Retail IT Pain Points [Part Three]

In our last two blogs, we talked about some of the pains IT professionals feel in the tough retail industry, where maintaining POS systems is a constant, everyday task. Today’s final blog of the series will explore even more of those pains and how Informs, Inc. can help. Let’s dive into those pain points.

Remote Security and Backups Are Annoying: We hear you. Retail IT environments are inherently distributed, complex and mixed. Perhaps you feel like you don’t have the time or staffing resources to be everywhere your POS systems are deployed, and you don’t have to be. However, these devices absolutely must be backed up and secured as reliably as possible due to strict regulatory and compliance requirements. The solution? Centralized the management of your data protection, security strategies and compliance. Backups should be able to be conducted automatically or manually on demand, and security breaches should be dealt with quickly and efficiently.

I Don’t Have the Time or Budget for Virtualization: You need to ensure the availability of POS systems says that IT resources (such as storage, applications and server capacity) need to be pooled across the business and shared between users who are geographically distributed. Having an architecture like this can save money, increase productivity and create efficiencies, but it can also be expensive and complex to migrate and maintain. You need a holistic view of all IT resources and virtualization and cloud computing to be affordable for your company.

My Company’s Decision Makers Don’t Understand IT: Corporate decision makers don’t always understand IT, and this can lead to miscommunication and missed opportunities. It’s important that you are careful to articulate the work your team has done to support your organization’s goals. You need easy-to-read reports that keep decision makers informed of your department’s ongoing and needs. They also help you plan for scheduled maintenance, upgrades and expansions. Reports can be run with a simple push of a button.

Working in IT for the retail business doesn’t have to be as difficult as it is today. Contact Informs Inc. for information on how we can help.