On one hand, we want to allow our employees to remain as efficient and productive as possible, and often this is on the move: out of town, out of ...

In any business, a fair expectation for employees is to set productivity goals and standards. We use these to measure how well someone is doing, to make financial decisions, and to create a record of performance over time. 

At Certified CIO, we internally measure these performance markers for employees which assists in determining salary, service charges, and gauging profit margins. We also use them to assess how productive employees are and how their levels of productivity change ...

Let’s face it: everyone’s looking to save money where he or she can. It’s just common sense, isn’t it? The same applies to businesses. In fact, it burrows to the point of running a business—making money. And making money depends on keeping costs down. 

As a Managed IT Services Provider, we charge our customers based on an agreed upon amount on a monthly basis, generally speaking. But those costs do, in time, increase.  Continue Reading →

It’s not unusual for us to talk to a prospective customer about our services and learn that their company employs a full-time IT person. So, they ask, why would they want to instead pay a company that won’t be watching their issues or dedicated to them full-time? There are several reasons:

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Adding an additional salary for most SMB is a big deal. In order to pay a qualified IT person, it can be an endeavor from a financial perspective. Highly ...

The recent COVID-19 event has changed the way many of us work. For some, it prohibited normal work. Many others, however, have adapted to a work-from-home (WFH) status. This can mean different things to different people and types of work, but for many SMB this means using a computer, whether personal or business, to log in to a central location. Other SMBs have online components of the software they use which circumvents the need for a central server.

Either way, it’s ...

The principle of least privilege (or PoLP) is, in layman’s terms, the idea that a user or technological process should have the minimum IT access necessary to efficiently complete their job or tasks. In other words, does Joe from Marketing need access to records from HR to perform his duty? If not, he should not be able to access them. Does Margaret from Accounting need access to the Finance records? Likely ...

How can a Managed Services Provider save YOUR BUSINESS money RIGHT NOW? 

Let’s pretend for a moment you’re a small business owner. Here we are, coming out of a crisis with a lot of economic recovery ahead. A lot of places are tightening their belts and not sure exactly where this is going. They may not be thinking about whether (or not) their IT is properly supporting them. In fact, it may be ...

We often get asked about NIST. What is it? How does it affect our business? Let’s take a brief view of NIST and explore some further reading. 

NIST stands for National Institute of Standards and Technology, which is a non-regulatory agency of the US Federal Government founded in 1901. However, in the IT world, NIST is generally shorthand for compliance standards relating to cybersecurity frameworks. This is very often, specifically NIST 800-53.  

Continue Reading →

With many of us working remotely, much of the normal interaction between a Managed Service Provider (or any active business – your business) and customer must still take place. Of course, telephone communications are basically unchanged (at least via a VoIP solution like 3CX which allows quick transition) and some essential activities are still going to occur in-person. But what about the other times, when a meeting or other face-to-face interaction is simply a better option? (Medical ...