Working from home has become hugely popular in recent years. According to the Office for National Statistics, more than four million people in the UK now work from home. The TUC reports that this number has increased by 19% over the past decade.

Working from home offers employees increased flexibility, but from an IT perspective presents some potential issues that must be addressed for you and your employees to work remotely effectively. A Virtual Private Network (or VPN) is a key tool to make this possible.

Access to networked hardware and software

A VPN allows remote workers to connect securely to your office network from anywhere in the world as if they're right there in the office with you.

By using a VPN application, you and your employees can securely access all centrally-managed software (such as Sage) and devices connected to your office network, such as printers.

Secure access to networked data

Having employees take data home on removable media such as USB sticks is an option, but it's certainly not the best option. Aside from security concerns, you end up with multiple versions of the same files because a single copy wasn't kept in a central location.

By using a VPN to connect to your office network remotely, your employees can securely access and edit files on your central storage.

Personal and work computers

Remote Desktop Protocol (or RDP) presents additional options when working from home. While having employees take home work laptops for remote working is an option (we can help with this), employees can also access a pure work environment via their home computer by way of RDP.

By taking remote control, securely over a VPN, of a physical or virtual PC in your office network, remote workers can keep their work computing and personal computing cleanly separated without requiring the additional expense of purchasing laptops specifically for remote working. This also means that any sensitive data still resides physically in your office.

Freedom to work where you want

There has never been a better time to offer your employees the flexibility to work remotely. At Firestone IT, our experienced technicians will help you get set up with VPN access for modern, flexible, efficient working.

To learn more about our services and what we can do for you, call us on 01323 33 25 95 or email us at hello@firestoneit.com and we'll find a dependable, cost-effective solution that works for you.