Chattanooga Teleworkers Connectivity Consulting Experts

Enlarging your telecommuter workforce can have a major impact on IT architecture, cybersecurity, and corporate culture. Progent has two decades of experience assisting SMBs to design, configure, administer, optimize, and troubleshoot IT networks that support work-from-home employees. Progent can assist your Chattanooga organization to select the appropriate tools and adhere to leading practices in creating and operating a safe virtual office solution for telecommuters that facilitates teamwork and returns maximum value. Progent can provide services that go from on demand guidance for helping you past occasional technical roadblocks to comprehensive project management or co-management to help you successfully complete mission-critical tasks.

Progent's consultants can assist Chattanooga, Tennessee organizations to with any facet of creating a high-performing work-from-home environment by providing infrastructure configuration services, IP voice troubleshooting, video conferencing integration, collaboration platform customization and training, cloud integration, Call Desk outsourcing, security and compliance, data protection solutions, and streamlined management.

Infrastructure for Teleworkers
Configuring the network infrastructure needed for a remote work environment can be particularly complicated if you must accommodate a mix of personal equipment such as PCs and notebooks, Internet routers, and wireless APs from different manufacturers and with a mix of OS software and firmware releases. Progent's background providing online support for both legacy as well as current IT products in virtual office solutions enables you to make cost-effective use of your available infrastructure and offers ready access to expertise for implement essential updates. Support services offered by Progent to assist you to implement a productive work-at-home infrastructure include:

• VPN connectivity allows you to create a secure tunnel for authorized remote employees to access IT resources situated at your corporate data center or in the cloud. Progent's consultants can assist you to deploy and maintain VPN access between your at-home workforce and your various network resources by providing remote VPN integration support. For businesses using Cisco's ASA security appliances, Progent's Cisco ASA Firewall consultants can help your remote workers to set up Cisco's popular AnyConnect client software to provide safe VPN tunneling for a broad range of endpoint devices including Windows, Mac, iOS, Linux, and Google Android.
• Virtual Desktop Infrastructure platforms allow an at-home worker to view and use a remote computer's desktop. This gives IT managers substantial control over the digital environment of at-home employees and offers remote users a consistent and more productive experience. Progent's VDI services include Windows Remote Desktop support and Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops VDI consulting.
• Routers connect home computer networks to the Internet and typically support VPN tunnels, home wireless connectivity, and firewall services. Progent offers top-tier remote consulting for integrating home routers from a variety of vendors. See router configuration support from Cisco-certified consultants.
• Home Wireless networks, typically supporting an entire household and guests, are frequently used by at-home employees to access their router for work. This can cause throughput as well as security problems. Progent can help you to mitigate these issues by providing services like Cisco Aironet configuration expertise, Cisco Meraki WiFi deployment expertise, and Ubiquiti WiFi access point setup help.
• Internet access methods impact the performance and reliability of connections between telecommuters and the corporate network. Mission-critical processes might require backup Internet connections in the event the normal connection breaks. Progent offers expertise for identifying Internet service providers, picking sensible bandwidth and data volume offerings, and integrating high-availability Internet access. Refer to Internet connectivity integration services.

VoIP Integration for Remote Workers
Extending the corporate phone environment to accommodate teleworkers is critical to maintaining an effective at-home workforce. A variety of cloud-based IP voice products are used by small and mid-size businesses to server teleworkers. Many enterprises rely on Cisco's current or legacy platforms for VoIP solutions. Progent can help organizations of all sizes to design or maintain a remote VoIP service that provides the versatility, convenience and protection required for at-home workers. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE IP Voice consultants offer high-level support to assist organizations optimize their current Cisco VoIP environments to handle an expanding at-home workforce.

• Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM) extends advanced telephony features to devices like VoIP phones, media processing platforms, Voice over IP gateways, and multimedia apps used across the network. Unified Communications Manager manages additional combined media services such as messaging, video conferencing, and customer collaboration networks. For more information about Progent's Cisco Unified CM or CUCM expertise, see Cisco Unified Communications Manager consulting services.
• Cisco CallManager is Cisco's earlier call-processing software and has been superseded by Cisco Unified CM or CUCM. Progent's consultants can assist you to maintain your current CallManager environment or upgrade smoothly to Cisco's current IP telephony solutions. For details about Progent's support services for CallManager and Cisco's other early VoIP products, see CallManager consulting services.
• Cisco IP Gateways provide connectivity with public telephony networks and with users operating beyond the corporate perimeter like telecommuters. Progent offers consulting expertise for Cisco's earlier generation IP gateways such as the UC520, UC540 and UC560 products as well as for modern Cisco Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) gateways. See Cisco SIP gateway integration expertise.
• Other VoIP Products supported by Progent's consultants include Vonage, Intermedia Unite and 8x8. Progent can assist you to enhance your wide area network infrastructure to work with these VoIP solutions and provide online integration and debugging services.

Voice/Video Conferencing for Remote Workers
A broad range of video conferencing products from major vendors enable virtual discussions, video and voice conferencing, chat, and screen/content sharing for both local workers and at-home workers. Many organizations use multiple products to meet the needs of their different partners and customers. Progent can help you to maintain your current voice/video conferencing ecosystem and optimize the engagement of your remote workforce.

• Skype for Business is Microsoft's popular unified communications platform that enables real-time presence, IM, voice and video calling and conferencing as well as the transparent integration of these functions within Office desktop and Microsoft 365 productivity software such as PowerPoint, Word, Excel and Outlook. Progent can provide the skills of Microsoft-certified specialists who can help your company to set up and manage Skype for Business client software to accommodate your remote employees. For details about Progent's consulting services for Skype for Business, refer to Skype for Business integration experts.
• FaceTime is Apple's multiuser video phone platform for iOS and macOS devices. FaceTime works on Wi-Fi or cellular Internet connections. Later editions of FaceTime support as many as 32 concurrent users for voice/video sessions. For details about Progent's support expertise for FaceTime, refer to Progent's FaceTime configuration expertise.
• Webex Meeting Center supports remote conferencing for virtually all computing devices. Delivered through Cisco's Webex Cloud platform, Webex services include sharing specific content or screens, presentations that embed rich media including Microsoft PowerPoint, network-based recording, plus revision and playback for future reference and training. For details about Progent's support services for Cisco Webex and for additional video conferencing solutions from Cisco, see Progent's Webex Meeting Center support services.
• Teams is Microsoft's next-generation replacement for Skype for Business. Teams provides a portal for conferencing, contacts, and content with features such as video conferencing, persistent threaded chat, plus data sharing. To learn more about Progent's support expertise for Microsoft Teams as well as for other Microsoft 365 products, refer to Progent's Microsoft Teams consulting services.
• Other Voice/Video Conferencing Apps supported by Progent include Google Meet, Amazon Chime, Zoom, and Slack. Progent can provide integration and troubleshooting services for these products and help your business to tune your WAN infrastructure to run them.

Microsoft Integrated Collaboration Software for Telecommuters
Microsoft's collaboration products are closely integrated with Microsoft's popular Office suites, offering a powerful environment of productivity apps that deliver a cohesive user interface for exchanging data and ideas throughout a corporate network and on a broad range of endpoint computers. Progent has delivered remote consulting services for Microsoft SharePoint and Exchange Server since their original publication and can assist businesses to tune these critical collaboration products to optimize the effectiveness of your at-home workforce.

Microsoft's collaboration platforms are tightly integrated with Microsoft's popular Office suite, providing a rich ecosystem of applications that deliver a consistent user experience for sharing information across multiple sites and on a wide variety of endpoint devices. Progent has provided remote consulting services for SharePoint and Exchange since their initial releases and can help at-home workers set up and use these flagship collaboration platforms to maximize productivity.

Microsoft Teams works with Microsoft 365 and supports third-party cloud services to provide real-time collaboration. Designed as a replacement for Skype for Business Online, Microsoft Teams can enable chat, video meetings with screen sharing, phone calls, cloud voicemail, group email, plus file and app sharing. Teams is closely integrated with Microsoft 365 and depends on Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, and Azure Entra (formerly branded Azure Active Directory) for supporting its full range of features. For additional information about Progent's support services for Microsoft Teams and Teams Premium, see planning and deployment expertise for Microsoft Teams.

SharePoint uses web sites to facilitate collaboration and knowledge sharing by providing policy-driven access to data, workflow, and utilities for looking through company-wide information silos. SharePoint allows you to create secure portals that enables remote workforce to view and update aggregated business intelligence by means of Intranets (Wikis), Blogs, social networking web sites, and Web Parts (Widgets). For details about Progent's SharePoint consulting services, visit SharePoint integration and application development consulting.

Exchange and Exchange Online offer secure collaboration features including public folders, shared mailboxes, and shared calendars and contacts. Progent's Microsoft certified Exchange experts can show you how to activate and utilize these features for your at-home workers. For information about Progent's Exchange expertise, refer to deployment consulting for Microsoft Exchange.

OneDrive is Microsoft�s shared cloud-based storage service, comparable to GoogleDrive. Remote workers can save files to the OneDrive service, and colleagues anywhere can access them securely through a browser. Included with Microsoft 365, OneDrive enables home employees to co-edit documents. Edits created offline are uploaded when you reconnect to the Internet. To learn about Progent's support services for Microsoft OneDrive, see Microsoft Onedrive configuration consulting.

Cloud Integration for At-Home Workers
Progent offers affordable online assistance for helping organizations to build, manage and optimize integrated hybrid network models that incorporate internal data centers, remote workers, branch offices, plus public cloud resources. Progent offers expertise for all modes of public cloud service delivery such as Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service, and Software as a Service (SaaS). Progent can help remote workers fix problems with cloud access, authentication, and cybersecurity.

Microsoft Azure is a leading platform for public cloud services that enables you to use IT infrastructure, virtual servers, and critical apps hosted on Microsoft's massive cloud. Microsoft Azure offers over one hundred cloud-based services such as hosting for Windows and Linux-based VMs, scalable cloud storage, email and messaging, app development with Visual Studio, and data backup. Progent can assist your organization to deploy VMs on Azure Virtual Machines, integrate cloud-based storage on Azure Storage services, streamline identity management with Azure Active Directory, and plan data backup and restore solutions with Azure Backup. Progent can also help you establish secure connections to Azure services for remote workers by configuring and troubleshooting firewall appliances and VPN tunnels. For details about Progent's consulting services for Azure, visit Microsoft Azure consulting services.

Microsoft 365, formerly called Office 365, is Microsoft's growing suite of client productivity software and cloud-based services offered by subscription. Microsoft applications and cloud services are marketed in a variety of plans intended for customers ranging from students and households to large corporations. Progent offers quick and easy online contact with experts familiar with Microsoft 365-compatible endpoints based on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Google Android technology. Progent can assist your business to evaluate the various subscription plans available for Microsoft 365 and configure 365 applications for your telecommuters in a way that delivers maximum business value. To find out about Progent's expertise for Microsoft 365, visit Microsoft 365 consulting support.

Microsoft 365 Exchange Online is among the most popular cloud-based applications in the Microsoft 365 product line. Microsoft 365 Exchange Online provides the benefits of lower spending for data center infrastructure, simplified management, on-demand scaling, high reliability, and additional benefits associated with public clouds. Microsoft has designed Microsoft 365 Exchange Online to operate smoothly with on-premises deployments of Exchange, enabling customers to build hybrid networks. Progent's certified Exchange consultants can provide as-needed help to guide you through challenging IT bottlenecks and also offer comprehensive project management outsourcing to make sure your remote workers have easy and safe access to your Microsoft 365 Exchange Online deployment. For information Progent's consulting expertise for Microsoft 365 Exchange Online, refer to Microsoft 365 Exchange Online configuration and troubleshooting expertise.

Amazon AWS is a trailblazer in the public cloud market and is the industry's leading source of cloud-based services. Progent offers quick and economical online contact with cloud connectivity consultants who can assist your organization to design, implement, manage, and troubleshoot hybrid information networks that integrate Amazon AWS cloud-based services with on-premises resources and with other public clouds like Microsoft Azure. Progent also offers the skills of Cisco-certified CCIE networking consultants to assist you to create a high-uptime network model to make sure your employees have a consistent computing experience regardless of whether they are working from your main office, a remote branch, from home, or on the road. For details about Progent's expertise for Amazon AWS, see Amazon AWS integration services.

Google Cloud (GCP) is a popular set of cloud computing services that offers Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and Platform-as-a-Service products. Progent's certified Microsoft, Linux, and Cisco consulting experts can assist you to expand your existing IT resources with the Google Cloud Platform, and Progent's DBA consultants can help you make your key applications cloud ready so your telecommuters can benefit fully from Google Cloud Platform services. Progent's consultants can help you to set up VMs on Google Cloud Compute Engine, plan a cost-effective storage system with Google Cloud Storage, and simplify access control for telecommuters with GCP Cloud Identity. Progent can also help you to utilize GCP's unified management technology to control and monitor your GCP environment. For information, refer to Google Cloud Platform (GCP) integration support.

Help Desk Call Center Support for At-Home Workers
An emergency, company-wide transition to a teleworker workforce, which could be motivated by an epidemic or as part of a business continuity plan, can overwhelm even a high-performing in-house Support Desk. Progent's Help Desk Call Center services make it possible for businesses of any size to outsource or augment their Help Desk Call Center with Progent's remote Technical Response Center (TRC) team.

• Progent's Standard Help Desk support services leverage Progent's extensive network of remote IT support experts along with world-class trouble ticketing and follow-up technology to provide an economical, modern Call Desk. Progent's Standard Help Desk Services offer a comprehensive solution that addresses all facets of online Level 1 desktop technical support from initial help requests to trouble ticket creation, screen sharing, problem resolution, and reporting. A web-based User's Service Portal enables at-home employees to monitor or revise the status of their current tickets, enter information, and upload screenshots or attachments. Support services are provided at a substantial discount off Progent's normal Level 1 technical support rates, and Progent offers optional fast hand-off to Level 2 and Level 3 IT experts to deal with advanced problems. To learn more, see Progent's Standard Helpdesk Services for small businesses.
• Progent's Call Center Supplemental Service allows your business to supplement your current Call Desk staff by splitting delivery of Help Desk Call Center support services seamlessly between your in-house IT support personnel and Progent's extensive team of desktop support technicians and subject matter experts. Progent's co-managed Call Center service uses a collective support model utilizing the leading professional services automation platform for handling help requests and ticketing, assigning responsibility, monitoring progress, and producing reports. For information about how Progent's Call Center Supplementation Services can enable your company to deliver world-class technical support to your from-home workers, see Progent's Help Desk Call Center augmentation Services.

Cybersecurity for Telecommuters
Work-from-Home workers commonly utilize their personal computing devices and often work in an unsecured physical environment. This multiplies their vulnerability to malware attacks and requires judicious deployment of corporate firewalls, AV tools, MFA-based identity verification, remote endpoint monitoring, intensive user training, and the creation of security policies built on best practices. Progent's veteran roster of IT security support consultants can help you to plan, deploy and manage a compliant security solution that guards critical information assets in environments that incorporate at-home workers.

Firewalls allow companies to create a network environment that can be safely accessed by on-premises users as well as by teleworkers, mobile workers, vendors, clients, and other stakeholders. Next-generation firewall appliances permit you to configure and control different permissions to various groups of users and to expand your network and adjust your cybersecurity posture as your business evolves and as cyber threats grow more sophisticated. Progent works with both current and older firewall devices from all leading manufacturers including Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Check Point, Juniper, and Fortinet. For more information about Progent's firewall support services, visit firewall support services.

Online Endpoint Monitoring makes it possible to track the various devices utilized by telecommuters and either reject or spot and respond to the latest threats such as ransomware. With ProSight Active Security Monitoring (ASM) services, a small-footprint software agent is put on each secured endpoint, watching all activity and utilizing advanced AI technology from SentinelOne to detect zero-day threats before they can spread. When a cyberattack is discovered, ProSight ASM instantly isolates the targeted endpoint from the corporate network to quarantine the malware. Because the ProSight Active Security Monitoring agent is self-contained, endpoint devices stay protected even if they are disconnected from the Internet. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, reseller, and integrator. To learn more about ProSight Active Security Monitoring, visit remote endpoint monitoring for telecommuters.

Progent's Duo authentication Managed Services utilize Cisco's Duo cloud technology to defend against compromised passwords by using two-factor authentication (2FA). Duo enables single-tap identity verification with iOS, Google Android, and other out-of-band devices. Using Duo 2FA, whenever you log into a protected online account and enter your password you are asked to confirm who you are on a device that only you have and that is accessed using a separate network channel. A broad range of devices can be used as this second means of ID validation such as a smartphone or wearable, a hardware token, a landline phone, etc. You can register several verification devices. For more information about Duo identity authentication services, refer to Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services for teleworkers.

Security Audits can assess the exposure of your information system to all classes of external and internal security attacks for a network that includes telecommuters. Progent can deploy online, automated cybersecurity analysis software for rapidly and affordably detecting a wide variety of security holes that can be surfaced over the Internet. Progent's security assessment experts, which can be provided by security professionals with top credentials including CISA, ISSAP, and GIAC, can assist your company to evaluate your operations and governance policies and assess your WAN infrastructure to allow you to implement the highest level of protection for your telecommuters.

Horizon3.ai's NodeZero Pentest Platform is a leading-edge penetration test (pentest) product family that supports automated threat assessment of your work-from-home environment as well as your internal and perimeter networks to help you expose, rank, remediate, and verify security vulnerabilities before malicious hackers can exploit them. Progent can help you to use NodeZero to carry out thorough pentests of your network perimeter and your internal network in order to evaluate your present security profile. Progent's NodeZero experts can also assist you to harden your network security and can help you to design and implement a cohesive cybersecurity strategy that simplifies management and delivers optimum cyber defense for on-premises, multi-cloud, at-home, and perimeter IT assets. To learn more details about Progent's vulnerability assessment solutions powered by on NodeZero's penetration test platform, refer to Consulting Services for NodeZero's Pentest Platform.

Download White Paper: Protecting a Work-From-Home Network
To view or download a white paper about critical areas to focus on for securing an IT environment that supports telecommuters, click:
Securing a Work-From-Home (WFH) Network White Paper. (PDF - 2.4 MB)

Data Protection Solutions for At-Home Workers
The field of Data Protection involves backing up and recovering vital data in order to avoid data loss and reduce recovery time and effort in the event of storage problems resulting from equipment breakdowns, software glitches, user error, cyber attack, or other causes. Dependable data protection strategies can be especially challenging to design and maintain in hybrid environments that incorporate local data centers, cloud resources, and an at-home workforce.

• Backup/Recovery strategies for teleworkers must address multiple types of user-owned endpoints. Progent offers fast remote help from consultants familiar with a broad array of platforms for protection Microsoft Windows, Apple Mac and Linux/UNIX powered servers and desktop computers as well as notebooks, iOS and Android tablets and handhelds. Popular backup/recovery products supported by Progent's data protection consultants include Barracuda Backup, Microsoft Azure Backup, Symantec Backup Exec, CrashPlan, Retrospect, and Time Machine. To back up data spread across a hybrid network, Progent offers ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS), a managed backup/recovery service that uses cloud storage and features fine-grained restore and unified management.
• Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity (DR/BC) plans commonly anticipate scenarios that call for a rapid switch to a work-at-home environment. Progent's expert disaster recovery preparedness experts and business continuity planning specialists can help your business to create, document and test a DR/BC strategy that includes the logistics of switching to telecommuting.

Unified Management for an At-Home Workforce
Microsoft has rebranded and rebundled its endpoint management platforms under the name Microsoft Endpoint Manager, which encompasses Intune for cloud management of mobile and remote endpoints and Configuration Manager for managing on-premises endpoints. Endpoint Manager offers a unified environment for protecting corporate data by managing onsite, mobile, and at-home endpoint devices.

Microsoft Intune
Intune is a component of Microsoft's Endpoint Management family that also includes Configuration Manager. Intune is a cloud service for managing and protecting remote devices and applications. Remote endpoint devices can be personally owned or business owned. IT admins managing the enrolled endpoint computers of telecommuters can use Intune to deploy and validate applications on devices, push updates and certificates, configure rules for accessing information and networks, set passwords, establish VPN connections, control how home-based workers share information, set up threat defense, verify security compliance, and delete corporate data from lost, stolen or decommissioned devices. Microsoft Intune runs with iOS/iPadOS, Google Android, Windows, and macOS endpoints. For details about Intune and to find out how Progent can assist your company to use this platform to administer the devices of your at-home workforce, go to Intune remote device management consultants.

VMware Workspace ONE
VMware Workspace ONE is a feature-rich centralized Mobile Device Management product that allows network administrators to keep offsite endpoints up to date and protected. Workspace ONE incorporates VMware AirWatch technology for centralized endpoint administration combined with VMware's Horizon virtual application delivery platform for access control, application management, and setup management of endpoint devices. Workspace ONE runs with endpoints powered by Windows 10, macOS, Apple iOS, Android, Chrome OS, or popular distributions of Linux. VMware Workspace ONE is offered by subscription as a cloud-based service or as an on-premises product via a perpetual license. Top features of VMware Workspace ONE include fast over-the-air deployment of out-of-the-box laptops, quick onboarding of new employees, policy setting and enforcement for all classes of devices, unifies reporting and performance analytics, an email encryption gateway, and integration with Microsoft applications and cloud services. For information about Progent's support for VMware Workspace ONE, visit VMware Workspace ONE mobile endpoint management expertise.

Contact Progent for At-Home Worker Support Services
To get in touch with Progent about creating and managing an efficient telecommuter solution for your Chattanooga, Tennessee business, call 1-800-993-9400 or go to Contact Progent.