Expanding your remote workforce can have a major impact on IT infrastructure, cybersecurity, and corporate culture. Progent has two decades of experience assisting small and mid-size businesses to plan, configure, manage, optimize, and debug IT networks that support work-from-home employees. Progent can help your Charlotte company to pick the right technologies and follow leading practices in creating and operating a secure virtual solution for telecommuters that promotes teamwork and delivers maximum value. Progent can provide services that go from on demand guidance for getting you past challenging technical bottlenecks to comprehensive project management or co-management to help you carry out mission-critical tasks.

Progent can help Charlotte, North Caroline companies to with any facet of creating a high-functioning remote work environment by providing network infrastructure configuration services, VoIP PBX troubleshooting, video conferencing integration, collaboration platform customization and training, cloud connectivity, Help Desk outsourcing, data security, data protection solutions, and unified management.

Network Infrastructure for an At-Home Workforce
Configuring the network infrastructure required to support a remote work environment can be particularly complex if you have to accommodate a combination of worker-owned equipment such as PCs and notebooks, Internet routers, and Wi-Fi APs from an assortment of vendors and with a variety of operating systems and firmware releases. Progent's background providing online help for both legacy as well as current technologies in remote office venues allows you to make efficient use of your existing infrastructure and provides you with ready access to expertise for making necessary updates. Services offered by Progent to assist you to create a productive telecommuting infrastructure include:

  • Virtual Private Network technology allows you to create a secure tunnel for authenticated remote workers to use IT resources situated at your corporate datacenter or in a public cloud. Progent's consultants can assist your company to deploy and manage VPN access between your teleworkers and your key network resources by providing online VPN configuration consulting. For businesses using Cisco's ASA security appliances, Progent's Cisco ASA Firewall experts can assist your telecommuters to set up Cisco's popular AnyConnect software for secure VPN tunneling for a broad selection of devices including Windows, Mac, iOS, Linux, and Google Android.
  • Virtual Desktop Infrastructure products enable a telecommuter to see and use a data center PC's desktop. This gives network managers significant control over the computing environment of telecommuters and offers them a familiar experience. Progent's VDI consulting services include Windows Remote Desktop integration and Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops expertise.
  • Routers attach at-home networks to the Internet and support VPN tunnels, home wireless networks, and firewalls. Progent can provide top-tier remote consulting for setting up home routers from all major vendors. See router configuration services from Cisco-certified consultants.
  • Home Wi-Fi networks, often shared by the whole family and visitors, are frequently utilized by telecommuters to access their router for work. This can cause throughput and cybersecurity problems. Progent can assist you to resolve these issues by delivering services that include Cisco Aironet configuration consulting, Cisco-certified Meraki WiFi deployment consulting, and Ubiquiti Unifi WiFi AP setup help.
  • Internet connectivity solutions impact the speed and reliability of connections between at-home workers and the corporate network. Mission-critical processes might require redundant Internet connections in case the primary connection fails. Progent can provide guidance for identifying service providers, choosing sensible bandwidth and data volume bundles, and setting up redundant Internet connections. See Internet connectivity solutions.

VoIP Solutions for Telecommuters
Expanding the business PBX environment to include teleworkers is vital to supporting an effective work-at-home solution. A broad range of cloud-based digital PBX platforms are used by small and mid-size businesses to server telecommuters. Many enterprises rely on Cisco's current or older products for VoIP management. Progent can assist organizations of any size to design or tune a telecommuter VoIP environment that provides the flexibility, convenience and protection required for at-home workers. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE Voice consultants can provide advanced support to help businesses optimize their existing Cisco VoIP systems to handle an expanding remote workforce.

  • Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM) extends advanced telephony capabilities to devices like IP phones, media processing products, Voice over IP gateways, and mixed media software deployed across the network. Unified Communications Manager manages additional mixed media services such as messaging, voice/video conferencing, and team collaboration networks. For details about Progent's CUCM expertise, refer to Cisco Unified Communications Manager expertise.
  • CallManager is Cisco's legacy call-processing agent and has been replaced by Cisco Unified CM or CUCM. Progent's consultants can help you to maintain your existing CallManager deployment or upgrade smoothly to Cisco's current IP telephony products. For details about Progent's support services for CallManager and Cisco's other legacy IP voice products, refer to CallManager expertise.
  • Cisco IP Gateways provide connectivity with PSTN networks and with clients operating outside the corporate firewall like at-home workers. Progent can provide expert support for Cisco's earlier generation IP gateways such as the UC520, UC540 and UC560 series as well as for current Cisco SIP gateways. See Cisco SIP gateway configuration expertise.
  • Additional VoIP Platforms supported by Progent include Vonage, Intermedia Unite and 8x8. Progent can assist you to enhance your wide area network architecture to work with these solutions and provide as-needed deployment and troubleshooting services.

Voice/Video Conferencing for an At-Home Workforce
A broad selection of voice/video conferencing products from leading technology companies enable virtual discussions, video conferencing, chat, and screen sharing for both onsite workers and at-home workers. Many organizations utilize multiple products to meet the needs of their various partners and customers. Progent can assist your organization to maintain your existing voice/video conferencing environment and optimize the engagement of your at-home workforce.

  • Skype for Business is Microsoft's leading communications product that enables presence, instant messaging, audio and video conferencing plus the transparent integration of these functions within Office desktop and Microsoft 365 productivity software such as PowerPoint, Word, Excel and Outlook. Progent offers the skills of Microsoft-certified consultants who can help your company to deploy and maintain Skype for Business client software to accommodate your at-home employees. For details about Progent's consulting expertise for Skype for Business, see Skype for Business integration services.
  • FaceTime is Apple's group video phone app for compatible iOS, iPadOS, iPod and macOS devices. FaceTime works over Wi-Fi or cellular Internet connections. Later versions of FaceTime support as many as 32 simultaneous users for video calls. To learn more about Progent's consulting expertise for FaceTime, visit Progent's FaceTime configuration expertise.
  • Webex Meeting Center supports remote conferencing for virtually all desktop or mobile devices. Offered via Cisco's Webex Cloud platform, Webex capabilities include sharing granular content or computer screens, presentations that embed rich media including Microsoft PowerPoint and Flash videos, network-based capture, plus editing and playback for future reference and training. For details about Progent's consulting expertise for Webex as well as for additional IP video products from Cisco, see Progent's Webex Meeting Center support services.
  • Teams is Microsoft's follow-up for Skype for Business. Teams provides a portal for conversations, contacts, and content with capabilities such as video calling, persistent threaded chat, plus data sharing. For details about Progent's support services for Teams as well as for other Microsoft 365 products, see Progent's Microsoft Teams consulting services.
  • Other Voice/Video Conferencing Platforms supported by Progent include Google Meet, Amazon Chime, Zoom, and Slack. Progent can provide integration and troubleshooting expertise for these products and help you to tune your network infrastructure to run them.

Microsoft Integrated Collaboration Software for Remote Workers
Microsoft's collaboration products are tightly integrated with Microsoft's popular Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365 families, providing a powerful ecosystem of applications that deliver a cohesive user experience for sharing data and ideas across multiple sites and on a broad range of endpoints. Progent has provided remote consulting services for SharePoint and Exchange Server since their original publication and can assist businesses to tune these critical collaboration platforms to optimize the effectiveness of your at-home workforce.

SharePoint Server Deployment Consultants for Remote WorkersSharePoint utilizes web sites to promote collaboration and information delivery by providing policy-driven delivery of content, workflow, and utilities for looking through company-wide information silos. SharePoint permits you to create protected portals that permits remote workers to view and update consolidated corporate intelligence by means of Wikis, Blogs, social networking web sites, and Web Parts. For information about Progent's SharePoint support services, see SharePoint integration and development expertise.

Exchange Configuration Experts for At-Home WorkersExchange 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. For details about Progent's Exchange consulting expertise, refer to deployment consulting for Exchange.

Onedrive Integration Experts for At-Home WorkersOneDrive is Microsoft's shared cloud file hosting and synchronization service, comparable to GoogleDrive. Remote users can store files to the OneDrive service, and co-workers anywhere can share them safely through a web browser. Provided with Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365, OneDrive enables remote employees to co-author files. Edits created offline are automatically synced when you go back online. To learn about Progent's consulting expertise for OneDrive, visit Onedrive integration experts.

Cloud Integration for Teleworkers
Progent can provide affordable online assistance for helping businesses to build, maintain and troubleshoot cohesive hybrid network models that include physical data centers, telecommuters, branches, and cloud services. Progent can provide expertise for all modes of cloud service delivery including Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service. Progent can help telecommuters resolve problems with public cloud access, authentication, and security.

Microsoft Azure Integration Services for At-Home WorkersMicrosoft Azure is a leading family of public cloud software and services that allows you to utilize infrastructure, servers, and critical applications hosted on Microsoft's extensive cloud. Microsoft Azure includes more than 100 cloud-based services including hosting for Windows and Linux-powered virtual machines, scalable cloud storage, messaging, application development with Visual Studio, and backup/restore. Progent can help your organization to deploy VMs on Azure Virtual Machines, integrate storage on Azure Storage services, streamline identity management with Azure Active Directory, and plan data backup and restore solutions with Azure Backup. Progent can also show you how to establish protected connections to Azure for at-home workers by configuring and debugging firewalls and VPN tunnels. For details about Progent's consulting services for Azure, go to Microsoft Azure consulting.

Microsoft 365 Integration for TelecommutersMicrosoft 365, previously called Office 365, is Microsoft's popular family of client productivity applications and cloud services available by subscription. Office applications and services are marketed in a variety of plans intended for users ranging from individuals and households to large corporations. Progent can provide fast and easy online contact with consultants knowledgeable about Microsoft 365-compatible endpoints based on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Google Android operating systems. Progent's experts can assist your business to evaluate the various subscription plans available for Microsoft 365 and configure 365 apps for your remote workers to achieve top business value. For information about Progent's consulting expertise for Microsoft 365, refer to Microsoft 365 consulting expertise.

Exchange Online Integration Services for TeleworkersExchange Online is one of the most popular cloud-based applications in Azure-hosted Microsoft 365 product line. Microsoft 365 Exchange Online offers the benefits of reduced spending for physical infrastructure, easier management, dynamic scaling, high reliability, and other benefits inherent with public clouds. Microsoft has engineered Exchange Online to operate smoothly with local deployments of Exchange, enabling you to build hybrid information systems. Progent's certified Exchange consultants can provide as-needed help to get you through challenging IT roadblocks and also offer end-to-end project management outsourcing to make sure your telecommuters have easy and safe access to your Microsoft 365 Exchange Online environment. To find out Progent's consulting expertise for Exchange Online, see Microsoft 365 Exchange Online configuration and troubleshooting consulting.

Amazon AWS Integration Services for TeleworkersAmazon Web Services (AWS) is a pioneer in the public cloud market and is the world's top source of cloud services. Progent offers quick and economical online access to cloud integration consultants who can help your business to design, implement, maintain, and troubleshoot hybrid information networks that integrate Amazon AWS cloud services with local resources and with other popular cloud platforms like Microsoft Azure. Progent also offers access to Cisco-certified CCIE networking experts to assist your company to create a high-uptime network model to make sure your employees have a consistent computing environment regardless of whether they are working from your main office, a remote branch, at home, or on the road. For information about Progent's expertise for Amazon AWS, see Amazon AWS integration services.

Google Cloud Integration for Remote WorkersGoogle Cloud Platform (GCP) is a popular set of cloud computing services that provides Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) products. Progent's Microsoft, Linux, and Cisco consulting experts can help your organization to scale your current IT assets with the Google Cloud Platform, and Progent's database consultants can help you make your critical apps cloud friendly so your remote workers can take full advantage of Google Cloud Platform services. Progent's consultants can help you to set up VMs on GCP Compute Engine, plan a cost-effective storage solution with Google Cloud Storage services, and simplify identity management for teleworkers with Google Cloud Identity services. Progent can also assist your organization to utilize GCP's unified management technology to control and monitor your Google Cloud environment. For information, refer to Google Cloud Platform integration expertise.

Help Desk Support for Telecommuters
An emergency, enterprise-wide switchover to a telecommuter business model, which could be driven by a pandemic or as an element of a disaster recovery/business continuity plan, can overstretch even a well-staffed internal Call Center. Progent's Help Desk services allow organizations of any size to outsource or supplement their Call Desk with Progent's remote Technical Response Center team.

  • Progent's Standard Help Desk Call Center support services utilize Progent's nationwide team of remote technical support specialists along with world-class trouble ticketing and follow-up technology to provide an economical, state-of-the-art Help Desk. Progent's Standard Help Desk Services provide a comprehensive solution that addresses all aspects of online Level 1 desktop support from help requests to ticket generation, desktop sharing, issue resolution, and reporting. A web-based User's Service Portal enables from-home workers to track or revise the status of their active tickets, enter information, and append screenshots and relevant files. Support services are provided at a substantial discount off Progent's normal Level 1 desktop support rates, and Progent makes available the option of fast hand-off to Level 2 and Level 3 IT specialists to resolve complex issues. For more information, visit Progent's Standard Helpdesk Services outsourcing for small businesses.
  • Progent's Call Center Supplemental Service enables you to augment your current Call Center team by splitting responsibilities for Support Desk support transparently between your regular IT support organization and Progent's nationwide pool of PC support technicians and subject matter experts. Progent's shared Help Desk Call Center service is based on a collective support model based on the leading professional services automation platform for handling service requests and trouble tickets, establishing responsibility, monitoring progress, and generating reports. To learn how Progent's Help Desk Supplementation Services can enable your company to provide world-class IT support to your telecommuters, visit Progent's Support Desk augmentation Services.

Security and Compliance for Teleworkers
At-home employees typically use their personal computing devices and often operate in an unsecured physical environment. This situation multiplies their vulnerability to malware threats and calls for judicious configuration of corporate firewalls, anti-malware tools, MFA-based identity verification, remote monitoring, intensive user education, and the development of security policies built on best practices. Progent's veteran roster of IT security solutions consultants can assist you to design, implement and manage a compliant cybersecurity solution that protects vital IT resources in networks that include at-home workers.

Firewall Integration Services for At-Home WorkersFirewalls enable companies to build a network that can be securely utilized by local users and by an at-home workforce, mobile workers, vendors, clients, and the public. Next-generation firewall appliances allow you to assign and control different permissions to various classes of users and to scale your network and modify your cybersecurity posture as your company evolves and as cyber threats become more complex. Progent works with both current and legacy firewall devices from all major vendors like Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Check Point, Juniper, and Fortinet. To learn more about Progent's firewall integration expertise, refer to firewall support services.

Remote Security Monitoring Services for TelecommutersOnline Endpoint Monitoring makes it easy to watch over the disparate devices used by an at-home workforce and either reject or identify and mitigate modern threats like ransomware. With ProSight Active Security Monitoring (ASM) services, a lightweight software agent is put on every secured endpoint, monitoring all activity and using advanced behavioral threat analysis from SentinelOne to detect new threats on arrival. When an attack is spotted, ProSight ASM immediately isolates the impacted endpoint device from the corporate network to contain the threat. Since the ProSight ASM agent is self-contained, endpoints stay protected even if they are offline. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, dealer, and integrator. For details about ProSight Active Security Monitoring, go to remote endpoint monitoring for at-home workers.

Two-factor Authentication Services for Remote WorkersProgent's Duo MFA service plans incorporate Cisco's Duo cloud technology to protect against password theft through the use of two-factor authentication (2FA). Duo enables single-tap identity verification on iOS, Android, and other out-of-band devices. With 2FA, whenever you log into a secured online account and enter your password you are requested to confirm who you are on a unit that only you possess and that is accessed using a separate network channel. A broad range of devices can be utilized for this added means of ID validation including an iPhone or Android or wearable, a hardware token, a landline telephone, etc. You can designate multiple verification devices. For details about ProSight Duo identity authentication services, visit Cisco Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services for an at-home workforce.

Security Audit Services for At-Home WorkersSecurity Audits can evaluate the exposure of your network to all classes of external and local security threats for an environment that includes at-home workers. Progent can deploy remote, automated cybersecurity analysis software for quickly and affordably uncovering a broad range of security gaps that can be found over the Internet. Progent's security assessment experts, which can be managed by security professionals with top credentials such as CISM, ISSAP, and GIAC, can assist you to evaluate your procedures and policies and assess your network architecture to allow you to implement top-level protection for your teleworkers.

Download White Paper: Securing a Work-From-Home Network
To view or download a white paper describing key things to focus on for protecting an IT environment that supports work-from-home staff, click:
Securing a Work-From-Home (WFH) Network White Paper. (PDF - 2.4 MB)

Data Protection for Telecommuters
The field of Data Protection covers saving and recovering critical information so as to avoid data loss and minimize recovery time in the event of storage system failures due to equipment breakdowns, software glitches, user error, malware, or any other reason. Dependable data protection strategies can be especially challenging to architect and maintain in hybrid environments that combine in-house data centers, public clouds, and at-home workers.

  • Backup/Restore solutions for an at-home workforce must cover diverse kinds of personally owned endpoint devices. Progent can provide quick remote access to experts familiar with a wide array of products for protection Microsoft Windows, Apple and Linux/UNIX servers and desktops as well as laptops, iPads and smartphones. Popular backup/restore products supported by Progent's data protection consultants include Barracuda Backup, Azure Backup, Symantec Backup Exec, CrashPlan, Mozy, and Time Machine. To protect data distributed across a hybrid network, Progent can provide ProSight Data Protection Services, a managed backup/recovery service that utilizes cloud-based storage and includes fine-grained recovery and unified management.
  • Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity (DR/BC) strategies often envision scenarios that call for a quick changeover to an at-home workforce. Progent's expert disaster recovery preparedness consultants and business continuity planning specialists can assist you to develop, document and test a DR/BC plan that includes the process of switching to telecommuting.

Unified Management for an At-Home Workforce
Microsoft has rebranded and reshuffled its endpoint management platforms under the title Endpoint Manager, which encompasses Intune for cloud-based management of mobile and remote endpoints and Configuration Manager for managing on-premises endpoints. Endpoint Manager provides a unified environment for safeguarding corporate data by managing on-premises, mobile, and at-home endpoints.

Microsoft Intune
Intune is a component of Microsoft's Endpoint Management suite that also includes Microsoft Configuration Manager. Intune is a cloud-based service for managing and protecting remote computers and applications. Remote endpoint computers can be user owned or company owned. Network administrators managing the endpoint devices of at-home workers can utilize Intune to deploy and validate apps on managed devices, push updates and certificates, set up rules for permission to access information and networks, manage passwords, establish VPN tunnels, determine how telecommuters share information, set up threat protection, ensure security compliance, and wipe sensitive data from lost, stolen or decommissioned endpoint devices. Intune runs with Apple iOS, Google Android, Windows, and macOS devices. For information about Intune and how Progent can assist you to use this platform to administer the endpoint computers of your at-home workforce, see Intune telecommuter device management expertise.

VMware Workspace ONE
VMware Workspace ONE is a feature-rich unified Mobile Device Management platform that helps network administrators to keep off-premises endpoints up to date and secure. Workspace ONE uses VMware AirWatch for centralized endpoint management plus VMware's Horizon virtual application delivery platform for authorization control, app management, and configuration management of endpoints. Workspace ONE operates with endpoints based on Windows 10, macOS, Apple iOS, Android, Chrome OS, or leading distributions of Linux. VMware Workspace ONE is offered by subscription as a cloud-based service or as an on-site deployment through a perpetual license. Key capabilities of VMware Workspace ONE include rapid over-the-air provisioning of out-of-the-box notebooks, immediate onboarding of new users, policy setting and enforcement for all classes of endpoints, aggregated management reporting and performance analytics, email encryption, and tight integration with Microsoft apps and cloud services. For details about Progent's support for VMware Workspace ONE, refer to VMware Workspace ONE remote device management consultants.

Contact Progent for Remote Workforce Expertise
To get in touch with Progent about building and managing an efficient telecommuter solution for your Charlotte, North Caroline organization, call 1-800-993-9400 or refer to Contact Progent.