In the early part of 2010, to manage our expanding team of associates, we identified a need to develop our existing IT setup. We were aware of the concept of cloud computing and sought the advice of M2i Communications to provide us with a hosted IT solution that would meet our business needs. The whole process took less than two weeks to complete. M2i set up the system, imported our email archives and showed us how to get the most out of the new services. They also upgraded our existing mobile phone set up, and we now have smart phones that are synchronised and configured with our email and calenders. Nearly a year on, we feel our organisation has really benefited from using M2i, they understand our business and provide us with a reliable infrastructure that contributes to our continued success. Furthermore we have saved several thousands of pounds in set up costs for a traditional email and data storage server, and a further one thousand pounds per year with ongoing maintenance contracts.
The hosted technology we now use gives us email, diary and contact management for everyone within the business, making a real difference from from using individual email accounts and diaries that aren't connected. It works with Microsoft Outlook, via a web browser and our smart phones. This is vital as it means our staff and associates can connect from any device, anywhere at any time. We continue to operate whatever the weather!
The SharePoint solution, which gives us access via a web browser to the latest versions of working documents has also really improved our time management processes, because we can always find what we need. There's a lot less time spent emailing others trying to find documents.
Everything is hosted in secure data centres which can be accessed over the Internet. We are billed on a monthly basis and are charged per user. M2i manages our account so we can easily add new users as we develop and grow however, we only pay for what we use. Besides saving money, using hosted services also reduces a lot of risk for us, as the M2i solutions provides back up, continuity of service, hardware and software maintenance, upgrades and disaster recovery. All Practice Solutions staff and our associates need to work effectively is a laptop, or smart phone, with a connection to the Internet.
