Worcester Business Journal

14 Worcester Business Journal • March 16, 2015 www.wbjournal.com T E C H N O LO G Y << It pays to be our business Customer. With a new way to go from fee to free. With TD Business Convenience Checking Plus, use your business checking and personal checking account balances to maintain a low minimum daily balance of $1,500. Get more with a TD Bank Business Relationship. Stop in one of our convenient locations, visit us online at tdbank.com/smallbusiness or contact James Ciociolo, Relationship Manager, at 1-508-368-6510 or Eric Torkornoo, Relationship Manager, at 1-508-368-6943. TD Bank, N.A. 329920.3-LM-CW-MA15-SmallBiz_WorcesterBiz_9x6_4C.indd 1 3/10/15 12:18 PM tocols and guidelines before a major snow event is key to ensuring a seamless and productive day off, Power said. It's also vital to have a clear definition of how the day will be handled. At Cumulus, it was understood, Falcon said, that employees had the resources to work from home and should use their own discretion about where to work. Whether these days count as a personal day or a regular work day should be clearly defined in company literature, Power said. Proper levels of security also need to be maintained during all remote work- place scenarios, Ellen J. Keohane, chief information officer at Holy Cross, said. While there are plenty of ways to access data and work remotely, employees at the college receive training on securely accessing school information, she said. Cloud technology also helps, allowing employees to edit documents without downloading them. Even though more businesses are incorporating cloud systems and full- range office suites like Google's into the workplace, sometimes the best tools for staying in touch are those "old school" options everyone has access to: email and phone calls, said Ashley Emerson Gilbert, director of Seven Hills Global Outreach and the International Center of Worcester. "I find the most familiar, basic tools are best. I know there are a lot of better interfacing and hip tools we aren't using," she said of the organization's work in countries where the Internet may be down for weeks. "Phone and email will always be the go-to." n Tech tools helped business flow during snowy winter Associate professor Eleanor Loiacono is shown in her office at WPI. When weather got in the way of her IT Strategy and Policy course three Mondays in a row, she used technology to convene the class. Face-to-device communication Free applications like Skype an- dGoogle Hangouts let you move conversations to video chats on your phone or camera-equipped laptop. Document editing With programs such as Google Drive and Dropbox, documents can be edited in real time and accessed by several employees. Virtual desktops Programs such as Citrix and VMware can allow employees to use such programs as Quickbooks remotely as though they were at their own work computers. 'Old school' staples If the fancier, more modern appli- cations are too much, sometimes there's nothing like a baseline email or telephone call to sort things out. Digital voice services such as Google Voice can be programmed to have your office phone directly call your home phone. One Call, a service used by most schools, can also be used to call or text employees to no- tify them the business will be closed. These four types of applications and programs can boost productivity when winter leaves workers stranded at home: Winter workarounds P H O T O / R I C K S A I A >> Continued from Page 13

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