Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1377667
27.5.2021 6 COMMERCIAL MANY great inventions around the world occur as a result of crises. Wars have powered the development of technology, bringing us air- planes. Plagues accelerated the development of medicine, resulting in major drug ad- vancement. After any crisis, the winners tend to be those who see all these changes as an opportunity rather than as a burden. Are you one of the future winners? The term the new normal was coined to describe a major shift to remote work caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Even today, this term carries a rather pejora- tive connotation – it feels as if we were forced into this real- ity. When the pandemic gets under control, businesses will face the decision: do they go back to the old ways, or do they make remote work part of their culture? New normal – good or bad? Remote work is doable but far from optimised. The big- gest challenge with the new normal was that businesses were forced to adjust in a hur- ry and were, in most cases, completely unprepared. They had to adopt makeshift solu- tions, often in the face of or- ganisational chaos, selecting options that were far from op- timal but that could be imple- mented quickly. And if some- thing works, even if not that well, it takes a lot of effort to replace it later. The pandemic has also led to the growth of criminal or- ganisations that specialise in cyber-attacks. Phishing is at an all-time high, ransomware is no longer a threat just to the biggest organizations and DDoS attacks are easily pur- chasable from the dark net. Combining the increase in criminal activities with expo- sure due to makeshift remote work solutions is a recipe for disaster. The great opportunity Businesses are facing a sit- uation that brings amazing opportunities, which are not being explored. Before the pandemic, most businesses rarely allowed remote work due to the lack of secure in- frastructure to support it, but also due to an old-school perception that employees needed to be controlled in order to perform efficiently. The new norm proved this theory wrong and now gives a remarkable opportunity for people to choose the style of work that fits their personal- ity, preferences and lifestyle. Once we get this pandemic under control, the new nor- mal or rather the new oppor- tunity will become all about giving a choice. Enlightened individuals and organisations will enable their teams to fig- ure out the best ways to work safely together, no matter where and no matter when. leading to improved employ- ee satisfaction leading to bet- ter work culture and more profits. The great expectations Without the right tools, however, 'The Great Oppor- tunity' could end up being the 'Great Flop'. This is due to current solutions being far from optimal and often un- safe. What businesses must do now, as we're hopefully ap- proaching the moment when we will be able to make the choice of where we want to work, is to make one last dif- ficult step: throw away make- shift solutions and provide their workforce with tools that let them work efficient- ly and safely no matter where they are located. And this is where BMIT comes in. The new opportunity offering – BMIT work BMIT has put in a lot of time and effort in analysing the makeshift solutions that busi- nesses were forced to adopt. It has seen the problems that these businesses face and it has come up with what it be- lieve are the best options. The BMIT Work offering is based on three solutions for differ- ent business requirements: • Make it Work allows teams to work remotely with the tools that they already know and use every day. Businesses that choose this solu- tion treat remote work as an option but are not yet ready to make a huge step away from the typi- cal office. • Work from Anywhere is a slightly bigger step, which aims to secure- ly move a company's solutions to the cloud as much as possible. This solution focuses on the scalability of remote work and treats it as an integral part of the com- pany culture. • Work Securely focus- es on the safety of data. This solution is aimed at businesses that work with sensitive data and/ or must meet strict com- pliance requirements. As part of this solution, BMIT offers clients everything that is nec- essary to make sure that giving their employees a choice does not, in any way, hinder the security of their business. Whichever solution one chooses, the BMIT team has the right expertise and expe- rience to make sure that your business takes advantage of this new norm. New norm or new opportunity?