Every month, we will share some of our favorite small business and technology articles. This month’s post covers how to stimulate IT innovation, evolving Wi-Fi technologies, and useful shortcuts for Windows 8.
Improve IT Innovation at Your Business
Can your IT professionals give your business a competitive advantage over your competition?
Christopher O’Malley, CEO of Nimsoft and Computerworld contributor, thinks so. In his article, Stimulating IT Innovation, O’Malley argues that IT is no longer a system-delivery support arm of your business. Rather, IT is the most likely source of your industry’s next great technology-driven innovation.
How can you foster innovation at your business? O’Malley lists three suggestions:
- Ask: Encourage IT professionals to bring new ideas on how technology can improve ongoing operations and processes to the table.
- Recognize: Give IT professionals that offer ideas credit, and publicly acknowledge their insights.
- Reward: Offer incentive for ideas that deliver powerful, positive results for the organization.
Teaser: Stay tuned for our upcoming ebook on this topic.
Advanced Wi-Fi Technology
In his Entrepreneur.com article, Three Technologies That Will Change the Way You Use Wi-Fi, Stewart Wolpin (@StewartWolpin) predicts that recent advancements in Wi-Fi technologies will evolve to better how businesses and remote employees stay connected.
- Mobile Connectivity: The GSMA and Wireless Broadband Alliance are working on an initiative that will create a network of Passpoint-certified Wi-Fi hotspots. If your smartphone and tablet is in range of one of these hotspots and is Passpoint compliant, it will automatically connect to a safe, secure Wi-Fi signal without you having to remember a password or go through a sign-in process—easing pain points of mobility and business travel.
- Faster Wi-Fi Speed: “Gigabit” is a 5G Wi-Fi that is expected to offer speeds up to 1300 Mbps, which is potentially 1,000 times faster than 4G.
- Wi-Fi Access: “Super Wi-Fi” is a router that can transmit a Wi-Fi signal up to five times farther than today’s standard router. How? Channeling unused TV white space. In other words, one of these routers can transmit a Wi-Fi signal accessible from thousands of feet away, instead of merely a couple hundred feet away.
Check out the full article for more on how Wolpin believes these technologies will affect businesses and global Internet access, as well as when they will likely be available.
Related Post: Check out our recent post—“What To Do When Your Internet Goes Down—A Small Business Technology Action Plan.”
Fan of Shortcuts?
For those businesses testing Microsoft’s Windows 8 or thinking about upgrading when the operating system becomes available, Steve Clayton from the blog “Next At Microsoft” found the following video that shows the various keyboard and mouse shortcuts available for Windows 8.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9Fczo6E5gE]
Clayton also posted a link to a PDF download that lists all the keyboard shortcut commands for Windows 8.
Share Your Favorites
What were some of the other interesting small business and technology articles you found this month? Please share them in the comments below.