In today’s day and age, it’s not surprising at all that technology is critical in business operations. It’s not just nice to have, but rather it has become a need to stay competitive and effective with your operations. Technology is there for good reason and it’s all up to your business to harness the strong possibilities of technology to your advantage.
Like any other facet or tool in business, it’s also important to know that there’s no such thing as perfection in business even when using technology. This comes with its own possibilities of glitches and weak points which also bring about challenges to the businesses who use a certain technology.
So, it’s necessary for startups, still in the adjustment phase, to be aware of what those challenges are. This is one good way for you to navigate through the challenges that startups experience so you don’t drown in those challenges and learn how to navigate through them smoothly.
Those challenges are:
1. Rising Security Threats
Technology is great but one of the common loopholes in technology is the threat of cyber security. Your information technology (IT) team might be strong, but hackers are also getting stronger, smarter, and more advanced. If you don’t strengthen your security systems, you’ll fall flat to the threat of data breaches and identity theft.
For instance, hackers can use phishing and malware to breach your company’s tech systems. Startups must be able to counter those threats with evolving solutions. One of the best solutions is to invest in a reputable managed IT services provider, so, you have an expert team working with your startup to help you through those security threats.
2. Integration Issues
Technology is getting more advanced by the day. Sometimes, it can get too advanced to the point that new releases may not be able to play nicely with the older systems and applications that are already used by your startup. This is true, especially if what you have are technological tools that aren’t scalable with the current technological systems you already have.
This is when integration problems arise, like the double-entry of data, lost information, or perhaps information that’s already difficult to retrieve. You can minimize integration issues by thoroughly selecting your tech software and apps to ensure that they pair up successfully with what you already have in place.
3. Using Too Much Paper
Despite the presence of advanced technological software and tools, there are still many startups that are reliant on too much paper. This is wasteful and it adds to all the work that has to be done in a day, not to mention the wasted resources. When businesses want to use technology, it follows that they should also move to a paperless system of transactions. By doing so, you aren’t slowing down the capabilities of what your tech software should be able to do.
For instance, it eats up a lot of your employees’ time when they have to keep printing and scanning files, even if you may already have a cloud system of file storage, management, and even file sharing. There’s a redundancy that goes on.
Technological software is there in place to help minimize the use and dependence on paper products. When startups successfully switch to a paperless system for most, if not all of their transactions, you’re enabling users to find data quicker.
4. Backup Issues
As its name implies, backup issues arise when startups save files only on one hardware or storage location and forget or deliberately ignore the need to back up those files. Unfortunately, this can result in lost files when that storage location fails. In worst cases, hackers may also have stolen those files or you may have accidentally deleted them. When there aren’t backup copies of important files, it may result in massive losses for your company.
This is where the need to have a good backup system for your files is very important. There are numerous cloud storage systems you can now make use of, which effectively give you a backup system when storing your files.
5. Unaddressed Or Uncovered Failures
There are also instances when the tech’s capability may go beyond the human team’s ability to identify the root causes of any glitch that goes on with the tech software. This situation results in a problem for many startups known as unaddressed or uncovered failures. No matter how experienced your team is, they might find it hard to analyze the situations, particularly coming from new software releases that they may not have worked with before.
Conclusion
One of the common problems that emerge universally among small businesses or startups is those in relation to technology. It’s an advantage to have the right technological tools to help businesses succeed and do better. But, it’s also an added challenge when startups are still unanimously scrambling to get the use of those technological facets right. The list of challenges is only a few, and it’s not meant to push you away from using technology for your startup. Through readiness, research, and working with the right tech companies, you can move past the technological challenges above.
