As many of you know, Providence moved into a new location in April. We miss being in downtown Lansing, but new VP of Sales & Operations Scott Zingery sums up the feelings of many of our staff members.

“I love our new location,” says Scott. “It’s great to have quick access to the office and not have to worry about parking. Plus, we’re right down the street from my favorite coffee shop, The Coffee Jam.”

The dust has settled and we’re getting comfortable in our new home, but we thought it couldn’t hurt to remind our customers and business partners about our new location one last time.

Effective since April 20, 2012, Providence’s new address is 530 S Creyts Rd, Lansing, MI 48917. Our phone numbers, email addresses, and other contact information remains unchanged. Please remember to update your contact information to reflect our new address!

Providence’s Scott Zingery recently completed training to become a Symantec Sales Expert Plus!

To achieve this technical product sales accreditation, Zingery demonstrated his knowledge and expertise in using Symantec Backup Exec 2012. This training helps to strengthen Scott’s commitment to providing the optimal solutions for our clients.

Please join us in congratulating Scott on this achievement.

Jeff Dettloff is the President and Chief Problem Solver for Providence Consulting, Lansing’s leading provider of advanced computer services and innovative technology solutions.

After 8 years in downtown Lansing, Providence Consulting is excited to share the news that we are moving our operations center into a new, 3,000 square foot facility located in west Lansing’s Delta Township!

Jeff Dettloff, Providence President and Chief Problem Solver, says, “We work hard to provide excellent service and earn the trust of our clients. Taking such great care of our customers has given us the opportunity to grow and expand. With that growth, the time has come to move into a new space that will bring even more opportunity.”

• Effective April 20, 2012, our new address is 530 S Creyts Rd, Lansing, MI 48917
• Our phone numbers, email addresses, and other contact information will remain unchanged.
• Please remember to update your contact information.
• Stop in to say hello!

Even though we will be working out of a different location, our customers should experience a seamless transition. In the event that something does require our attention, please call or email! Our phone numbers, email addresses, and other contact information will remain unchanged.

Please remember to update your contact information to reflect our new address!

We’ve spent quite a bit of time on our blog crowing about the benefits of Microsoft Office 365, but we just had to share this news.

Effective as of March 2012, Microsoft is now offering Office 365 for FREE to students, school faculty, and staff members! Offered as the Microsoft “A2″ plan, the free service includes the standard Office features you know and love like Word, Outlook, and Excel. But Microsoft ups the ante by the including power-packed applications Exchange, SharePoint, and Lync.

Microsoft is cutting prices for Office 365 across the board to make it more easily affordable for organizations of all types, and will be releasing a full Office 365 for education service this summer. But you can get the jump on it and get your faculty, staff members, and students using this great service today, free of charge.

For more details check out the full announcement from Microsoft.

Have questions about MS 365 and cloud-based computing? Just give us a call. We would love to hear from you.

Jeff Dettloff is the President and Chief Problem Solver for Providence Consulting, Lansing’s leading provider of advanced computer services and innovative technology solutions.

Last weekend, Michigan’s Lower Peninsula was struck by a late winter storm with wet, heavy snow and high winds. According to the Battle Creek Enquirer, more than 200,000 residents and businesses were left without power. Today the snows have melted away and it looks like Spring outside, but this is a great opportunity to consider what would have happened to your business if this storm hit your area.

If a storm like this happened during the business week, could your business continue to operate?

Questions like this used to keep us up at night. But we sleep easy these days because there are a ton of innovative technologies now available that offer peace of mind when things go wrong.

• Microsoft Office 365 – Anywhere, anytime access to your email, documents, contacts, and calendars on nearly any Web-enabled device.
• Microsoft Sharepoint – Centralized, cloud-based access to your business’s information and applications through an intranet-like portal.
• Hosted Solutions – Outsourcing your servers with Providence Hosted Solutions means less daily stress and worry, and redundant internet services and power backups (like diesel generators) means your business keeps running even if your electricity is not.

What if the worst case scenario does happen? Providence Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery services can help you plan for nearly every contingency, and will help you get things up and running ASAP if and when something does go wrong.

Jeff Dettloff is President and Chief Problem Solver at Providence, a Lansing IT Consulting firm.

Have we mentioned lately how much we love Lenovo products?

We like Lenovo because they offer great machines at an even better price, but we just love to see the kind of stress testing that they put their PC’s through before they put them on the market. Think your current computer would survive this fall?

If you’re ready to upgrade, Providence is your local Lenovo Business Parter and we would glad to help you find the Lenovo PC that is right for you.

Jeff Dettloff is President and Chief Problem Solver at Providence, a Lansing IT Consulting firm.

Jeff Dettloff, Providence’s President and Chief Problem Solver, also serves as the 2011-2012 President for the Capital Area IT Council (CAITC). Jeff recently moderated a CAITC panel discussion on mobility and the connected workforce at this fall’s Greater Lansing Business Showcase. For the next few weeks we will be sharing the knowledge we gained from attending this panel.

How does the new mobility affect your business? Are you in the fast lane? Please share your insights and experiences.

Our last installments in the “Brave New Mobile World” series discussed the necessity of being mobile ready, and how the new mobility affects your work force. In this article we will take a look at the important points to consider when making decisions regarding mobile devices within your workplace, and discuss the security issues that the new technologies present.

When making any business technology decision, the first questions that should be explored are what the technology will cost and how the company is going to measure return on the investment.

One trend we see too much of is a company making an investment in mobile devices without knowing precisely how they are going to be used. iPads and Android tablets have a tremendous “cool” factor, and it can be easy to rush in and commit resources to them without thinking it through. There are tons of ways that these devices can enhance productivity and creativity, but we politely suggest that you make sure you know how you intend to use them before you pull out your credit card.

The next question is often, “which device?” Every week there’s a new device being released, so it pays to take the time to really investigate your options and find the device that does precisely what you want. Is device size an issue? Does it need to be pocket size, or will your workers be okay with toting around a larger item? Tablet devices with large screen sizes provide a great percentage of the functionality you would expect from a full size computer (but you might not want to recycle that desktop just yet). But is the bigger screen necessary? Pocket size smart phones pack a lot of punch in a very small package. Be sure to consider all options.

And don’t discount the input that you can get from your employees. Many workers, especially in high tech industries, already follow the latest developments and may have much experience and familiarity with different models. In fact, some may have a preference that is so strong that it can be advisable to let your workers be a part of the decision making process. If you let your workers make a choice, even on an individual basis, of what their device will be, that can eliminate backlash from employees that end up with the “wrong” device.

Which brings us to another possibility; letting your employees buy their own device. This has been approached in a couple of ways.

For instance, there’s a national trend right now toward organizations not paying for the device, but providing a stipend or a coupon that helps employees with the purchase. (Talk to your accountant too, because this plan may make better sense on many levels.) Or perhaps your pocketbook doesn’t need to become involved at all. Many workers are willing to buy their own technology now, provided they can get on the corporate network and have access to corporate data.

But this brings another set of concerns. How do you support and secure your network and data with such a diverse array of devices? The bottom line is: Deal With It.

Like it or not, we are now seeing much greater diversity of mobile devices in the work place. Establishing strict rules and restricting your network to certain “approved” devices can be counterproductive, and can mean that employees start using personal devices for business purposes. That means the business now has zero influence or control, and chances are security on the personal device is not up to your standards. Bad news.

Instead, think about staffing your IT department with generalists, people that can support anything, instead of specialists that focus on one or a few areas. This may represent a paradigm shift for your IT department, but your IT guys should not be limiting your productivity by reducing the number of things you can do as a business. What they should be doing instead is taking a look at what you are doing, and figuring out “how can they provide piece of mind?”

As employees are empowered to be wherever is best for them, employers will have to deal with change. Let people be free and work the way that they want to work. This is the recipe for success in the Brave New Mobile World.

Jeff Dettloff, Providence’s President and Chief Problem Solver, also serves as the 2011-2012 President for the Capital Area IT Council (CAITC). Jeff recently moderated a CAITC panel discussion on mobility and the connected workforce at this fall’s Greater Lansing Business Showcase. For the next few weeks we will be sharing the knowledge we gained from attending this panel.

How does the new mobility affect your business? Are you in the fast lane? Please share your insights and experiences.

In our last post we discussed how the mobile industry is changing the way consumers find and interact with businesses. Today we’ll look at how the new mobility is beginning to affect businesses themselves.

Best estimates say that between 60 and 80 percent of today’s work force is mobile, which means they don’t need to be in their office to do work. This trend got rolling in the 90’s as laptop computers became more and more affordable, and really took off with the advent of handheld Personal Digital Assistants or PDA’s (remember those?). Blackberries became the standard in the 2000’s, but the 2007 introduction of the iPhone was a game-changer.

The iPhone was so influential that it essentially spawned a new industry. Every mobile phone manufacturer and service provider now seems to have a smartphone at the center of their business plan. Tablet devices like the iPad, Xoom, and Kindle are taking off and seem to be the next step in the evolution. Traditional desktop and laptop computers are getting less and less use.

What this means to business is that workers are now empowered to do more, do it more efficiently, and can work from wherever they happen to be. They’re no longer tethered to a desk. But as with any technological advancement, there are positives and negatives to be aware of as we move further into the age of the mobile worker.

On the positive side, remember that the point of all these gadgets is to get people to talk to one another, to communicate and share information. At the end of the day, despite the potential distractions, your workforce is better connected than they could have possibly been even five years ago. Correctly managed, this should lead to higher productivity.

Look for ways that mobile technology can help you cut costs. But be aware that you may have to give up some of the “old ways” of doing things. For instance, instead of forcing the entirety of a geographically diverse workforce to travel to a single location for a meeting, you can save on airfare, mileage, and employee time by using Skype conferencing or another videoconferencing tool.

Cloud-based technologies can do wonders for communication and collaboration. Applications like Google Docs and Microsoft Sharepoint provide a convenient repository for documents that are being worked on by a team. Documents can be configured to be editable by many workers or just one or two, and they can be accessed at any time, from anywhere, provided you have an internet connection. An added bonus to using such systems is that any knowledge shared is knowledge retained; you may have workers moving in and out of a project, and even in and out of your company. Centralizing information in shared document storage can help make sure that your project keeps moving forward even if a key person leaves.

With workers now connected around the clock to their business email and data, the line between personal time and business time is getting very blurry. It is now common for workers to answer email and perform work tasks from home on their own time. While employers may see this as a great deal for them, they also should be aware that it can lead to employee burn-out. It is important to make sure that employees are using their vacation time to truly rest and relax, instead of taking along their laptop to get work done from the beach.

Our mobile devices, tablets, and cloud-based tools can allow us to still have personalized connections even as we become more independent in our work. But always remember that it is important not to lose that human touch. Make sure to personally engage your co-workers and get people to talk to each other. Sometimes it is easier (and quicker) to walk down the hall instead of sending that email.

Jeff Dettloff is President and Chief Problem Solver at Providence, a Lansing IT Consulting firm.

The Capital Area IT Council (CAITC) has once again been invited to present at the 2011 Greater Lansing Business Showcase. Taking place on Thursday, October 27 at the Lansing Center, the event will feature a racing theme with the tagline, “Is Your Business On the Right Track?” Highlights include a lunchtime keynote address by Lt. Governor Calley, followed by a panel discussion moderated by Providence’s very own Jeff Dettloff, 2011-2012 CAITC President!

Following the day’s theme, the IT Council’s presentation is entitled “Life in the Fast Lane: Technology Tools for Today’s Businessperson on the Go.” Our panel will look at how smart phones, tablet devices, cloud based services, and other emerging technologies are helping to create an increasingly more mobile workforce and how businesses can start to capitalize on all of this IT innovation.

Get free admission! For a limited time you can print a complimentary E-Pass, courtesy of Greater Lansing Business Monthly!

Featured presenters include:

• Brian Miller, VP Information Technology Services & CIO, Davenport University
• Liz Morgan, Senior Director of Business Development, Ingage Networks
• Bil Moore, Technology Consultant, Strategic Products & Services
• David Smith, Director of Business Development, Gravity Works Design & Development
• Kate Tykocki, Vice President of Communications, Ciesa Design

The panel will be moderated by Jeff Dettloff, President, Capital Area IT Council, and President, Providence Consulting

For more information about the Greater Lansing Business Showcase event or to register for the networking luncheon, please visit www.lansingbusinessmonthly.com.

To RSVP to attend the IT Council’s “Life in the Fast Lane” presentation (will immediately follow the luncheon–approximate start time 2pm) please contact Chris Knapp at 517-492-5592 or cknapp@camw.net. This presentation is free with admission to the showcase.

This Capital Area IT Council presentation is generously sponsored by Davenport University.

Hewlett-Packard gave the tech world quite a shock with their recent announcement regarding the impending end of their line of TouchPad tablet computers and the webOS business group. We have fielded quite a few questions about what this decision means for owners of HP desktop and laptop computers, and we want everyone to know that you’re still in good hands with HP.

We have certainly been keeping a watchful eye on these developments, but at this time we do not foresee any reason for concern. The HP board’s decision to “evaluate strategic alternatives” for their Personal Systems Group business, which is the portion of HP that makes these tablets, does not equate to an announcement that they intend to shutdown or sell off the PC portion of their business.

In a recent message to HP channel partners and resellers, Stephen DiFranco, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Personal Systems Group – Americas, stated that “At $42 billion and growing, [HP] is the largest PC business in the world with #1 market share and profitability worldwide. We are not taking our foot off the pedal now and will continue to drive leading innovation across our PC portfolio now and in the future.”

HP’s competitors will almost certainly try to take advantage over confusion surrounding this issue, and Providence will continue to monitor the situation. In the event that this does in fact gain traction and HP begins to move away from their PC business, we will be prepared with alternative options and will keep our customers “in the loop.” You will be the first to know.

It is illustrative to look back at the changes IBM underwent when the company sold its PC business to Lenovo in 2005. By trimming the fat and focusing on their core business IBM has continued to thrive. Virtually all gaming consoles sold in the world today use the latest microprocessor technology from IBM. The company is spearheading a “green” initiative called Big Green that is focused on increase energy efficiency. In 2009 IBM was even awarded the National Medal of Technology and Innovation by President Barack Obama, for their Blue Gene supercomputing program. And to Lenovo’s credit, the ThinkPad laptops and ThinkCentre desktops have never been better.

Should you still have any additional questions or concerns, please let us know and we will be happy to address them.

And by the way, if you still have a hankering for one of those inexpensive HP tablets, the company just announced a final run of TouchPads. Get ‘em while they’re hot!

Jeff Dettloff is President and Chief Problem Solver at Providence, a Lansing IT Consulting firm.