Phoenix IT Solutions from itSynergy: Technology Consultants for Small and Medium Sized Businesses

Technology Consulting for Small and Medium Business

itSynergy Newsletter

Michael Cocanower
President, itSynergy

Welcome

As I type this month's newsletter intro, I am sitting in Houston's Hobby airport waiting for my flight back to Phoenix. I have been here for the past week with our Technology Advisor, Dan Zaremba, attending Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Conference - the single largest annual partner event for Microsoft and all of its partners.

It has been a crazy week attending keynotes from the very top (Steve Ballmer) all the way down the chain.

I even had the opportunity to present in 5 different sessions this year, one of which I was the sole presenter on (the topic was "Real-World Key Performance Indicators and Business Intelligence to Run Your Company" - one of my favorites!). Additionally, this week that we spend away from the office every year delivers the most value through the relationships and connections we are able to make with vendors, colleagues, Microsoft personnel, and the press.

I came away from this year's conference with several key takeaways:

1. On Monday, Microsoft announced the official launch date for the new version of Small Business Server 2008 (SBS) and the new Essential Business Server 2008 (EBS)--November 12. I would guess that greater than 90% of our customers with less than 40 desktops are currently running Small Business Server, and many have not upgraded in quite some time so I expect we will be very busy later this year getting everyone up to the latest version with all of the new features it offers. Additionally, Microsoft now has a product for all of our customers that are too large for Small Business Server. Essential Business Server is for companies with up to 300 PCs, and offers many of the features of SBS without the 75 user limit. We already have one customer running a pre-release version in production as of last month, we'll have a second in production this month, and already have a 3rd slated for implementation shortly after release.

2. The Software as a Service (SaaS) message from Microsoft is loud and clear. Microsoft finally announced pricing for an online bundle of applications that will allow customers to host their data and business applications in a Microsoft data center, and pay a small monthly fee instead of having to invest thousands of dollars in server infrastructure. The new offerings are priced VERY competitively, and we will be offering this as an option to a server infrastructure going forward. I think it will be especially appealing to smaller customers that would rather pay a few dollars per month with minimal upfront costs rather than investing thousands of dollars in a server infrastructure that is only very lightly utilized.

3. Microsoft is going to start more heavily emphasizing Windows Vista adoption on PCs. From our standpoint at itSynergy, we are in agreement with them that Vista is ready for prime time. We recently refreshed all of our desktops internally with Windows Vista and have been purchasing Vista on laptops for many months now. I have personally been running Vista on my laptop for about 9 months, and although I did have a few glitches initially, it has been perfect and error free since Service Pack 1 was released. I like Vista much better than XP, find it equally if not more stable, and do not feel there is any reason customers shouldn't switch to this new operating system short of some application that isn't compatible. In the case of application compatibility, I think it is time to let our vendors know that it is time they release new versions of their applications that are fully Vista compatible given that it has been out for over a year now. They can't keep their head in the sand forever. . .

As I leave the conference and wing my way back to Phoenix, I am excited about the year to come, and especially excited to ride the wave of the new version of SBS and the new release of EBS. It has been 5 years since we have had a major new small business release from Microsoft, and I am excited that we now have the tools to offer a new jump in features and functionality for our customers. I am also looking forward to engaging in dialogue with both new and existing medium business customers about the features and benefits of EBS, and the impact it can have on their business.

Have a great month!

5 Chronic Small-Biz Mistakes To Correct

By Jeff Wuorio
Reprinted with permission from the Microsoft Small Business Center

To paraphrase Yogi Berra, chronic business mistakes are deja vu all over again.

Missteps, miscalculations and outright duds are unfortunate, yet ever-present starters in any small-business lineup. If nothing else, if it weren't for the battalion of snafus that lay in wait, every mom and pop kiosk would sport a bottom line that rivaled the New York Yankees'.

But what can really spell the difference between an established powerhouse and a perennial cellar dweller are chronic mistakes - those repeated and overlooked blunders.

Here are five persistent pitfalls that may apply to you and your business, along with steps to purge them.

7 Good Reasons To Call A Lawyer
By Jeff Wuorio
Reprinted with permission from the Microsoft Small Business Center

For many small-business owners, contacting an attorney is akin to opening a faucet - everything gushes out but little comes back in return, short of a hefty water bill.

OK, so this analogy is a little trite. It's also horribly inaccurate. Legal advice and guidance in varied forms is absolutely central to any small business. You will get a bill, yes. But using an attorney doesn't have to be a burdensome financial drain.

Here are seven signs that suggest your business may benefit from the involvement of an attorney:

System Engineering Corner

Notes from the Network Engineering Department:

Note to readers: As our network engineers work with all of you across our entire customer base, they observe trends and issues that many people have in common, or that many customers will find helpful to know about.

This section is designed to give them a mechanism to communicate those issues to you, with the hope that YOU might benefit from.

How Big is Your Mailbox?

We have spent a lot of time recently (which translates to a lot of extra expense for our customers) troubleshooting, managing, and working with VERY large mailboxes.

From a purely technical standpoint, once a mailbox gets over a GB in size, it starts to become a minor challenge in terms of supporting it, speed of access and search, and management in general. Once a mailbox gets to be over 2 GB in size, we start to run into some very serious limitations that will manifest in support, management, and disaster recovery scenarios.

Believe us when we say we are VERY heavy Outlook users, but using a few simple techniques, it is not much of a challenge at all to keep our own mailboxes under the 1 GB limit we need to keep us 'light on our feet' with our own mailboxes.

First: archive! Outlook has a built in archive feature that will remove things from your mailbox and put them into a long term storage file. Our technique is to add to that archive file daily until it gets to be between 1 and 2 GB in size, then burn that to a DVD (so that it isn't taking up space on the server). This can easily be set up to happen automatically in Outlook, and you can get very granular in your control of what gets archived, how old it has to be before archive, etc. Just ask us for help to get this set up.

If you are already in the 'danger' zone with your mailbox size, we can assist you to remove items from your mailbox into a file manually based on a number of different criteria (usually by date). We can even automate a 'mass export' of multiple mailboxes by date from the server if you have many users with large mailboxes. We can put these 'history' files on a DVD or somewhere accessible so that if you do need to look up historical information for any reason, you can get to it.

Finally, once you get everyone on the server down to a reasonable size, we can also assist you with setting up some mailbox limits so that they don't get out of control again. We can set up warnings, and even prevent people from sending and receiving mail when their mailbox gets too large. Most companies start to warn in the 1 GB neighborhood, and then get more severe with the restrictions around 1.5 GB. This ensures they stay well below the 2 GB limit where they can really get into trouble in a disaster recovery situation.

With just a few simple steps to keep things in check, you can ensure your performance stays optimal, and one of the most important business tools around (Outlook) works efficiently and error free without any interruption.

July 2008
In this issue

□ Welcome
□ Small-Biz Mistakes
□ Reasons to Call a Lawyer
□ Engineering Corner
□ Referral Program
□ Are You a Control Freak?

itSynergy Referral Program

Can we buy you dinner and send you to the movies? How about make a donation to your favorite charity in your name? Earn rewards for referring new customers to itSynergy. For more details, please visit here.

Are You A Control Freak? 5 Ways To Stop
By Joanna L. Krotz
Reprinted with permission from the Microsoft Small Business Center

For entrepreneurs, the drive to be in control is the best of traits and also their waterloo.

Certainly, infant businesses can't thrive without a founder's laser focus and passionate attention to detail.

But as chaos subsides and business starts chugging along, take-charge Dr. Jekylls often turn into Mr. Hydes, loosing their inner demon: the control freak. Usually, entrepreneurs are so involved in nurturing their baby businesses, so breathlessly invested in every step the baby takes, that they don't recognize the moment when the company actually walks on its own.

At that point the master problem-solver typically turns into the problem himself (or herself).

When owners can't let go, companies are stunted. Employees and opportunities hit the wall of a chief executive who insists on knowing every trivial thing, being at every routine meeting, calling each and every shot. Do you feel the chill of recognition? If you want your business to grow, stop feeding the monster. Get your control freak under control. Here's how.

1. Get rid of Superman. The irony here is that the better you are at building the business, the more complex and unmanageable the company becomes. By the time it's too big to handle on your own, you're so used to being in charge that you're sure it's all under "control"-until, that is, something goes wrong. You'll lose a key client. A talented partner will walk. Your spouse will get fed up. The control freak will be gleeful. Listen: "You can't do it all," says Marty Kotis, who says he learned that lesson the hard way. After opening a branch office of his Greensboro, N.C., real-estate development company, Kotis decided to manage both the headquarters office and the branch office.

Technology Consulting for Small and Medium Business

E-Newsletter July 2008