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We live in a technologically evolving world. The professional conference room of yesterday looks far different than it did even 10 years ago. The prevalence of handheld computing, cloud-based sharing, and wireless solutions have increase the speed of business and have necessitated some changes in the workplace as well. Here are some ideas to help you improve the professionalism in your conference room:

  1. Elimate Clutter.This includes unsightly cords and wires, but can also refer to items stored in the conference room. Take the time to have your conference room equipment such as your projector, phone and speakers neatly installed to enhance to professional feel of the room. Perhaps making your conference room wireless to avoid clutter and making it safe for everyone.
  2. Install Equipment that is Easy to Operate. You shouldn’t have to call the IT guy in every time you need to hook up a projector, it makes you look unprepared and unprofessional. Similarly, inability to effectively use a conference phone will make you sound like an amateur to those on the other line. That being said, Ubiq provides a management dashboard for the IT Department to remotely manage your conference room – making both the IT Department and users’ lives easier.
  3. Provide Adequate Internet Bandwidth Our world revolves around access to the internet. Be sure to provide adequate bandwidth for any type of presentation you might have in your conference room. Presentations can get frustrating if a streaming video continues to pause for buffering.
  4. Don’t use Free Services at the Expense of Professionalism. If you hold a lot of video conferences because most of your users are remote, it would probably be worth using a premium paid service. Some of the free services available are more likely to lag and cut out.
  5. Use Wireless Presentation. In our ever-evolving wireless world, more and more conference rooms are utilizing devices that allow multiple users on different platforms (smartphones, tablet, laptop, etc.) to wirelessly connect to a presentation and share what’s on their device. This promotes a more fluid transfer of information and sharing of ideas.
  6. Control the Climate. Nobody likes it too hot or too cold when they sitting in a conference room for long periods of time. A professional conference room will be well ventilated and climate controlled so that the most memorable thing to come out of the room IS NOT how uncomfortable it was.
  7. Provide Meeting Room Names. Many conference rooms would have a specific name. From all the in person deployments’ we’ve been to, the coolest ones would be naming all the conference rooms after Marvel superheroes, or countries around the world. Naming the conference room adds more of a personal touch and customization. Also, this makes booking conference rooms so much easier rather than booking Meeting Room 1.
  8. Use Meeting Room Scheduling and Analytics. If you work in a busy office, your conference room is probably in constant use. Not only is it necessary to be able to schedule its use, so as to avoid conflicting meetings, but it might also be interesting to know how your room is being used. There are programs available that not only help you schedule, but will give you insight into what specific meetings your rooms are being used for.
  9. Use Whiteboards for Walls. What is a meeting without plenty of space to collaborate ideas? Your professional conference room should provide plenty of whiteboard space, and they look and function much better when mounted to the wall. Now it is easy to be creative.
  10. Less is More. It seems like there are a lot of different aspects to a professional conference room but less is more. Keeping your conference room simple, clutter free and easy for your users to make a wireless presentation is key. Fancy doesn’t mean practical!

Additional Reading
10 Conference Room Design Mistakes
Impress Board Members With These Five Modern Conference Room Designs
Why You Can’t Afford to Skimp On Office Interior Design
 

Want to set up a wireless Conference Room?Try Now

The decision to adopt new technology such as wireless presentation, can impact an entire organization. It can shift the ways in which teams perform and communicate. That decision is not always the easiest one to make. People, data, business operations and procedures have to be taken into consideration.
How can a CIO/CTO lead a charge that could impact the way an organization “lives?” There must be proper support and “buy in” across the company from the C-Suite to your employees. Ideally, you’ll want everyone to be on board with the proposed changes and accept them into their work practices.

The C-Suite

While many decisions can be made independently by the CIO or CTO, there needs to be consideration of the other executives to get their understanding and support as new technology will be passed onto their direct reports. Often times, you will need to provide analysis and recommendations to quantify and qualify the need for new technology. Cost and operational benefits need to be presented to show how the needs can be satisfied and how the changes will impact the business overall.

Human Resources

Changes to the company culture will impact its people. New technology adoption may require updated policies, training and new organizational structures. Teams may be merged or expanded to support new business models that come with the new technology. Performance levels and requirements may be modified. Human resources will need to be involved.
For example, Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies will impact security and privacy. They will also add accountability and liability of individual employees and the reporting structure. Human resources would need to provide some direction in understanding and may have to amend their employee guidelines to support the policy and change.

Communications

Company/corporate communications will be central in providing education and updates related to new technology and the changes it will be bring. From announcement memos to posting new guidelines to any press releases to the public, communications is the news center of your business. New technology might also impact the way communication is disseminated throughout the organization. Therefore, you will need to work with them to ensure the right messages are being shared internally and externally.

Training

New technology adoption may not be as intuitive as we would like it to be. New or upgraded software and hardware always requires a learning period for teams to get up to speed and feel comfortable working with it. Employees want to feel confident in their work, which includes the tools they use. Therefore, training can really win over the team in see how the new technology will help them do their job more efficiently.
Training should come directly from the IT team, or can be partnered with your company’s human resources or learning departments. Facilitation of training across the company will help others understand the work that other teams perform and their impact on the whole organization. The goal should be to optimize your business in an efficient, effective and seamless way.
Something “new” can disrupt business. Your company culture will continue to shift with each change and upgrade. It is on you and your IT department to provide not only the implementation but also the education and support necessary across the company. Getting the “buy-in” from colleagues and employees will make the transition go smoother and technology adoption quicker.

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Today’s conference room technology opens the paths of communication between people, platforms, and devices. With greater exposure, there could be significant risks if the right security measures aren’t taken. The purpose of enterprise security is no longer just to keep internal network data where it belongs in a central location. It has expanded to ensure data is protected across multiple access points in and out of your organization.

Enterprise security is like driving a car. Really.

The term “The Information Superhighway” has become a well-worn cliche, and it’s easy to understand why: It’s the perfect metaphor for how electronic information travels. Some cars drive carefully, protecting their vehicle (data) and their passengers (the organization). Some cars are looking to get to where they need to go without pause, quickly cutting off others. Some drivers don’t have valid licences while others are driving in cars that have been stolen.
Traditionally, the common approach to security on the information superhighway was to look at it as an everyone-for-themselves type situation. However, in enterprise security, you’re looking out for everyone who is connected to you in and out of the main office while protecting your data and organization. Traditional security may look at the immediate moment. If all seems clear and things were okay until that point without fail, then it’s time to get moving. Enterprise security is like listening to the traffic report, plotting the best path using GPS or Google Maps and checking your car before you hit the road.

So what exactly is it?

It’s really a holistic approach to managing your data and protecting your company’s interests. To maintain government and internal security compliance amidst rapidly changing technology, you have to look at where your data is sourced, stored, and delivered. Data comes in various formats, including paper. Information is being transferred from hand to hand and across internal and external devices between you, your colleagues, clients, and vendors. You certainly don’t want to get it into the wrong hands!
Your IT teams are programming and providing support to make sure data flows and processes are working as intended. They also are striving to put safety measures in place to be proactive in defending, protecting, and serving the entire organization. In some fashion, they are the police force of your company’s information cache. They are also working towards ensuring that no breaches or gaps in system communications could pose a potential threat to your business and its privacy. To this end, the infrastructure needs to be designed to support the expanding technology and means in which people access and transfer information.
While IT security teams have always been mindful of this, on an enterprise level it’s now a matter of securing data outside of “headquarters.” Think about virtual teams, using multiple devices, including BYOD (“Bring Your Own Device”). Whether it’s requiring pass codes on personal smartphones or tablets or restricting access to specific IP addresses, enterprise security is what will help your organization maintain government and internal compliance, keep personal and business information safe, and solidify trust with clients and vendors.

Be prepared.

Certainly, one cannot always predict when a breach, hack, or virus will hit your system, just as you can’t predict a car crash. However, with enterprise security, one can be prepared and stay aware. It may require changes to the data architecture. It may require additional resources. Being connected to the outside and ensuring all is secure beyond your company’s walls will put you ahead of the game when the hard times come. Just like being on the road, you can protect and defend yourself with the right systems and processes in place.

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The phrase “enterprise IT metrics” might sound rather daunting if you have never come across it before, but do not let it scare you. Gaining a firm understanding of enterprise IT metrics could save you money in the short term and make you money in the longer term.
What does it mean?
In its most basic form, enterprise IT metrics are numerical measurements of your IT systems, processes and procedures. It is no different to the way the finance department uses financial ratios to measure business performance, or a marketing team will use regular measurements such as customer churn and average revenue per customer to keep an eye on their ongoing performance.
Just like other departments across the business, forward-thinking IT teams are using sensible enterprise IT metrics to ensure they are performing as efficiently as possible and getting the most out of their budgets.
Even simple measurements such “IT spending as a percentage of overall revenue”, or “IT spend per employee”, can reveal so much about what is right and what is wrong with your IT strategy.
In a nutshell, enterprise IT metrics revolve around driving increased value.
Why are enterprise IT metrics important?
When you compare current enterprise IT metrics to those of past years, you get an instant idea of how effective your spend really is. You will see at a glance whether or not your company’s IT deployment strategy is heading in the right direction. If your enterprise IT metrics data suggests things are not going as well as you would have hoped, then you are now in a position to do something about it and generate innovative ideas to turn things round.
The real eye-opener comes when you compare your enterprise IT metrics with other businesses in the same industry. Was that extra IT spend you battled for really worth it? Could your money have been better spent on something that would add real value to the business, like wireless presentation technology?
Everybody benefits
There are clear financial benefits to be had by adopting a data-driven approach to how you run your IT team. It is clear that if you can achieve efficiency savings with your IT spend, resulting in a lower IT cost base, the business wins. If you can use enterprise IT metrics data to inspire innovative IT solutions, such as dealing with the problems posed by enterprise security, you are able to deliver a superior service to your colleagues, meaning the business wins.
There is one further significant benefit: your increased credibility.
IT teams, and by implication the CIO, can sometimes get a bad press within the company for not fully understanding the needs of the business. By using enterprise IT metrics the right way, you can demonstrate sound financial acumen as well as show your willingness to run your team in a manner aligned with the rest of the business. It is another win, but this time for your own career.
Natural culture change
By setting the enterprise IT metrics agenda, the CIO can facilitate positive cultural change across his or her team. The team will understand that the emphasis is on generating value. It is this culture change that is going to maintain interest and enthusiasm among team members once the enterprise IT metrics programme has been implemented.
Implementing change is a challenge for any manager, but if the CIO can demonstrate that value is being created it will help provide focus for all staff. It will even improve their knowledge and skills base, benefiting the team and the wider business over the longer term.

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The chances are you don’t know much about Enterprise IT Transformation or what it means, but if you want to get ahead of your competitors, you really do need to know more about this exciting area. The fact is, over the next few years smart businesses are going to gain a significant competitive edge by changing the way IT is viewed and implemented within their organisations.
If you are a business owner, or for that matter a stakeholder in any business, whether it is employee, supplier or customer, you will want that business to do as well as it possibly can because there will be a benefit to you:

  • Owners are looking for increased profits.
  • Employees look for increased profits so they can receive higher salaries.
  • Suppliers want to work with profitable companies for continued business and reasons of trust.
  • Customers are reassured by profitability as it usually translates to a good, ongoing reputation.

In an increasingly competitive business environment, where rival companies know more about each other’s products and services than ever before, improved technological competency really is an area where businesses of all sizes can gain a competitive edge.
What Is Enterprise IT Transformation?
As IBM themselves note, Enterprise IT Transformation is about changing the internal IT processes within a business. It is about viewing IT not as the bit of the company that ‘deals with computers’, but instead viewing IT as an accountable service provider that adds value to the organisation.
Enterprise IT transformation can apply to any aspect of the IT function within a company. Using computer servers as an example, it is not unreasonable to imagine the following scenario:

  • A company keeps its own servers within their own office building
  • These servers will be stored in their own dedicated space, which needs to be regulated at a particular temperature
  • The servers are the bedrock of the company’s daily operations
  • If a problem arises – for example, the server room overheats – then all servers will automatically shut down
  • Every employee’s network access fails. The company rapidly becomes unproductive

Furthermore, most companies are likely to have strong enterprise security such as spending a significant chunk of its IT team dedicated to looking after IT infrastructure and general troubleshooting. If there is a problem with the computers or systems, somebody is employed to fix it.
Forward Thinking
A more forward-thinking business will have already recognised the benefits of not keeping servers on the premises and instead will be utilising cloud computing technology, such as that available from Box which can speed up the Enterprise IT Transformation. Cloud computing has opened up a world of possibilities for businesses large and small.
By outsourcing this type of work, many possibilities are opened up. IT infrastructure is looked after by a third party supplier, who can use their economies of scale to ensure both enough computing power to guarantee that computer systems stay up and running at all times, and also that this service can be delivered for a very reasonable price.
As for the staff employed to maintain the network and troubleshoot, a forward-thinking business would move these staff from maintenance mode to innovation mode. Members of the IT team have more time with which to pursue core business objectives and add value to the business. Over the longer term, this benefits all business stakeholders.
This is just one example of how Enterprise IT Transformation can benefit business. There are further new technologies that can help businesses keep in touch with suppliers and partners in order to reduce costs, as well as improve the service a company provides to customers.
The original IT revolution in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s really did transform the way business works. We have reached a point where technology has advanced so far that another IT revolution is underway. You need to make sure your business is a part of it.

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Internet of things is everything connected to everything via the Internet. Its your smartphone communicating with your laptop, TV, thermometer, work computer, projector, monitor, watch, shoes, home thermometer, home appliances, car and much more. The Internet of things is also applicable to so many different things such as your personal lifestyle and health, agriculture, finance, and office productivity. There are many different estimates about the growth of the Internet of Things. In one study conducted by MIT Review, it’s estimated that by 2020, approximately 26 billion objects will be linked together in the Internet. That is a significant increase from 12 billion things connected to the Internet in 2010, and approximately 18 billion things that are connected to the Internet today in 2015.
One big issue concerning the Internet of Things is communication amongst the different things connected to the Internet. How is it that an iPhone is going to be able to communicate with a Samsung TV and an LG fridge and a Toyota car? Another issue regarding the Internet of Things is security. With so much news appearing about hackers being able to steal private information from companies via the Internet, many individuals and companies have the challenge of being able to protect the data of their company and customer information. In addition, a lot of data is also collected through the Internet, so the companies who protect the privacy of their own customers will be rewarded.
Most importantly, in your office almost every employee has their own smartphone, and large corporations typically provide computers to their employees as well. How will you protect your company’s data when your employees start to access your company’s data on their own smartphone? Many of these questions are still to be determined, but many employees who bring their own device (BYOD/bring your own device) to work will change the way technology is used in the office, and security for the use of technology in the office for employees who bring their own technological devices to work will be paramount.
Employees will also be bringing many more of their own personal devices with them into your office spaces, meeting rooms, conference rooms, and boardrooms. How is it in 2015 that we are not able to instantly share what’s on our personal laptop instantly to the biggest screen in the meeting room wirelessly? There are a few technologies trying to fulfill this need, but one excellent up and coming solution that wirelessly connects devices in boardrooms to large monitors, TV screens and projectors is Ubiq. Ubiq is a start-up out of Waterloo, Ontario in Canada, and is on a mission to make wireless presentations easy. To learn more about how Ubiq can help your company present wirelessly, click below.