THE COST OF MANAGING , SECURING AND PROTECTING DATA IS BECOMING MORE SIGNIFICANT .
FINAL WORD
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THE COST OF MANAGING , SECURING AND PROTECTING DATA IS BECOMING MORE SIGNIFICANT .
Businesses need to be more proactive in how they address the information that ’ s available to them , create a competitive advantage and ultimately drive revenue . To address this , businesses must achieve hyper-availability , where always-on data automatically anticipates the needs and meets demands across multiple infrastructures – virtual , physical , cloud – while remaining protected , and ensuring compliance .
FACTOR IN THE RIGHT DATA PROTECTION
Data management and protection is essential if businesses are to not only survive , but to drive the Digital Transformation and thrive in an increasingly competitive environment . Over the last few years , there have been data centre outages and increasingly sophisticated ransomware attacks , which could have had irreparable consequences to not only brand reputation but also data and financial loss .
Hospitals store critical patient data , which if a victim of malware could result in cancelling life-saving operations while banks have access to sensitive personal data , which if not appropriately protected could result in serious financial theft .
Today , businesses must re-evaluate their data management strategy and take a holistic and a more proactive approach to data management . One that is on the right infrastructure , always protected , ready to work , in the right place , at the right time while meeting regulations , such as GDPR .
EXPLORE ALTERNATIVE STAFFING
Always on businesses don ’ t stop , sales targets still exist , and customers have requirements that need to be met .
During the summer period , businesses should consider re-allocating staff to cover certain roles and responsibilities of another employee during their holiday , to not only drive learning and development initiatives , but also address a potential skills gap in the company .
Similarly , certain industries encourage it , particularly retail , leisure and hospitality , who take on seasonal and part-time workers to help meet the always on demands during peak periods .
While this addresses the immediate business needs , consideration needs to be given to what data employees have access to , and
Claude Schuck , Regional Manager for Middle East and Central Africa at Veeam Software
what processes are in place to mitigate the risk posed by those with authorised data access , who have bad intentions .
It is not enough to adhere to legislation , such as GDPR , that focuses on what data businesses have access to and how they use it , if they don ’ t drill down to the micro level at what individuals could do with the available data .
AVOID THE BURNOUT FROM TRADITIONAL DATA AND STORAGE MAINTENANCE
In the age of the Hyper-Available Enterprise , businesses must evolve from a policy-driven approach to a behaviour-driven strategy . Data needs to become intelligent and selfmanaging to improve the responsiveness , security and business value of data . IT teams are responsible for the availability of the data and ability for the organisation to innovate , respond to marketplace needs and deliver new digital services .
By moving to a more proactive mode of automation and orchestration , businesses can harness the value of its data to better adapt and anticipate the needs of the always-on customer . By reducing the cost and time the IT team has to spend on managing and storing data , the team can focus on driving the Digital Transformation of the business . •
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