As 2017 draws to a close, it’s time to start making plans for the year to come. Before you decide to make changes to your technology infrastructure and settle on new IT investments, it’s important to consider not just what your future goals are, but how well your current technology has helped your business prosper over the last year. Evaluating the impact your technology had in 2017 will help you make more informed decisions going forward.
An in-depth analysis will give you more information to work with, but a great way to give yourself a general overview of how well your past investments paid off and what you should focus on next, is to answer these three questions.
1) How did your technology help you over the past 12 months?
This is probably the easiest question to answer. Did the new accounting software you purchased solve the efficiency issues you were hoping to overcome? Did moving to a hosted server help you better manage your monthly IT costs? Take note of all the accomplishments you and your team had over the past year that were a direct result of changes made to your technology over the course of 2017. These wins are indicators that you’ve been on the right track.
2) Where did your technology fall short in 2017?
Are your employees still struggling to share information between departments thanks to incompatible software? Were customers left waiting because of communication or production issues? If there are still technology trouble spots you couldn’t address fully or at all in 2017, they should be a priority for 2018. These are the weak points that can hold your business back from both short-term and long-term success.
3) Where can improvements be made in 2018?
When you consider your technology frustrations, what are the first few things that come to mind? A reception computer that keeps crashing? A critical server that always seems to be offline? The concerns that immediately jump out at you are areas that you can focus your attention on as you start building your technology plan for 2018.
Not all of your business goals need to be game-changers, and the changes to your technology don’t necessarily need to be either. Small adjustments can make a big difference in the long run. And with the right planning, some big adjustments – like adopting cloud technology – can fix multiple issues, both big and small.
Ready to start evaluating your business’ technology needs for 2018 and beyond? Get in touch with me at CPU, Inc. We’re the trusted IT professionals for businesses nationwide.
