If the events of 2020 taught us anything, they taught us about the importance of disaster recovery. Whether it was a global pandemic, a recession, or one of countless other crises, we were all recovering from something this past year.
One area where this was especially true was in the world of data center transformation. As so many workers transitioned to a remote lifestyle, it became clear that our ways of managing data needed to be more agile – and if anything ever went wrong, we had to have plans ready.
At most places of business nowadays, IT leaders now have a common understanding – having your business prepared for disaster recovery (DR) is absolutely essential. If your organization ever experiences any sort of IT breakdown, and your employees’ access to their most essential data is interrupted, you need to have a way of getting your files back and maintaining business continuity. And it’s not enough merely to duplicate your data, stash it on a backup server, and call it a day. Today, a more sophisticated process is called for.
Traditional DR strategies tend to miss the mark. For starters, companies have historically set up processes that are too complex, as they tend to use many different servers and applications spread across disparate locations. Often, these systems are slow and unreliable. Additionally, companies today need to be concerned about “dark data” – files that they’re storing and maintaining even though they add no value to the business. The optimal DR strategy is one that doesn’t waste anyone’s time or money.
And of course, in this age of COVID-19, companies really need to consider revamping their strategies. Over the past year, disaster recovery has become far more challenging – now, if an IT mishap were to strike your business, you’d be dealing with retrieving data for a wide range of employees in many different locations. It’s difficult to prepare for disaster scenarios when the impacts can be so widespread.
At Zones, though, we create solutions to these difficult challenges. Our strategy is one that puts the cloud at the forefront – when you have your data in the cloud rather than on premises, it makes for easier management and simplified DR. This cloud-first model is easy for us to achieve because of our strong OEM partner relationships. Microsoft, with its highly reliable Azure platform, and Veritas, with its many essential software solutions, both help to make cloud DR a reality for our clients.
Over the years, we’ve seen all too many times how direly companies need to improve their DR plans. According to our research, nearly 50% of mid-market firms have poor disaster recovery plans in place today, and they have an imperative to do better. And our Zones team has everything it takes to help. We have a proven track record of designing and implementing DR solutions that work – to get started, all you have to do is take the first step and reach out.