September 2020 - Striven

Month: September 2020

Why You Should Use Cloud Accounting Software

Posted on by Eric Kingett

When your business started, desktop accounting software (DAS) might have been the ideal solution. The leading applications seemed powerful, especially compared to old-school accounting: sales receipts, pencil sharpeners, hand-held calculators.

As technology and accounting software have evolved, more applications have migrated to the cloud. And for good reason.

As Zach Lanich writes in Forbes, cloud-based software applications have increased security, they update automatically, and they save companies a lot of money.

Cloud accounting software has all of those advantages but can do so much more for your organization’s financial management.

Breaking the chains of your desktop software

Let’s face it: desktop accounting software tethers you to one place, on one device, at one time. With an increased business atmosphere of collaboration, accessibility, and speed, it doesn’t benefit you to be limited by a desktop application.

There are plenty of reasons to move your accounting operations to the cloud. To fully understand them, let’s examine the most common problems accounting departments face with desktop software. Then we can see how the cloud solves them.

Exporting time

Uploading accounting report to the cloud

Users of desktop accounting software (reader: you may be one of them) are consistently frustrated with reporting time. Some DAS applications use front-end exporting, which means you have to wait until their report exports before it can be 100% complete.

What should take seconds ends up costing your accounting department over 30 minutes. That’s 30 minutes per report.

Desktop software’s speed is also often dependent on the amount of financial data you’re trying to export. It’s enough to frustrate any business with robust accounting records.

Fortunately, cloud accounting software reports in seconds. Because it’s web-based, it uses back-end exporting. That means it exports reports “behind the scenes.” The result? Reports happen almost instantly.

In the cloud, reports also load in real time, allowing you to continue doing your job, rather than losing time and resources waiting.

CPA Access

Because DAS is hosted on your hard drive, it only allows for one user to access it at a time. (This counts for remote users, too.) If your CPA needs access to company data, you’ll probably end up with a multi-step process, including exports and relaying information either by email or snail mail.

If that export takes 30 minutes, you’re wasting an employee’s time just so your CPA can view the data in the first place.

With cloud accounting software that’s hosted on a remote server and browser-friendly, CPAs can access your accounting system anywhere, at any time. Unlike on your desktop, when your CPA uses the system, you don’t get kicked out.

Even better, CPAs can run reports and export them all on their own, directly from within the system. All you need to do is grant them access.

Transparency

Users of desktop accounting software have to work on different computers, each with separate hard drives. That means users outside of those computers can’t see any financial data. Instead, they’ll need to rely on the (slow) reports exported from the system.

DAS tools are also limited: they don’t allow you to see granular details about, for example, report and transaction totals.

Cloud-based accounting software provides much more access and transparency across your entire organization. With a complete business management system, all of your employees can not only access accounting details simultaneously, but they can also communicate using the system. That way, your company keeps information centralized and continually accessible.

A complete management software application with full financial management tools also allows you to access more data points that might be related to, but not be derived from, a traditional accounting system. That information could include sales data, marketing budgets, payments on a customer portal, or payroll data. If your accounting department can easily get access to company-wide information, they’ll work much more efficiently.

Mobile access

Woman using mobile phone and laptop

According to a recent study by IWG (International Workspace Group), telecommuting is on the rise—and remote access to software is more important than ever. They report that: 70% of professionals work remotely one day a week; 53% work remotely for at least half the work week; 11% work remotely all week long.

Because you can only access desktop accounting software using the computer you’ve installed it on, you’ll have to purchase a license per-computer in order for others to access it.

If your accounting department has remote workers or employees who travel, they’ll have to bring their computer wherever they go. (In this scenario, hope they’ve downloaded the software onto a laptop.)

If they don’t bring a computer, or if they experience any technical difficulties, they’ll need to contact someone who has a licensed computer just to enter simple financial records.

Cloud-based accounting software, on the other hand, is accessible on any device at any time. It’s perfect for remote workers, CPAs, and traveling accountants.

Some cloud-based software products have their own apps; some don’t. Any cloud accounting software you try should at least be optimized for views on desktop, mobile, and tablet.

Data security

With desktop accounting software, you have to perform backups manually to ensure your data is secure. But if something happens to the computer your software is installed on— if it’s damaged, lost, or stolen— you’ll also lose and compromise your data.

Keep in mind that it’s not just “data” we’re talking about. Those are your financial records. It’s painful to think about what that kind of loss can do to a business. Even options for data recovery can be time-consuming, and they’re not guaranteed to work.

There’s also a speed issue here: desktop software is only as fast and secure as the computer it’s installed on. A slow and unsecured computer equals a slow and at-risk software application.

Cloud accounting software is backed up on remote servers, 24 hours a day. In the cloud, your data is also backed up in real-time. Should your desktop computer be compromised in any way, your data is not only protected, but you can also still access it from any other device.

Cloud-based software has an added speed bonus, too. Since your financial data isn’t being stored on a hard drive, everything you do in the system will happen much faster.

Updates

Most desktop software only offers updates once per year. That means no new features and no resolutions to problems unless the vendor issues an intermittent bug fix. Not only do these updates occur sparingly, but users sometimes have to pay to unlock them and then download the update on their licensed computer.

Worse, users are typically locked out of the software until the update is fully downloaded. If you’ve ever waited for one of these to happen, you know just how frustrating it can be. Especially when you’re trying to get work done.

By contrast, most cloud accounting software automatically updates every 3-6 weeks. With a truly robust software, that means you get access to approximately 8-17 new features per year, as opposed to the paltry few on the desktop.

Completing a cloud system update while working

With every update, your system unlocks new functionality and resolves bugs. And because updates occur for only an hour on off-hours and on weekends, you shouldn’t experience any disruption to your workday.

Truly advanced cloud accounting software will even update in the background of your application, so if you happen to be working during an update, you’ll still have read-only access to all of your financial data for that hour.

Double entry

Most desktop accounting software offers limited integration opportunities. Most of the time, companies who use multiple systems need to replicate data in every system just to maintain accuracy.

Double entry means double the effort.

However, if you have a fully integrated cloud accounting solution, you can eliminate double-entry altogether. By pulling in data from your sales, human resources, and project divisions, you’ll already have the information handy.

Some systems accomplish this type of connection through integrations and APIs. But it’s also possible, and preferable, to have a single system that connects your data. That means no signing in and out of separate applications. For your accounting department, it means no twisting arms to access information from other divisions.

A complete management solution

At this point, you might be wondering: can my desktop accounting software just integrate with an ERP or other business management software?

It can. But that’s like plugging your vacuum cleaner into a wall socket that keeps shorting out.

Rather than ignoring the shortcomings of desktop software (which will only become greater with time, as they become legacy products), moving to a fully integrated cloud solution will provide greater accessibility for more robust financial management.

Conclusion

Desktop accounting software applications are going the way of the dinosaurs. Applications that run in the cloud provide not only more data security, but a whole host of process features that make your accounting much easier. And faster.

It’s no longer a question of whether you should consider a cloud solution— it’s a question of when.

When looking for a cloud solution, make sure it can completely integrate with your other company data. Just because an application exists in the cloud doesn’t necessarily mean it does everything you need it to.

With the right vendor and features, you’ll be able to completely streamline all of your accounting processes, for now, and for the future.

When Employees and Customers Don’t Want to Wear Masks

Posted on by Matt Bernot

Polarization has become par for the course in the United States. It spreads across all facets of everyday life: social media, sports, politics, social justice, news, and even the virus itself. Very few aspects of our culture have been immune to the tidal wave of immoderation. 

family with masks safety that uses all in one business management software

Every business owner in America—and, for that matter, the world—has aggressively pivoted towards a safety-centric business model. While the health of your employees and patrons has been at the forefront of your agenda, your business stillhas a responsibility to maintain fiscal health, too. This requires (almost) never turning away a paying customer. 

With each American business confronting various degrees of noncompliance, disobedience, and outright irresponsible behavior from patrons—and sometimes employees—in regards to public health, business owners have been put squarely in the center of an unprecedented predicament without an obvious solution.

How do you assure your customers, employees, and even your own family that you are acting in the best interests of public health without completely alienating those with antithetical beliefs? Customers with whom you share fundamentally different ideologies are still your customers, and the same goes for your employees.

Health Comes First

When it comes down to it, your business’s commitment to upholding health and safety regulations is priority number one. Creating and maintaining an environment that is diligent in upholding safety protocols starts with you, but it takes a team to make sure nothing slips through the cracks. Your employees can not afford to take a passive approach to combating COVID-19. In a survey done by Accenture, 82% of consumers were fearful for the health of others, as opposed to 64% that were fearful for their own health.

While brick-and-mortar establishments have the benefit of being able to heavily enforce safety rules and regulations, businesses that offer—or are exclusively limited to—field services have been forced to toe the line of overstepping boundaries. Your employees are required to wear masks when in a customer’s home, and you’ve required that customers reciprocate. But what happens when a customer does not oblige? 

After all, they’re in their own home. Does your employee feel obligated to continue servicing the customer, or have you afforded them the autonomy to refuse service? What happens when it’s not the customer, but your own employee ignoring protocols? While each customer and employee is unique in their methods and beliefs, your job is to lay out the ground rules for deeming what is acceptable while on the clock.  

Everyone has differing opinions on what they think is the “right thing” to do is right now. Disagreements will occur—it’s natural. But by doing our best to occasionally take a walk in someone else’s shoes, we can work together towards the common goal of safety. Including empathy in the core philosophy of your business plan isn’t just a suggestion anymore—it is imperative for you and your employees alike to understand that.

Remain Calm in Conflict

Everyone is subject to moments where stress gets the best of us—it’s a part of being human. Whether you have worked directly with customers or have simply been a bystander in a shopping centre, most people have encountered an unruly customer at some point. Before COVID, it was simply an annoyance. Customers—fairly or unfairly—would seemingly lose the ability to use their “inside voice” while hurling insults and vulgarity. Annoying, yes, but most likely not dangerous.

In today’s world, the routine rudeness towards those in customer service positions has escalated. With these professionals often tasked with policing the health and safety measures of their business, they are subject to the backlash coming from those who don’t feel as though public safety measures apply to them. The backlash becomes magnified when your employees have to police this behavior while in the confines of your customer’s home. 

Don’t forget—just because your employees are in charge of enforcing health and safety regulations does not mean they are perfect actors themselves. Be aware and in control of your employees behavior. Their nonchalance about mask-wearing will foster an unsafe environment, and it facilitates further unsafe behavior from the customers who are following their lead. It is up to you to ensure your employees are setting a good example.

This is all uncharted territory. Before 2020, the customer was always right, no matter what. But what happens when the customer is threatening the health of those around them rather than simply being argumentative about returning a pair of shoes? What happens when it’s your trusted employee of 10 years that is neglecting safety protocols?

  • Be empathetic. Most people that are lashing out at you about safety protocols are handling their own frustrations and anxieties about the pandemic in a poor fashion. Oftentimes, they just want to feel heard. Reiterate that you value their business—or their contributions to your business—and simply want them to take part in safety measures for the betterment of everyone. Even when you don’t agree, express understanding.
  • Keep Things Professional. While it is important to be assertive and firm, communicate in a manner that doesn’t resort to raised voices, personal insults, or otherwise unprofessional behavior. Sometimes, people are just seeking conflict for conflict’s sake—don’t indulge them.
  • Work As A Team. As the owner or primary authority on staff, it may be in your best interest to step in during a confrontation with an unruly customer. While your employees should always be encouraged to ask for help, they may be less likely to do so in a situation like this. 

    Give your employees room to resolve the conflict themselves, but if the customer continues to unreasonably escalate the situation, it’s time for you to step in. If there is a scenario where a customer is attempting to hold an employee accountable to following safety standards, take time to pull them aside, address the issue, and reiterate what they can do better next time.
men shaking hands talking about all in one business management software
  • Offer Solutions. During an altercation, it doesn’t always seem possible to find a reasonable solution. But when you’re able to focus the attention on the future rather than the initial problem, people are more likely to participate in the de-escalation process. Whether it’s providing a free mask or offering personalized attention, find ways to progress the conversation. 
  • It’s Their Home, But It’s Your Health. If your business offers field services, your employees may feel a bit uncomfortable enforcing rules in someone’s home. It is important that you address this with both your employee and the customer in advance—laying out the ground rules will remove the ambiguity and awkwardness.

    Your employees and customers need to know when, and if, it is acceptable to refuse service. If your customer reports unsafe employee behavior, take immediate steps to confront that employee so that further issues do not arise.  
  • Know When To Draw The Line. Just because you do everything right doesn’t always mean the other person will follow suit. If someone is endangering the health of you, your staff, and other customers, it may be time to remove them from the premises. This is a last resort saved for only the worst of the worst offenders. That being said, it’s important to know when this option must be utilized.

    While you’ll tolerate some heated vocabulary and minor non-safety related rule violations, the line is crossed when this person repeatedly refuses to wear a mask, social distance, or otherwise not follow public safety protocols.

Put The Situation In Perspective

It can be easy to let personal sentiments trickle into your professional life—especially when it relates to dealing with particularly difficult customers. The manner in which your employees respond to these challenges begins with you. As a business owner, your job is to cultivate an atmosphere that upholds a professional standard of service to every customer regardless of any personal disagreements that may exist. That being said, it is also important that you teach your employees where “the line” is, and what to do when a customer crosses it.

It can be awkward—at the very least—to address these issues with an uncooperative employee as opposed to a customer. Regardless if you’ve known them for 20 years or 2 months, they are people capable of spreading COVID-19 just like you and me. No one is exempt from the responsibility of maintaining public health, and it’s your job to have those uncomfortable conversations to ensure this stays true. 

In our increasingly polarized world, we encounter many people whose words leave us with nothing but an exasperated “Really? C’mon.” Being the bigger person is hard. But when your business—and public health—is at stake, being the bigger person is the only option there is.

Data Security Just Became Everyone’s Job

Posted on by Matt Bernot

Gone are the days when your tech support team was just down the hall, ready to diagnose any dilemma ailing your devices. Even if you don’t have an IT professional on-premise, every office has their de facto “tech expert”. Maybe that person is you, maybe it’s an intern, accountant, whomever. But now that your employees are scattered, what is the proper protocol for handling complex technical difficulties? Or, more importantly, what is the proper protocol for proactively deterring these issues? Google is always ready and willing to answer your questions, but sometimes your employees will require more than a search query.

Cyber Security

Technical malfunctions are an issue in more ways than one. In the midst of the most abrupt shift businesses—and, frankly, modern society—have ever seen, hackers, scammers, and delinquents across the world are digging their seedy fingers into any vulnerability they can detect.

Protecting your business against threats starts with investing in the proper technology, but it goes far beyond that. Your employees need to understand the importance of protecting your business’s data, and need to be aware of the dangers that often lie in plain sight. With the persistent and continued entanglement of personal and business information comes increased responsibility on behalf of you and your employees.

Time Is Money

If your business has never been exposed to a data breach, then consider yourself lucky. Cybercrime has consistently been on the rise for years now, but the COVID-19 pandemic has given rise to even more attacks across the globe. With an unprecedented amount of people working from unsecured workstations, it has been a proverbial field day for cybercriminals.

Now, you may be thinking “Why would someone hack my small business? We’re not Apple or Amazon with trillions in the bank.” It’s a fair point, but put yourself in the shoes of the criminals for a minute. Would you feel more apt to launch an attack on an organization with arguably more money, power, and cybersecurity systems than most world governments or on a small to medium sized business with (relatively) less money, power, or cybersecurity infrastructure?

From the eyes of the criminal, it seems wise to steal $1000 from 100 different uber-vulnerable small businesses rather than heist $100,000 from a Fortune 500 company. Insidious as these criminals are, they are savvy enough not to pick fights they cannot win. 

According to a study published on Vox.com, 1 in 5 small businesses have fallen victim to a cyberattack. Of those, 60% go out of business within 6 months. Considering that—according to IBM—the average time from identification to containment of a security breach is 280 days, your business simply can’t afford not to take preventive measures against cybercrime. 

Securing The Workstation

Many businesses have been fortunate enough to be able to give employees the hardware they need to continue operating remotely. For others, they’ve had to rely on their employees’ personal computers to get the job done. By now, in either case, you’ve probably read up on standard security measures to take. You’ve mandated VPN software, ensuring passwords don’t actually contain the word “password”, and educated your employees on the dangers of phishing emails.

Even if you put all of these procedures in place, sometimes they are simply not enough. No business is unique—true cybersecurity can’t be achieved with a “one-size-fits-all” approach. By using software that can mold to the contour of your business’s specific needs, you’ll be able to have the peace of mind knowing that your data is safe.  

With all of your employees operating, communicating, and sharing documents under the same umbrella of security, you’ll be able to better handle any issues that arise. More importantly, you’ll be able to prevent them from even happening in the first place.

People, Not Computers, Make Choices

As a business owner, your job is not only to put proper security protocols in place, but to ensure they are actually being followed. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link—it only takes one less-than-diligent employee to compromise your data. How can you make sure security measures are consistently being adhered to without disrupting the atmosphere of trust that has become so crucial to remote work?

Online Trust

The answer is proper training. Whether that is coming directly from you, your IT department, or an outside agency enlisted to help your business, it is critical that your employees know what’s at stake. Cybercriminals are cunning, heartless, and unrelenting—they will always be pursuing new tactics of subversion. When your employees are properly educated and trained on how to best hinder the actions of malevolent actors, they will better understand the gravity of the situation.

Act Early, Remain Diligent

Not all problems can be avoided, especially during a time like this. But if you find your business playing catch-up when it comes to a security breach, it may already be too late. By taking tangible, preventative steps to install the proper systems you can rest assured that you’re doing everything in your power to keep your business afloat.

Keep your employees in the loop—their understanding of the critical role they play in data security is paramount. Cybercrime will never truly cease to exist, but when it comes to your business, your fate doesn’t have to be determined by anyone but you.

This Is How Remote Teams Can Work Better Than Ever

Posted on by Matt Bernot

Teamwork makes the dream work, right? Everyone has learned at some point in their lives—often the hard way—that great things are seldom accomplished alone. This is true for businesses, families, sports teams, and every other group of people working towards a common goal.

The key to a successful team starts with each team member knowing, and eventually mastering, their respective roles. As a leader, your job is to accurately assess the various talents (and weaknesses) of your team members and assign responsibilities accordingly. Some people will naturally bite off more than they can chew, while others will refuse to take even a nibble. Ultimately, success lies with one key mantra that New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick has summed up better than anyone: “Do your job.”

business management technology remote work

Doing your job has taken on a whole new meaning since March. By now, “working from home” has become just “working”. As the United States asynchronously reopens, you are left wondering how long you will be required—and how long you’ll want to—work from home.

Some businesses have faltered during this transition, but plenty of others have come out stronger than ever. If your business falls into the former category, take a minute to assess why. Are your recent struggles born solely from the switch to remote work, or do they originate from the lack of resources, support, and technology utilized during the transition? Every business is unique, but what has been made clear during the last several months is that remote work is actually an advantage for your business—if done correctly.

Increased Job Satisfaction

In a recent survey conducted by CNBC and SurveyMonkey, the Workforce Happiness Index score of employees who were working remotely was higher than those who were not. Granted, working from home during a pandemic is a privilege not afforded to everyone. Those who have continued to leave their homes every day—risking their health and their family’s health—have been reasonably less satisfied.

That being said, if your business is able to function remotely, there is no excuse not to. Cutting out long commutes, increasing family time, and, once again, ensuring personal health and safety has led remote workers to this increased level of satisfaction. Satisfied workers are the backbone of a productive team.

Workers Have Been More Productive At Home

Sometimes, it feels like we need to be in a room with someone to collaborate effectively. Well, at least, we felt that way until COVID hit. While we all occasionally miss the hustle and bustle of the workplace, workers have proven that they are as equally collaborative and productive from home—if not more so.

Working remotely, your employees are able to avoid distractions that come along with the hustle and bustle. With the advancement of technologies that allow businesses to manage projects remotely, your team can continue to function like the well-oiled machine it is. Collaboration is more important than ever—but removing the extraneous interactions that come with the territory of non-remote work has allowed workers to focus on the thing that matters most: getting work done.  

Everyone is Saving Money

This should speak for itself, right? Your business can increase productivity while you—and your employees—are saving money. When it comes to overhead, your office space is no longer the albatross that it can sometimes feel like. According to Global Workplace Analytics, employers can actually save over $22,000 per fully remote employee per year. 

Choosing an Outfit

That is substantial, to say the least. With every dollar saved comes the opportunity to invest in your business’s future. Your employees will appreciate the efforts given to help them achieve more, and in turn your customers will be left more satisfied than ever. Beyond helping your business’s bottom line, your employees will save money, too. Remote work has allowed for less spending on transportation, food, and professional attire.

Access To Top Talent

When geographical constraints are removed from the equation, your talent acquisition pool becomes a whole lot wider. When you’re able to reach across the country—or even the world—to assemble your team, you’ll be able to find people that seamlessly mesh with your company’s culture. In the same vein, you’ll be able spend less time getting new team members up to speed. If you are able to make the best hire the first time around, the decreased rate of employee turnover will allow your teams to accomplish more.

Better Together

It can be stressful to manage a team from a distance. It can be stressful to be a part of a team from a distance. It can be stressful to simply exist in 2020. And that’s ok. We are fortunate enough to live in an era where your business can not only survive this pandemic, but come out of it better prepared for the future by putting the proper tools in place. Being able to collaborate with people around the globe is often something that we take for granted. Right now, your employees are better off at home. When your employees are better off, your business is too.

What It Takes to Delight Customers From a Distance

Posted on by Matt Bernot

Well, here we are. By now, you’ve developed your fair share of new habits. Your customers have too. Like it or hate it, it’s been unavoidable. Seeing that we lack the ability to time travel, only one option remains—to march onward. To do that, you and your business need to start by addressing the elephant in the room: COVID fatigue. 

Listening to Others

You’re tired of being cautious and concerned about every minute detail of, well, everything. From anxiety to anger and everything in between, you’ve felt it all. It affects interns and CEOs alike. (Don’t forget blog writers, too.) Everyone handles similar hardship in different ways. Despite the global pain and hardship, there’s something to be said about the spirit of resiliency arising from this moment—when we go through tough times together, it brings us closer. 

Let your customers know you’re there for them, and they will reciprocate. As a unified front, you and your customers can not only survive this new climate, you can help shape it. Prepare to rush once more unto the breach, dear friends, because tough times can be conquered—as long as your business and your customers are in it together.

Your Customers Need To Be Heard

Odds are, your business looks little like it did at this point last year. Change is inevitable—but sometimes it is forced upon us. Businesses that have thrived during the COVID-19 pandemic have shared several commonalities. But these commonalities, in many ways, have nothing to do with their products or services.

During tumultuous times, communication is king—in life and in business. Successful businesses have been able to maintain an honest, productive dialogue with their customers. People respond well to being reassured that their needs are being met, and this is especially true when it comes to personal safety. As the world navigates through uncharted waters, make sure your customer knows you’re there for them. Delivering clear, concise, and empathetic messaging will make all of the difference. 

Your product may be superior, but don’t hang your hat on that alone. If the message you are delivering to your customers lacks an empathic and compassionate tone, your customers may begin to look elsewhere. Start by acknowledging and understanding the issues that your customer is going through. Routinely ask your customers what their concerns are, and monitor your business’s data to assess if there are any recurring issues that need to be addressed. 

Importantly, if you find issues, take action.

The takeaway here: show your customers you care about them. Take the time to connect with them on a personal level. Those extra few minutes personalizing an order or chatting from your business’s Facebook page will go a long way to retaining their business. As their priorities change, yours must change with them.   

“Be Water, My Friend”

Over half a century ago, I don’t imagine that Bruce Lee foresaw himself being mentioned in a 21st century, mid-pandemic business tech blog. Nevertheless, his insights are as relevant as ever.

Water is fluid and ever-changing—it takes the shape of its surroundings. It adapts, moves quickly, and makes sure that every crevice is filled. It goes with the flow. Just like water, your business needs to be constantly evolving to fit the world around it.

Since the onset of COVID-19 in the United States, 75% of consumers have tried a new store, brand, or different way of shopping. While these new spending habits were born out of necessity, many people began to willingly change their long-held beliefs about what products and services they were loyal to.

As a business owner, now is the time to take control of your business’s narrative. As new customer habits emerge, reinforce them—stay on top of the trends that will keep your brand in the forefront of your customer’s psyche. Monitoring, understanding, and acting in service of the shifting habits of consumers in your industry will allow you to stay ahead of the curve.

Invest In Your Future

As you plan for the remainder of the year and beyond, you’ve undoubtedly taken a broader and more detailed look at your business’s future than ever before. This year has ushered in the rethinking of your supply chains, customer transactions, and overall business plan. Your business model has always accounted for market disruptions, but referring to 2020 as a standard “disruption” is a dire understatement.

jar of coins with bonsai tree future investment

The only real constant is change—you should embrace this opportunity for change with open arms. Keeping ahead of the curve is key to the future resiliency of your business. As your business adapts and grows, utilize technology to facilitate that growth. 

“Companies need to leverage a systematic approach to strengthen the resilience of their current business models to ensure their ongoing operation during COVID-19,” says Daniel Sun, VP Analyst, Gartner. “CIOs can play a key role in this process, since digital technologies and capabilities influence every aspect of business models.” 

Digital technologies influence every aspect of your business model, and almost every aspect of people’s lives at the moment. Make sure that your business follows suit. Even if you are operating from a brick-and-mortar establishment right now, advertising, customer service, and—most importantly—transactions can and should be more easily handled via a streamlined, virtual process.