Many businesses fail to make the most of their IT. Avoid the following IT blunders to not only save you time and money, but also ensure your technology works well for you.

Businesses of all sizes are reliant on their IT. Technology is a key driver of business growth and competitive advantage, affecting productivity, employee morale and customer satisfaction. Unfortunately, many businesses fail to make the most of their IT. If technology isn’t properly managed or reviewed, it may fail to meet your business needs. Moreover, businesses routinely make IT blunders that end up being costly. We highlight the top 8 IT mistakes to avoid so as to save you time and money. Doing so will be a positive step towards ensuring your technology is functional and efficient.

• 1. Data overload

Data is undoubtedly invaluable. However, with advances in technology, more data is available to businesses now than ever before. Collecting data just for the sake of it can delay decision-making and bog a business down. To avoid analysis paralysis, we recommend identifying data that is critical to business decisions, collecting it and discarding anything else.

• 2. Holding on to infrastructure

Holding on to hardware unnecessarily can slow a company’s ability to grow and innovate. Instead, we recommend thinking carefully about what apps and services you really need on premise and putting the rest in the Cloud. This will free up your time and resource for more strategic decision making.

• 3. Failure to back up appropriately

Data loss can be crippling to any business. Whether from a cyber-attack, natural disaster or extended power cut, data recovery can be a painful and expensive process. Ensuring you have a good backup strategy is critical, as is testing these backups regularly to confirm you can retrieve your data effectively.

• 4. Slacking on security

Security remains a top concern for most businesses so ensuring you have adequate IT security provisions is critical. As a minimum, we recommend implementing the security features of your operating system and having updated firewalls and antivirus programs in place. For extra protection, we recommend looking at the Cyber Essentials scheme.

• 5. Not protecting employee phones

Smartphones carry so much sensitive data nowadays that it is crucial to protect company phones from getting lost or stolen. You should password-protect company smartphones, enable remote wipe capabilities and ensure you have a secure operating system. For more granular controls, consider investing in mobile device management software.

• 6. Lack of employee training

The benefits of investing in new technology and equipment are quickly eroded if your employees don’t know how to use it. Technology changes all the time, and even existing technology gets updated. Therefore, employees need regular training and support to ensure they’re using technology efficiently. It is also worth checking whether your software vendors offer free training or on-going assistance. Another important area to educate employees in is IT security. Employees are your best form of defence when it comes to cyber security. Training them on how to spot and avoid falling for phishing scams is paramount. Phishing simulations help prepare employees for real phishing attacks and have been shown to improve awareness by 25%. Trend Micro provides a completely free security awareness service, called Phish Insight, to help your organization resist online scams.

• 7. Overuse of virtual chats

Employees that become overly reliant on technology such as virtual chats, can lose the ability to communicate properly. As a result, they may actually end up taking longer to accomplish things. We recommend creating rules around Slack or Skype, encouraging employees to use video chat to resolve problems or pick up the phone if an email string gets too long.

• 8. Improper hardware disposal

Your business is likely to have redundant data across drives, CDs and USBs. In disposing of this hardware, you should ensure personal and confidential data is erased properly. Data that falls into the wrong hands could have serious consequences. To wipe a device effectively, you should clear the data using specialist erasure software, or purge it using a magnetic field and destroy the device by shredding or melting to render it non-functional. If you have any questions or comments on the list above, we'd love to hear from you.