Coleman Technologies Blog

Why You Want An MOS (Or Any Other) Certification
The more your internal staff can handle, the less they have to lean on others for assistance.

Chances are, these “others” would be the members of your internal IT team (assuming that you have more than one person in the first place). Otherwise, they’ll likely spend a bunch of valuable time trying to Google the answer to their question.

Therefore, it only makes sense to have your staff be capable of as much as possible independently, without the need to turn to someone else or an Internet search. That way, everyone’s time is used more efficiently, maintaining productivity and allowing everyone to focus on what needs to be done.

When a solution is as commonly used as Microsoft Office is, this only becomes even more evident.

Certifications are effectively seals of approval from an authority. If someone was to be certified as a Microsoft Office Specialist, it more or less is just proof provided by Microsoft that this someone does indeed know their stuff when it comes to the Office software suite. Having certified people on staff means that a business is able to handle more advanced situations.

The Operational Benefits Of A Microsoft Office Specialist
Microsoft’s productivity software titles are among the most commonly used in the business world, to the point where many of their applications’ names are now synonymous with the documents they produce - how often have you heard someone call a presentation a “Powerpoint” instead of a “slideshow?”

As a result, chances are fairly high that your business is one that uses at least one of the applications included in the “Microsoft Office” suite.

Like we said before, a lot of time can easily be wasted trying to do something in an Office program, especially if the person is having difficulty remembering how to perform a task that they do not need very often, or have never encountered before.

However, if your team has a few Microsoft Office Specialists on it, they would be able to assist with a quick message, reducing the stress put on your IT staff and allowing them to continue their other duties without interruptions coming in (at least, interruptions from Microsoft Office requests).

How to Become Certified
To learn more about this certification, visit Microsoft’s official page describing it. The official test is exclusively administered by Certiport testing centers, who provide a useful test center locator to help you figure out where and when your next testing opportunity is.

To otherwise assist your staff with their technology issues, and take some more of the workload from your internal IT staff’s shoulders, Coleman Technologies is here to help. Reach out to us at (604) 513-9428 to discuss our solutions with one of our professionals.

Selecting the Right Type of Phone
It might be tempting to discredit the importance of telephony for your organization, but you should resist this notion. Businesses still rely on the phone to communicate both internally and externally, and eliminating it can create a situation where your clients have one less way of getting in contact with you. Therefore, the importance of the telephone in the office cannot be understated, as your reputation with your patrons hangs in the balance. As you can imagine, there are several different kinds of phones out there, each with their own pros and cons. It’s up to your organization to determine which solution best suits your needs.

Landline
For a long time, the landline was the only kind of telephone solution for businesses. This utilizes the connections provided by a telephone company which consisted of private branch exchange (PBX) hardware in the office. This would give businesses the option to create extensions for employee and office, as well as opportunities for other services like call transferring and directories. Even though these are so familiar, many organizations are ditching landlines in favor of other solutions that are more flexible and efficient. It just so happens that the Internet and all its developments are much better at accommodating the needs of businesses, including new telephone solutions.

Virtual Phones
A virtual phone system can be considered a middle ground between the traditional form of telephony and a Voice over IP system. Incoming calls can be processed through a traditional telephony method, and they are then forwarded to the right employee through a VoIP system. This gives a business with both in-house employees and remote workers the opportunity to unify their communications. Additional features can also be added in for a more dynamic solution.

Voice over Internet Protocol
Voice over IP is a system that aims to cut out the need for traditional telephone solutions entirely. VoIP fully utilizes the Internet connection of your organization’s office to fulfill all of its telephony needs. The right solution can give your business all it needs to be functional on any device from a desktop to a mobile device. There are some different ways to use VoIP, so you’ll want to make sure you select the right method out of the gate to get the best return on your investment.

• An in-house VoIP system will be an expensive up-front cost, as the equipment needed to host the system can be quite taxing on any normal budget. There will also be a monthly fee for the components needed to make calls, and any maintenance the solution requires must be administered by your in-house staff. The benefit to all of this is that you’ll have complete and total control over your business’ telephone system--something that no other solution can offer.
• A cloud-hosted VoIP system means that everything is taken care of so your organization can instead focus on remaining productive with your time. This means that there is no need to buy hardware or maintain it on your end. In the event your phone system goes down, the provider is the one responsible--not you--meaning that you’ll be somewhat reliant on others, but the productivity spike can mean all the difference. In the event your Internet goes down, you’ll also be left without service, but again, this isn’t something that’s directly yours to influence.

It’s easy to see why VoIP is such a great solution, but is it right for you? Find out by giving us a call at (604) 513-9428.

Human Resources may not be the meat and potatoes of any business, but it is exceedingly important. With all the mandates a business has to stay in compliance of, having people whose job it is to deal directly with the staff on behalf of the company makes a lot of sense. Since some SMBs don’t have a dedicated HR department, there are now platforms available that provide those services. But, let’s first start by outlining what kinds of tasks the average small business has to deal with, with a list.

The top six issues a HR department would have to deal with are:

• Employee retention
• Health and safety
• Personnel
• Payroll
• Training and compliance
• Employee management

Software developers have been creating dynamic human resources software, aiming to take the hassle out of a crucial part of your business. Some are pretty advanced, providing human resources directors useful automations that help them control many of the vast responsibilities placed on them. Some useful HR-related software you’ll see includes:

• Human Resource Information System (HRIS)
• Applicant Tracking System (ATS)
• Onboarding
• Benefits Administration
• Time and Compensation Management
• Training Management Performance, and Recognition Management
• HR Analytics
• Wellness Management

It seems overwhelming, but most of today’s most popular and utilized tools check most of the boxes as far as including a useful cache of tools that will allow them to manage any small or medium-sized human resources department competently.

While it once was popular to host all the applications a HR department would use on a single computer or on a very small network, today there are a few HR software vendors that provide a completely hosted solution. This means the software is hosted on secure servers that are managed by a provider, and accessible from anywhere there is an Internet connection.

Human Resources as a Service
Some small businesses have begun to completely outsource their human resources, with some success. HR as a service (HRaaS) basically eliminates the need to hire human resources staff, as the service provides resources that allow for a holistic approach to all the important tasks a human resources director would accomplish without the resounding costs associated with traditional human resources strategies.

Not only does a HRaaS platform eliminate a large section of the costs associated with human resources, it standardizes the approach to HR, eliminating the hiccups that often happen with the traditional method. A business will have their HRaaS platform customized for them and would be assigned a HR professional to help keep everything working properly.

Ultimately, it will be up to you to determine how to do human resources right. If your business is searching for a consultant to help you through hard business and technology decisions, reach out to the professional IT technicians at Coleman Technologies. Call (604) 513-9428 to get started building a more efficient business.

Google Drive

• X allows you to select or deselect items.
• Shift + A allows you to select all visible items. You can use Shift + N to clear your selection of visible items.
• Enter or O will let you open an item you have selected, while N will let you rename it.
• Z lets you move an item to a selected folder, while S will star or unstar them.
• You can use these shortcuts to create various items:
  • Folder - Shift + f
  • Document - Shift + t
  • Spreadsheet - Shift + s
  • Presentation - Shift + p

Google Docs

• Ctrl + K: Insert or edit a link.
• Alt + Enter: Open a link.
• Alt + Shift + 5: Type with a strikethrough in your text.
• Ctrl +: Format your text with a superscript.
• Ctrl -: Format your text with a subscript.
• Ctrl + Alt + F: Insert a footnote.

Google Sheets

• Ctrl + Space: Select all contents in one column.
• Shift + Space: Select all contents in one row.
• Alt + Shift + 7 or Ctrl + Shift + 7: Apply a border to your selected cells.
• Ctrl + \: Clear formatting of your selection.
• Ctrl + Page Up or Ctrl + Page Down: Jump to either the previous sheet or the next sheet.
• Ctrl + ~: See the list of formulas.

Google Slides

• Ctrl + D: Duplicate a slide or object.
• Page Up/Page Down, Up/Down: Move from slide to slide in the filmstrip.
• Ctrl + Alt + Shift + F: Move over to the filmstrip.
• Ctrl + Alt + Shift + C: Move back to the canvas.
• Alt + Shift + Left/Right Arrow: Rotate objects by one degree.
• Alt + Left/Right Arrow: Rotate objects by fifteen degrees.

By using these shortcuts, you should be able to get more out of your Google services. There are far too many shortcuts to include here, so for the complete list, you’ll need to be in Drive, Docs, Sheets, or Slides. Once you’re in, just use Ctrl + / to pull up the list of keyboard shortcuts for the Google app you’re using.

Do you have any tips and tricks to share? Let us know in the comments.

Imagine, for a moment, just how much you have to lose from a data loss incident. Your business depends on its data, and if it suddenly loses access to it, you could be in a position where downtime significantly impacts your bottom line. In situations like this, you have no time to waste. You have to get back in the game as soon as possible or you risk losing so much traction that it could be hard to keep the doors open.

With this in mind, you can’t possibly achieve this goal without data backup. You have to think of it in terms of a potential loss incident--essentially it is professional risk management. While it’s true you don’t want to make decisions based solely on the what-ifs, it’s hard not to justify it in this case. What it boils down to is this: if you don’t have data backup and suffer from a disaster, your business will, more likely than not, fail. Therefore, the best way to ensure the possibility of success is to implement data backup and prevent a potential loss incident from surfacing in the first place.

Basically, the sheer fact that you know you need to back up your data is enough to justify having a solid backup solution.

The point that we are trying to make is that we shouldn’t have to convince you to go all-in on your business’ data backup and disaster recovery solution. It should be common sense. After all, you’re trying to preserve your business and its future against the possibility that a disaster scenario cuts its life short. You have no reason not to invest in something that could potentially save your business. It doesn’t matter whether it’s from a natural disaster, user error, or hardware failure--there is always the chance that an unforeseen event could spell the end of your organization.

The right data backup solution can go a long way toward keeping your business afloat, even in a worst-case scenario. To find out more about BDR, reach out to Coleman Technologies at (604) 513-9428.