Coleman Technologies Blog

Let’s face it, if your business operates anything like most do, you have far too many of these processes for anyone to reasonably remember. This means that making sure that your processes are both comprehensively recorded and accessible for your employees to reference is a crucial facet to your productivity.

Fortunately, doing so is relatively simple, as long as you go about it properly.

Step One: Identify What You’re Documenting
The important thing to remember about creating documentation is that, unless the task itself is incredibly granular, making the documentation too specific isn’t going to help anyone. On the flip side, any documentation that is too vague isn’t likely to provide anyone with the value that it should.

You need to store your documentation in a centralized place that all employees can access. It helps even more if there is a system in place to allow you to search the contents of each document, sort them in various ways, and highlight changes and edits made to processes. In other words, utilizing a document management system or a knowledge center of some kind will go a long way in preserving the functionality of your processes. There are plenty of tools and applications out there for this, and we can help you choose the best one for your situation based on your specific needs.

Step Two: DIARI (Do It And Record It)
This step will form the basic shape of your documentation, as it will create a step-by-step guide to completing the task as a whole. You’ll need to go through a run-through of the process you’re trying to document, recording every step you take.

Don’t be shy about including details, either. For instance, if your process will require the same questions to be asked each time it is put into action, include the list of questions in your documentation. If someone is supposed to be contacted specifically, identify them in your documentation and provide their contact information.

From here, you should have a pretty good handle on how the process typically goes down… and the insights to make it even better.

Step Three: Refine, Repeat, Revise
When you were running through your process, were there any steps that would have made more sense to do earlier so you could be better prepared for a later responsibility? Try rearranging the steps in your documentation and trying it again. Did it work better, or worse? Take these observations into account and act accordingly.

Really, once you commit the time to doing it properly, creating invaluable and useful documentation isn’t that difficult of a process. You can even bring multimedia into it, if it’s a good fit, using tools like Steps Recorder on Windows.

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The Stakes Are High
A lost smartphone is something that needs to be taken seriously nowadays. Not only is it an expensive device to replace, its contents could be considered priceless. Anything you’ve accessed via that phone (potentially including your finances and social media) is then at risk. If this device was used for business purposes, your data could be at stake if your device was stolen - and, if you used it as a part of a two-factor authentication measure, there goes your access to your network.

Clearly, this wouldn’t be a good thing.

This is precisely why Android includes a feature to help you find a device, should it ever be lost.

Auto-Location
On your Android device, you need to work proactively and enable a few settings.

In your Settings, you should be able to find a Find My Device option. Make sure this is turned on. Your Location should be set to High accuracy. Finally, you will want to enable Google to Use Location History. While this will diminish your privacy from the eyes of Google, it will make your phone that much easier to find.

To locate your device, you’ll then need to access the same Google account that is used on the device in question from a web browser. Google is able to give you a general idea of where the device was last located on a map, and even what Wi-Fi networks it is connected to. The Find My Device application can do the same thing if you have access to a second device.

Find My Device also allows you to remotely lock your device and display a message to help anyone who might find it get it back to you. Once you’re in the vicinity of your device, you can also command your device to ring. This command will override the volume settings, increasing the chances of it being heard.

If you truly believe that your device has been stolen, there is also the nuclear option: remotely wiping the device via Find My Device.

Keep in mind, in order for these features to work, you absolutely have to enable them on your phone first. Otherwise, you’ll be out of luck if the device ever goes missing.

Act Fast
It is also important to remember that these features will only work as long as the phone is on. Sure, you could still check for its last known location in Find My Device, but there’s no guarantee that it will still be there.

Finally, if you truly believe that your device was stolen, contact the proper authorities and give them everything you know.

With any luck, you’ll be able to find your lost phone lickety-split. While you’re here, take a look at some of our other blogs, where you can find other handy tricks and useful information, courtesy of Coleman Technologies.

Once you have your content selected, whether it’s text or an image, all you have to do is press two keys.

To cut a word or phrase from one place in your content, press Ctrl + X. To copy this content instead, keeping the original and duplicating it elsewhere, press Ctrl + C. Pasting your content is just as simple - with the place you want the content added selected, press Ctrl + V. This will insert your content where you want.

If you happen to be copy-pasting from a website to another document, it may not be a bad idea to paste it without bringing any formatting from the website over. Otherwise, it is apt to look funny on your documents. Pasting without formatting is almost as simple as regular pasting, you just add another keystroke in the middle: Ctrl + Shift + V.

Of course, any of the tasks can be accomplished with the mouse alone. Right clicking on a word, an image, or a group of selected text will bring up a menu that includes all of the above options. However, your cursor is generally more accurate than the mouse, so you may have to undo your efforts (Ctrl + Z) a few times before it’s right.

Real World Example:
Let’s say you want to send a webpage link to someone in an email or instant message. In your web browser, click the address bar (that’s the part with the ‘http://… “). That will highlight the URL. Hold down Ctrl and press C. Then go into your email or instant messenger, click where you want to paste the URL, and hold down Ctrl and press V.

Whichever you use, it’s bound to be more time-efficient than rewriting anything that needs to go in a different spot. Make sure you subscribe to our blog, so you can be alerted whenever we upload more content!

What Are Templates?
Evernote’s templates are handy, pre-built structures for notes that provide users with a simpler means of organizing specific types of information. Instead of taking time struggling with your formatting each time you start a new note, you can apply one of the templates that Evernote offers on their website. Those with a subscription to Evernote Plus, Premium, or Business can even use formatting they’ve created in past notes to generate their own templates for repeated use.

Applying Templates in Evernote
Once you’ve acquired a few templates, either from the Evernote website’s collection or from a past note, applying one of your choosing is relatively simple.

• In Evernote, start a new note.
• In the body of the note, click Templates to view the ones you have saved.
• From there, you can search for any templates you have, delete ones you no longer want or need, edit their names, and of course, apply them to notes.
• If you want to edit a template, follow the same process, and once you’ve made the changes that you want, save it as a new template. Note: only those with Plus, Premium, or Business accounts are able to do this.
• Plus, Premium, and Business users are also able to create their own templates this way.

So, what do you think? Is this a welcome change to Evernote? What other improvements would you like to see them make down the line? Let us know in the comments!

Applying Software Patches
It should be clear that software patches are designed to fix security problems and improve the functionality of the software, but some organizations simply don’t have time to implement them manually, or they simply don’t understand the purpose for them. Part of the problem is that sometimes the developers aren’t necessarily clear that patches are available, while other times those within your organization may not even know how to administer them. Regardless of the reason, there are usually problems on a network that will go unattended for extended periods of time.

Most hackers only want to take advantage of the issues they can detect. Thus, there could be countless threats out there designed to target countless unpatched vulnerabilities on your network that not even the hackers can know about. It makes sense for a hacker to use just one exploit to target a handful of vulnerabilities. Therefore, it’s important to make sure that all software that you use is updated and patched.

Additionally, your systems shouldn’t be running unused programs. The more software you have, the more ways hackers can take advantage of your organization’s network vulnerabilities. Moreover, you might even be wasting revenue on renewing software licenses that you don’t even need, so it’s best perform a network audit from time to time to get the worthless software off your infrastructure.

Dodging Social Engineering Attempts
Social engineering is broadly categorized as any method that takes advantage of unprepared users or those who are ignorant of solid network security practices. Examples include a phone call or email message claiming that the network has been breached by a foreign entity and that “tech support” needs to remote into the computer and resolve the issue. There are other, more subtle methods as well, such as targeted spear phishing attacks that go after specific users with personal information that convince them that the hacker is someone in authority.

These types of attacks vary in sophistication, but they can range anywhere from an employee receiving a message claiming that they’ve won a prize, to the intruder physically following your employees into the office and stealing sensitive data manually. In instances like these, a little bit of employee training can go a long way. Teach them to look for anything suspicious, and inform them that vigilance is incredibly important in the workplace.

These two security improvements barely scratch the surface of what your organization should be focusing on for network security. If you want to fully protect your business to the best of your ability, give us a call at (604) 513-9428.