Technology has long been at the heart of businesses of all sizes, and developments in recent years have led these organizations to rely on their technology more than ever. But for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), the importance of technology doesn't necessarily equate to the amount of resources they have to support it.
TechRadar Pro spoke with Sarah Burkhart, senior director of software and customer experience at Dell, about the challenges facing SMBs and how choosing the right laptops for your workforce can help protect and grow your operations, regardless of the level of immediate technical support available. to them the ground.
“My husband has a small business,” Burkhart explains. “And I can tell you that as a small business owner, he doesn't have an IT department. He is so common among small businesses. Inevitably, the owner or whoever is more technical becomes the IT department.
“[As] the technology landscape continues to change, small businesses are caught up in all the changes that many of us are caught up in, in terms of the need to be able to access data from anywhere and the desire to work synchronously. with colleagues and asynchronously. All of this is still a problem for small businesses. But then add the fact that they have limited resources specifically dedicated to technology, and it can be overwhelming for small businesses to navigate the decisions they need to make around the right technology to meet their needs.
SMBs would rather focus on meeting their customers' needs and other key business objectives than worry about the details of IT infrastructure and security. One of the first steps in achieving this balance is to make sure your business is equipped with the right technology to meet your needs.
“Probably the most important thing to understand is that not all technology is created with small businesses in mind,” Burkhart tells us. “But there is technology that is created absolutely with commercial environments in mind. When you look at the Dell portfolio, for example, we have PCs that run the gamut from gaming PCs to commercial business systems. A lot of solutions in our portfolio that we partner with Intel® on. Intel's vPro is sort of a check mark, which is looking to say it fits my business needs.
“I think the first step is to recognize that there is a suite of products designed specifically to meet the needs of the small business community,” he continues. “That's where you start, then you dig from there. Otherwise, the technology in the tech landscape is just too confusing and overwhelming.
Security is essential to ensure a reliable and stable foundation for SMB technology. Users have different requirements and are best served by being able to choose from a variety of laptops and desktops. Business leaders need to be able to choose from ranges of PCs, whether laptop or desktop, that meet these different requirements, knowing that they are based on a secure and reliable platform that ensures compatibility between these different devices.
“Reviewing Dell PCs with Intel vPro® ensures compatibility under the hood, if you will, so all of these devices share the same kind of security features,” says Burkhart. “Dell and Intel work closely together to ensure our devices are the most secure commercial PCs. And they are hardened and protected against threats from malicious actors. I think these are the indicators that small business owners want to have when looking for new technology that can not only last as long as possible, be a good buy in terms of technology spend, but also be compatible with other devices in their environment. .
To listen to our full conversation with Dell's Sarah Burkhart and learn more about identifying the technology that will best support your SMB, watch the video above.
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