Facilitating remote working through technology

While remote working was new to many at Sterling and Wilson, backed by the support from the IT infrastructure team, the employees quickly got into the groove.

By Manoj Deorukhkar

Do all medium to large companies have a good Business Continuity Planning (BCP) strategy and action plan in place? The answer most certainly is a “yes”.  So, did any of these companies foresee the speed and magnitude with which the disaster—Covid-19 pandemic—would hit the world?

No surprises: the answer certainly is a “no”.

The current situation is a perfect example of VUCA—volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity—unleashed by natural forces, and hence, it was not on the risk radar of any organization. It has forced all organizations to think out of the box, and the IT team had to fight the situation with whatever preparedness they had and come up with solutions that were not acceptable earlier.

At Sterling and Wilson, we have aligned ourselves with the evolving situation. Our IT policy and infrastructure are robust, which ensures that the entire value-chain is fully informed on the status of all ongoing assignments. We have strong processes in place that empowers employees to remain fully productive while working remotely or working from home.

The lockdown prompted us to quickly come up with Use Your
Own Device (UYOD) policy, with necessary precautions, to
ensure continuity of work.

For us, this was a defining experience that changed our mindset on several parameters, both on technology and non-technology front. Here are a few examples that highlight the challenges and steps taken by the company to deal with the lockdown in India and the tough situation.

• User Mindset: Working from home was new to most of our employees, and they quickly got into the mode. Many of them realized the importance of high speed and reliable internet connectivity at home.
• Communication: Using video conferencing instead of a personal meeting has now become a natural way to collaborate. Our investments in collaboration tools like MS Teams, LifeSize, and GoTo meetings have paid a rich dividend, enabling us to continue the work seamlessly. Employees quickly adapted to the etiquette of multi-party meetings and presentations.
• Cloud: Our investment into cloud footprint has proved to be immensely beneficial – it ensures no physical presence is required to keep on-premise data centres operational.
• Remote Connectivity: Our Virtual Private Network (VPN) connections have jumped multi-fold to provide secure and trusted link to employees working from home.
• Personal Devices: The sudden lockdown meant that many employees did not have their laptops to work from home and there was no way for them to pick it up from the office. Hence, employees started using their personal computers. This prompted us to quickly come up with Use Your Own Device (UYOD) policy, with necessary precautions, to ensure continuity of work.
• User Support: It’s been challenging to maintain the Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and the effectiveness of the end-user support process. However, everybody has been enabled to adopt a remote support model with the use of tools for remote support and resolution. This is a welcome change to sustain and optimize the IT support model.
• IT Security: This large scale (almost 100%) shift to work from home has a massive implication on IT security posture, especially on network and application security. This involves revisiting our security policy, processes, and tools.

We have also seen a huge surge in attempts from hackers after the lockdown, and that has prompted us to vigorously restart the IT security awareness campaign as well as the actual deployment of few tools like anti-virus on personal computers.

The  author Manoj Deorukhkar is the Chief Information Officer at Sterling and Wilson Pvt Ltd

The article was first published in the April 2020 print edition of Voice&Data