Disasters don’t just happen to other people. Something as simple as a faulty power supply or burst water pipe could take out your office at any time. It’s also easy to lose or break notebooks and tablets when you’re out on the road.
Don’t keep all your eggs in one basket
Hardware and software can be easily replaced, but your precious business data cannot. You might occasionally back up your important files to USB stick, disc or even a Network Attached Storage drive. However, they won’t save the day if you’ve left them in the office and they’re also destroyed by disaster.
It’s important to keep “offsite” backups away from the office, so your business data is safe and sound should disaster strike.
You might do this manually on a USB drive, but this still leaves you at risk of losing data. If you only back up offsite monthly, then when disaster strikes you could lose a month’s work. This compounds the lost productivity as you struggle to get back on your feet.
Look to the cloud
The best approach is to automate your offsite backups and store this data in the cloud. You’ll minimise the amount of data lost in a disaster and speed up the recovery process.
Some cloud backup services let you access your files from any device so you can keep working. This can help you keep the lights on while your recovery plan is put into action.
Rather than just backing up in the cloud, you might choose to move some entire systems to the cloud, such as your Office suite, accounting package and Customer Relationship Management system.
Along with keeping your data safe in the event of a disaster, cloud services can also form the foundation of a mobility strategy to help your people work anywhere, anytime. They’ll have access to everything they need to get things done.
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