Expanding your at-home workforce may have a significant impact on IT architecture, security, and corporate workflows. Progent has 20 years of background assisting small and mid-size businesses to plan, configure, manage, optimize, and troubleshoot IT networks that support at-home workers. Progent can assist your Akron organization to select the right technologies and adhere to best practices in building and operating a secure virtual solution for teleworkers that facilitates teamwork and delivers top business value. Progent can provide support services that go from as-needed guidance for getting you past occasional IT roadblocks to comprehensive project management or co-management to help you carry out mission-critical tasks.
Progent's consultants can help Akron, Ohio companies to succeed with any aspect of building a high-performing work-from-home environment by providing infrastructure configuration services, VoIP PBX troubleshooting, video conferencing integration, collaboration platform selection and deployment, cloud integration, Call Desk augmentation, cybersecurity, backup/restore solutions, and streamlined management.
Network Infrastructure for a Remote Workforce
Configuring the network infrastructure required for an at-home work environment can be particularly challenging if you have to manage a mix of worker-owned hardware like PCs and notebooks, routers, and wireless appliances from different manufacturers and with a mix of OS software and firmware levels. Progent's experience delivering online help for both legacy as well as current IT products in virtual office venues enables you to make cost-effective use of your available infrastructure and offers ready access to top-tire consultants for implement essential updates. Support services offered by Progent to help your company to implement a productive work-at-home ecosystem include:
VoIP Integration for an At-Home Workforce
Expanding the company phone system to accommodate teleworkers is critical to supporting an effective at-home workforce. A variety of cloud-centric VoIP platforms are used by SMBs to server remote users. Many enterprises rely on Cisco's current or legacy platforms for VoIP management. Progent can help organizations of all sizes to design or tune a telecommuter VoIP service that delivers the flexibility, convenience and protection required for at-home workers. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE IP Voice consultants can provide advanced support to assist organizations tune their current Cisco IP voice environments to handle an expanding remote workforce.
Video Conferencing for Teleworkers
A wide selection of voice/video conferencing platforms from major technology companies support virtual meetings, video conferencing, chat sessions, and screen/content sharing for both onsite workers and telecommuters. Many companies use a mix of products to accommodate their various partners and clients. Progent's communications experts can assist you to maintain your current conferencing environment and optimize the experience of your remote employees.
Microsoft Collaboration Software for Telecommuters
Microsoft's collaboration platforms are tightly integrated with Microsoft's popular Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365 families, offering a rich environment of productivity apps that deliver a consistent user experience for exchanging information across multiple sites and on a broad selection of endpoints. Progent has delivered online consulting support for SharePoint and Exchange since their original publication and can assist businesses to tune these critical collaboration products to optimize the effectiveness of your remote workers.
SharePoint utilizes web entities to facilitate collaboration and information delivery by providing policy-based access to data, business processes, and utilities for searching through enterprise-wide information silos. SharePoint permits you to create protected portals that allows remote workers to see and update aggregated corporate intelligence via Intranets (Wikis), Blogs, social networking sites, and Web Parts. To find out about Progent's SharePoint expertise, go to SharePoint configuration and application development consulting.
Exchange and Exchange Online offer secure collaboration features including public folders, shared mailboxes, and shared calendars and contacts. Progent's Microsoft certified Exchange experts can show you how to activate and utilize these features for your at-home workers. To learn about Progent's Exchange consulting services, refer to deployment consulting for Microsoft Exchange Server.
OneDrive is Microsoft's collaborative cloud-based file hosting and synchronization service, similar to GoogleDrive. At-home workers can store files to the OneDrive service, and co-workers can share them securely through a web browser. Provided with Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365, OneDrive enables remote workers to co-author files. Revisions made offline are uploaded when you go back online. For details about Progent's consulting services for OneDrive, see Microsoft Onedrive configuration experts.
Cloud Integration Services for Telecommuters
Progent offers fast and affordable remote assistance for enabling businesses to create, manage and optimize cohesive hybrid network models that combine internal data centers, at-home workers, branch offices, plus public cloud resources. Progent offers top-tier consultant for all modes of public cloud service such as Infrastructure as a Service, Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS). Progent can help at-home workers resolve issues with public cloud access, authentication, and cybersecurity.
Microsoft Azure is a popular family of public cloud services that allows you to utilize IT infrastructure, virtual servers, and key apps hosted on Microsoft's massive cloud. Microsoft Azure offers over 100 services services such as the ability to host Windows and Linux-based VMs, scalable cloud storage, messaging, application development with Visual Studio, and data protection. Progent can help your organization to deploy VMs on Azure Virtual Machines, integrate storage on Azure Storage services, unify identity control with Azure AD, and plan data backup and recovery solutions with Azure Backup. Progent's cloud experts can also help you establish protected access to Azure for at-home workers by configuring and debugging firewalls and VPN IPsec tunnels. To find out about Progent's consulting services for Microsoft Azure, visit Azure consulting services.
Microsoft 365, formerly called Office 365, is Microsoft's popular suite of business productivity applications and cloud-based services offered on a subscription basis. Microsoft apps and cloud services are marketed in a selection of plans designed for users ranging from students and households to major corporations. Progent can provide quick and easy remote access to consultants knowledgeable about Microsoft 365-compatible clients based on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Google Android technology. Progent can help you to assess the numerous subscription bundles offered with Microsoft 365 and configure 365 applications for your remote workers to achieve maximum business value. For details about Progent's consulting services for Microsoft 365, go to Microsoft 365 integration expertise.
Exchange Online is one of the most popular applications in Azure-hosted Microsoft 365 product line. Exchange Online offers the benefits of lower costs for physical infrastructure, simplified management, dynamic scaling, high availability, and additional advantages associated with cloud computing. Microsoft has engineered Microsoft 365 Exchange Online to run smoothly with on-premises deployments of Exchange, enabling customers to create hybrid cloud/onsite information systems. Progent's Exchange experts are available for as-needed assistance to get you past tough technical bottlenecks and also offer end-to-end project management outsourcing to make sure your remote workers have easy and secure access to your Microsoft 365 Exchange Online environment. For details Progent's consulting expertise for Exchange Online, go to Exchange Online integration and troubleshooting consulting.
Amazon AWS is a pioneer in the public cloud computing arena and is the world's leading provider of cloud services. Progent offers fast and affordable online access to cloud integration consultants who can assist your business to design, implement, manage, and debug hybrid information networks that integrate Amazon AWS cloud services with local data centers and with other popular cloud platforms such as Azure. Progent also offers access to Cisco-certified CCIE networking consultants to help you to create a high-availability network architecture to make sure your users have a productive computing experience regardless of whether they are working from your main office, a remote branch, at home, or on the road. To learn about Progent's support services for Amazon AWS, go to Amazon AWS consulting support.
Google Cloud (GCP) is a popular suite of public cloud services that provides Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and Platform-as-a-Service products. Progent's certified Microsoft, Linux, and Cisco consulting experts can assist you to extend your current IT assets with the Google Cloud, and Progent's DBA experts can show you how to make your mission-critical applications cloud friendly so your remote workers can benefit fully from Google Cloud services. Progent can help your business to set up VMs on Google Cloud Compute Engine, plan a cost-effective storage solution with Google Cloud Storage services, and streamline identity management for telecommuters with Google Cloud Identity. Progent's experts can also help your business to utilize GCP's unified management technology to administer and monitor your GCP environment. To learn, refer to Google Cloud Platform (GCP) consulting support.
Help Desk Support for At-Home Workers
A fast, organization-wide switchover to a telecommuter business model, which might be driven by an epidemic or as part of a business continuity process, can overwhelm even a high-performing in-house Support Desk. Progent's Help Desk Call Center services allow organizations to outsource or augment their Call Desk by using Progent's online Technical Response Center (TRC) team.
Security and Compliance for Teleworkers
Work-from-Home (WFH) workers commonly utilize their own devices and often operate in an unsecured physical space. This situation increases their susceptibility to cyber threats and calls for judicious configuration of corporate firewalls, anti-malware tools, MFA-based identity verification, remote endpoint monitoring, thorough user training, and the development of policies built on best practices. Progent's seasoned team of data security support experts can assist you to design, deploy and manage a compliant security solution that protects critical information resources in environments that incorporate remote workers.
Firewalls allow companies to create a network that can be safely accessed by on-premises users and by telecommuters, mobile users, suppliers, customers, and other stakeholders. Modern firewall appliances allow you to assign and control different access rights to different groups of users and to scale your network and adjust your security profile as your business evolves and as cyber threats become more sophisticated. Progent works with both new and older security appliances from all leading vendors including Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Check Point, Juniper, and Fortinet. For more information about Progent's firewall configuration expertise, go to firewall configuration and support expertise.
Online Endpoint Monitoring makes it easy to watch over the disparate computers utilized by at-home workers and either block or identify and mitigate modern threats such as ransomware. With Progent's ProSight Active Security Monitoring (ASM) services, a lightweight software agent is put on each protected endpoint, watching all activity and using advanced AI technology from SentinelOne to identify new threats at inception. When a cyberattack is discovered, ProSight Active Security Monitoring instantly isolates the infected device from the network to quarantine the threat. Since the ProSight Active Security Monitoring software agent is self-contained, endpoints remain secure even when they are offline. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, reseller, and integrator. For more information about ProSight ASM, go to remote endpoint monitoring for at-home workers.
Progent's Duo MFA service plans incorporate Cisco's Duo cloud technology to defend against stolen passwords by using two-factor authentication. Duo enables one-tap identity confirmation on Apple iOS, Android, and other personal devices. With Duo 2FA, whenever you sign into a protected application and give your password you are requested to verify your identity via a unit that only you possess and that is accessed using a different ("out-of-band") network channel. A broad selection of devices can be utilized for this added form of authentication such as a smartphone or wearable, a hardware token, a landline telephone, etc. You can designate multiple validation devices. To find out more about Duo two-factor identity validation services, go to Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services for an at-home workforce.
Security Audits can evaluate the exposure of your information system to all types of outside and local security attacks for an environment that includes at-home workers. Progent can deploy online, automated cybersecurity analysis software for quickly and economically uncovering a broad range of security weaknesses that can be surfaced over the Internet. Progent's endpoint security audit consulting services, which can be managed by network security experts with advanced credentials including CISA, ISSAP, and GIAC, can assist your company to evaluate your workflows and policies and review your WAN infrastructure to allow you to design the highest level of protection for your telecommuters.
Download White Paper: Securing a Work-From-Home (WFH) Network
To read or download a white paper about critical areas to concentrate on for protecting an IT environment that supports telecommuters, click:
Securing a Work-From-Home (WFH) Environment White Paper. (PDF - 2.4 MB)
Data Protection Solutions for At-Home Workers
The field of Data Protection covers backing up and restoring critical information so as to prevent data loss and minimize recovery time and effort in case of storage system problems resulting from hardware breakdowns, software hiccups, operator mistakes, cyber attack, or other causes. Dependable data protection solutions can be particularly difficult to design and maintain in hybrid environments that combine in-house data centers, public clouds, and at-home workers.
Unified Management for an At-Home Workforce
Microsoft has renamed and rebundled its endpoint management platforms under the name Microsoft Endpoint Manager, which includes Intune for cloud-based management of remote devices and Configuration Manager for managing local endpoints. Endpoint Manager features a unified platform for protecting corporate information by controlling onsite, mobile, and at-home endpoint devices.
Intune
Intune is part of Microsoft's Endpoint Management suite that also includes Configuration Manager. Intune is a cloud-based service for managing and securing mobile devices and applications. Managed endpoint computers can be user owned or company owned. IT admins managing the enrolled endpoint devices of telecommuters can utilize Intune to deploy and validate apps on devices, push updates and certificates, configure rules for accessing information and resources, manage passwords, establish VPN tunnels, determine how telecommuters share data, establish threat protection, ensure compliance, and wipe corporate information from missing, stolen or decommissioned endpoint devices. Intune runs with iOS/iPadOS, Google Android, Windows, and macOS/OS X devices. To learn about Microsoft Intune and to find out how Progent can help you to use this platform to administer the endpoint devices of your at-home workers, see Intune remote endpoint management consultants.
VMware Workspace ONE
VMware Workspace ONE is a feature-rich unified Mobile Device Management (MDM) product that allows network administrators to keep off-premises endpoints current and secure. Workspace ONE incorporates VMware AirWatch for unified endpoint management along with VMware's Horizon virtual application delivery technology for authorization control, application management, and setup management of endpoint computers. Workspace ONE operates with devices powered by Windows 10, macOS, iOS, Google Android, Chrome OS, or leading distros of Linux. VMware Workspace ONE is offered by subscription as a cloud-based service or as an on-premises deployment through a one-time purchase. Key capabilities of VMware Workspace ONE include fast remote provisioning of out-of-the-box notebooks, immediate onboarding of new users, policy set up and enforcement for all classes of endpoints, aggregated reporting and analytics, email encryption, and tight integration with Microsoft applications and cloud services. To find out about Progent's expertise for VMware Workspace ONE, see VMware Workspace ONE mobile endpoint management expertise.
Contact Progent for Remote Workforce Expertise
To get in touch with Progent about building and maintaining a productive telecommuter solution for your Akron, Ohio business, phone