We have been discussing ways to optimize infrastructure to be more proactive and drive business benefits through technology.  It would be an oversite if security did not enter the conversation.  At the same time, small business owners are being bombarded with hype about cloud computing and it may seem that this is the panacea for everything from e-mail to virus protection software and combatting malware.

In the end, it is customers that create IT solutions for small business. That said, outside providers need to offer the building blocks of products and services that together providers and customers knit together as solutions. This distinction is important because it is not generally the case that one can just purchase products and services, drop them in and expect that business outcomes will change dramatically without active involvement. Like anything, what one puts into something one gets out.  Let's take the example of something transformative like virtualization.  This is a word that many small business owners do not understand; but it is a solution that requires their involvement in order to overcome the problems - excess power consumption and cooling, lengthy disaster recovery, burdensome management - that it addresses. 

Owners considering computer services for small businesses have a wide variety from which to choose.  As mentioned in 6 Top Considerations for Small Business IT Implementation, proactivity is a more economical state.  Here are 6 steps to help you get there:

While small business owners are often overwhelmed with a wide range of non IT issues from personnel to cash flow to supplier management, here are 7 ways owners are utilizing technology in business:

Just as server virtualization allows small businesses to abstract the individual computing resources from physical hardware, storage virtualization benefits for small business IT include efficiency and ease of management of their information storage resources. 

Small business IT implemention can be very challenging due on one hand to the limitation of resources available and on the other the high reliance on the infrastructure for the business (order processing, inventory, etc.)  While IT may often fall in the important but not urgent category, consider these 6 top considerations for IT in your small business:

Owners of small and medium businesses are in a squeeze.  On one hand they need to find a niche to be able to be competitive with limited resources.  On the other, operating in this niche today usually requires more IT resources than they have.  So, how does a small business owner complement IT staff (if there is staff at all)?  Here are 5 ideas: