Just until a couple of years ago, remote working was considered taboo by several businesses worldwide. Organizations believed that remotely working employees would be highly distracted without a traditional office environment. Besides, setting up remote connections, providing remote access and managing employees remotely were considered next to impossible.
But as we know, the Covid-19 pandemic transformed this notion when almost all businesses had to resort to remote working. Today, as we enter the so-called post-pandemic world, several businesses have embraced remote working on a permanent basis, while many others have adopted hybrid-working models. People have realized that remote working, unlike the traditional belief, does not decrease employee productivity, but rather enhances it by manifolds.
Besides improved productivity, businesses have experienced several other benefits of remote working such as access to a greater talent pool and reduced investments in office spaces and infrastructure. But this journey from traditional office culture to remote working, although swift, has not been easy. Allowing employees to work remotely is easier said than done. Businesses have to consider several aspects majorly related to corporate data security and remote provisioning that can create major consequences, if not managed properly. This is where implementing efficient RMM solutions play a vital role.
Challenges of Remote Working
Remote working has been a drastic change for both the employers and the employees. While the employees too faced some challenges in adjusting to this new change such as lack of engagement, inability to connect instantly with managers and colleagues, and blurred work-life boundaries, they eventually got accustomed to it. But employers, on the other hand, encountered greater obstacles.
1. Increased cyber security risks
An enterprise’s IT admin secures the office spaces with multiple layers of protection that help keep the corporate data and network safe. However, remote working allows employees to step out of this safe haven and work from any place of their choice, using public networks which are flooded with lurking cyber threats. Businesses have to go the extra mile to put several security policies in place and constantly monitor compliances to ensure that their corporate data isn’t under attack by hackers or other malicious actors.
2. Cumbersome remote management
Managing a plethora of device configurations and set-ups is simply easier when the entire workforce operates from defined office spaces. With employees working remotely, not only does the visibility of the workforce decrease, but it becomes cumbersome for IT admins to keep a track of their inventory, manage diverse dispersed devices and provision them with enterprise-specific policies.
3. Improper communication & engagement
A regular day in the traditional office culture involves employees meeting their colleagues, sharing a cup of coffee, discussing action items, having face-to-face meetings and engaging in work as well as team activities alike. With remote working businesses find it difficult to get their dispersed teams to communicate efficiently. Communication barriers lead to lowered productivity and greater employee disengagement.
4. Non-tech savvy employees
Although the corporate world relies heavily on digital devices and the latest technologies, earlier in the traditional office culture, not every corporate role required employees to handle digital devices regularly. With remote working, mobile devices have become the glue that holds the workforce together. However, not all employees are tech-savvy to use these devices for their daily tasks. Some may even need frequent help with settings and device complications. Waiting around for the company’s IT teams to reach out to the employees to help resolve their device usage queries and issues can lead to a massive loss of time and productivity.
What is Remote Monitoring & Management Software (RMM)
Remote Monitoring & Management (RMM) software is a tool designed to help IT, admins, to streamline their organization-wide remote device and endpoint management. IT admins of organizations, or even Managed Service Providers (MSPs) who offer managed IT services to other businesses can benefit largely from the RMM software in terms of time and efforts required to manage and provision a large number of devices.
This tool fits in perfectly to solve the remote device and endpoint management-related challenges that businesses face when opting for remote or hybrid working. Rather than engaging in a time-consuming and labour-intensive process of managing multitudes of devices manually, the RMM software helps IT admins automate routine tasks and push security policies on their remote device fleets, without wasting time on frequent site visits.
How Does an RMM Software Benefit Your Business?
While RMM software is mostly leveraged by MSPs, it can also prove extremely beneficial for a company’s in-house IT team. Let’s take a detailed look at how RMM software benefits businesses.
1. Proactive monitoring
The greatest challenge in enterprise mobility is to keep a constant check on remotely dispersed employees. Simply providing employees with mobile devices for work is not enough. It is crucial to keep these devices secure and maintained their best health.
RMM software helps IT, admins of organizations, to monitor the inventory-wide performance and uncover any potential problems even before the users or clients experience them. This kind of predictive analysis goes a long way in helping businesses keep their devices at optimum performance.
2. Faster issue resolution
Remote working has made it mandatory for all employees to use mobile devices for their daily work and interactions, even those employee feedback whose regular jobs do not involve much use of technology, such as mine workers, construction workers, drivers, etc. Such employees are bound to face some technical queries or device issues.
With the RMM software, IT admins can reach out to their employees and help them resolve their device errors quickly with various features such as Remote Cast & Control, Screen recordings, VoIP calls, etc. This saves IT time and effort in making frequent on-site visits and prevents employees from facing an extended device downtime.
3. Integration with ITSM
When your work environment is so heavily dependent on mobile devices and digital devices of various kinds, there are ought to be some technical glitches in the way. Modern-day RMM software not only helps you to reach out to your remote employees but also helps you integrate the leading ITSM tools with the RMM software to generate context-aware support tickets and manage issues more swiftly, straight from the RMM console.
4. Improved cybersecurity
While remote working is appreciated and accepted by the world, enterprises would agree that deploying a remote work environment is not an easy task, when it comes to securing their corporate information. Remote employees are exposed to a variety of cyber risks in terms of data compromisation, device protection and network security threats. With RMM software, your business’s IT admins can roll out extensive security policies to protect your employees’ devices, the corporate data on them, as well as the networks to which they connect leaving no room for accidental breaches.
5. Automated compliance alerts
RMM software enables your IT admins to protect your corporate assets and the information with security policies, as well as frequent compliance checks. IT admins can schedule compliance alerts in case of any enterprise policy being overpassed. Automated alerts can be configured for various incidents such as overuse of data, Geofence breaches, unauthorized SIM swaps and other compliance violations. This way, keeping a track of the usage and security incidents, as well as the quick action to be taken against these instances becomes manageable.
6. Reports & analytics
Another advantage that modern-day RMM software present is the extensive organization-wide inventory reports and overview. IT admins can examine device usage, employee behaviour and much more from the comprehensive reports generated by the RMM tool for various factors such as device unlock attempts, battery percentage, location reports, screen time and other device vitals. This helps IT admins examine device usage patterns and enables wider traceability of issues.
7. Location tracking
You can constantly be aware of your employees’ whereabouts with the help of the location monitoring capabilities of the RMM software. Some of the latest RMM solutions allow you to monitor your employees’ real-time locations and also configure area-based Geofences to keep a close eye on your workforce. This feature proves especially useful for businesses that have a mobile workforce such as logistics, mining, construction, etc.
8. Limit user access to devices
A good RMM software helps IT, admins of businesses, to enable secure remote access to their employees. Allowing employees to work remotely is a challenging task in terms of corporate data security. RMM tools provide extensive configurations to allow only authorized users to access the devices and the resources on them. Configuring passcode policies, encrypting corporate data with security keys, and enabling role-based access are some of the many features that can be leveraged by the company’s IT admins.
9. IT automation
Remote working has led to the surge in the use of mobile devices and cloud-based mobile applications. Hackers have evolved with time and have found the latest ways to detect app and system vulnerabilities to infect corporate devices and networks with malware. The solution to this grave problem is simple but tedious to execute. Routine system and app updates, patch fixes and timely repairs prevent malware from breaking into the corporate systems.
RMM software enables IT admins to automate these routine tasks of timely OS and app updates, which not only ensures maximum cyber security but also relieves the IT teams from redundant efforts.
10. Centralized management
The core purpose of RMM software is to help IT, admins of companies and MSPs, to simplify remote management of devices. A single centralized dashboard that offers such diverse functionalities can not only help IT admins save time from toggling between various tools, but also help businesses save costs on purchasing multiple solutions. A single solution caters to your remote device monitoring, security and management needs.
Closing Lines
Amidst the chaos that the pandemic-driven remote working has created, RMM solutions bring in a sense of relief to all the businesses looking for streamlined remote management. Scalefusion MDM is a device and endpoint management solution that is trusted by over 8000 businesses worldwide and offers extensive RMM capabilities straight off a simple and intuitive dashboard.
