With a new year comes new challenges, new opportunities, and exciting ideas for pushing your company’s IT department forward. However, even the best-laid plans sometimes hit road bumps. So here are ten suggestions for worthwhile IT New Year’s resolutions and some ways they might go awry.
#1 – Roll Out Two Factor Authentication Company Wide
How I think it will go: everyone has no problems with the new security policies and the rollout goes smoothly.
How it will really go: the initiative is abandoned after getting fifteen people a day calling support confused about how to log in.
#2 – Upgrade The Network Backbone To All Fiber
How I think it will go: network latency drops in half and the IT department becomes company heros.
How it will really go: some critical routers are incompatible with the new backbone and several departments get stuck with slow network speeds.
#3 – Install New SPAM Filters On The Email Server
How I think it will go: people rejoice in the time saved from having to deal with annoying SPAM email.
How it will really go: the filters need to be turned off after a week because critical client emails keep going to SPAM.
#4 – Integrate New Desktop Backup Solution
How I think it will go: all users rest easy knowing their critical data is backed up and secure.
How it will really go: the accounting department loses critical files after they disable backups because “it slows our computers down too much”.
#5 – Launch New Intranet
How I think it will go: all departments can find the information they need quickly and easily.
How it will really go: most people continue to use a random assortment of Dropbox accounts and spreadsheets making the Intranet useless.
#6 – Clean Up VPN Users List
How I think it will go: network admins breath a collective sigh of relief knowing only people who absolutely need VPN access have it.
How it will really go: support lines are flooded with angry users who think they can only get their work email at home over the VPN.
#7 – Enforce New BYOD Policy
How I think it will go: everyone respects the policy and limits their personal device usage to non-business tasks.
How it will really go: head of marketing gets his phone stolen and the company’s social accounts all get hacked.
#8 – Stay Under Budget For Years Hardware Spend
How I think it will go: with careful planning the IT department has cash to spare at the end of the year.
How it will really go: the budget is blown when a clumsy employe spills coffee on a $4,000 printer.
#9 – Update Firmware On All Routers
How I think it will go: all company routers become more secure and stable with the latest firmware updates.
How it will really go: because of budget cuts half of the routers don’t have maintenance contracts and can’t be upgraded.
#10 – Move To Entire Network to IPv6
How I think it will go: network load in critical areas goes down due to IPv6’s more efficient packet routing.
How it will really go: only a fraction of the network can use IPv6 because dozens of the company’s software products don’t support it yet.
