Monday, Mar 23, 2020
Since Sept 27, 1879
Retail $2.20 Home delivered from $1.40
THE INDEPENDENT VOICE OF MID CANTERBURY
Set to change lives
Opinion justified P10
P4
Dynamic Computer Services owner Darryn Franklin warns having staff work from home can come with many thorny issues. PHOTO HEATHER MACKENZIE 200320-HM-0017
Working from home By Heather Mackenzie
photographers@theguardian.co.nz
Covid-19 is clearly having an effect on all of New Zealand. With self-isolation and social distancing becoming the norm, the stage where many businesses require staff to work from home is looming rapidly. Sounds easy enough – give them a laptop and cellphone and off they go. Simple, the business wheels can keep turning until it is safe to return the work and toilet paper is back on supermarket shelves. However Dynamic Computer Services (DCS) owner Darryn Franklin warns having
staff work from home can come with many thorny issues to be dealt with. He said it is vital that remote staff systems are set up and tested well before companies actually need them. “Business continuity is vital to remain solvent and computing systems and data protection are certainly part of that, but also operators need to think about how they are going to continue trading. How will your customers or clients contact your business if physical access is no longer possible?” Franklin said it is imperative for business
sending employees home to work, to know for sure their data is going to be protected from hackers and scammers currently taking advantage of the virus-induced workfrom-home movement. “If you are a business with 20 staff working from home, how will all that data be collated, monitored and kept safe?” If a company wishes to grant remote access to the work servers, at the very minimum staff should prove their home computers have all the latest updates and their virus protection is a recognisable brand with all the recent downloads installed.
Providing employees with work laptops or having them take their desk top computers home will circumvent any home virus protection issues, but this is not exactly a foolproof solution either. “Do staff members have enough room in their homes to fit another desktop and potentially two screens?”
CONTINUED
$100
towa your trrds a costs*vel One of the best selections of mobility scooters around. Guaranteed to impress.
*Conditions apply. Find out more. Drop in to 113 Blenheim Road, visit moremobility.co.nz or call 0800 666 222
P2
Ph 03 307 7900 to subscribe!