It’s hard to escape the phrase hybrid working right now. With businesses still trying to find their feet as we emerge from the worst of the pandemic, there’s a growing demand for more flexible working methods to become permanent.
Whilst there are many benefits in adopting a hybrid approach, such a radical change in working will always raise challenges for businesses. Many are now finding themselves with offices designed to host hundreds of employees either empty, or occupied with just a skeleton staff, leading to a significant and unnecessary drain on resources. With hybrid working set to become the standard, downsizing office space has become a priority in order to cut these costs. But what does this mean for IT infrastructure?
Getting out of the house
With less people in the office, it makes little sense to maintain the same level of IT infrastructure hosted in-house. On top of the wasted resources, there’s the additional problem of monitoring. There are fewer eyes available to ensure equipment is working as it should and on-hand to respond to any faults that occur. This results in problems being spotted less frequently and at a slower pace, which increases the chances of issues slipping through the net and having to be flagged by customers before they are remedied.
Such infrastructure is also at odds with the agility that’s at the heart of hybrid working. Keeping things in-house doesn’t provide the flexibility that’s necessary to make this hybrid approach a reality. Moreover, it raises issues around planning for the future, with many businesses facing uncertainty in the coming years due to the continued impact of the pandemic. When faced with such operational uncertainty, it’s vital that businesses can be agile enough to respond and adapt to the unforeseeable.
Colocation is the answer
Given the impact of hybrid working on modern businesses, organisations need a solution that’s better suited to serve the flexibility at the heart of hybrid working. Moving to a colocation data centre can provide just that.
The first and obvious benefit is the financial aspect. The process of migrating from an in-house solution gives businesses the opportunity to review their IT infrastructure and see whether it’s still suited to their needs in the world of hybrid working. Many systems that were vital when everyone was in the office will no longer be of any benefit, and the decommissioning of these systems can help businesses cut their costs and streamline their processes. When coupled with the savings made from downsizing on office space, businesses can enjoy substantial financial savings which can be reinvested into new opportunities that better facilitate growth.
Flexibility is another key benefit. Many businesses will still be exploring how best to facilitate a hybrid approach. Does this include every employee? Will hotdesking be used? With so many factors in flux, businesses need an infrastructure that is agile enough to match this uncertainty. Many are now making use of new and changing technologies to help facilitate hybrid working, and systems need to be able to cope with this change.
Security is another important factor in this decision. Remote working has brought on a new wave of security challenges. The line between the professional and the personal has blurred, and this has affected security behaviours and created gaps in our cyber defences. Moving to a data centre does a great deal to alleviate this threat, with operators using penetration testing and vulnerability scans to ensure security. Colocation can keep your mission critical infrastructure safe at a time when cyber threats are growing both in prominence and sophistication.
Most importantly, IT infrastructure still needs to be resilient above all else, and data centres are the ideal environment for improving resiliency. With the right tools to provide optimal cooling for servers, and benefitting from constant connectivity and power supply, data centres are well-placed to ensure 100% uptime. It is this reliability that means organisations using colocation providers can have peace of mind, knowing that both their servers and their business are in good hands.
Hybrid working and colocation – an ideal match
Hybrid working presents a number of challenges for businesses, but IT infrastructure doesn’t need to be one of them. Moving to a colocation data centre can not only result in significant cost savings, but it can also help businesses stay agile and secure at a time of uncertainty.
At ServerChoice, we provide solutions that are both flexible and scalable to help businesses manage this transition. If you’re in the process of moving towards hybrid working, get in touch and see how we can help here.
