London Telecommuters Integration Support

Expanding your at-home workforce can have a significant impact on network infrastructure, cybersecurity, and corporate processes. Progent has 20 years of experience helping SMBs to plan, configure, administer, tune, and troubleshoot IT networks that support at-home workers. Progent can help your London company to select the appropriate technologies and follow leading practices in creating and operating a secure virtual office ecosystem for teleworkers that facilitates collaboration and delivers maximum business value. Progent offers services that go from on demand expertise for helping you over occasional IT bottlenecks to full project management to help you carry out business-critical tasks.

Progent's consultants can help London, United Kingdom companies to succeed with any facet of creating a high-performing telecommuting ecosystem by delivering infrastructure design and configuration services, IP voice troubleshooting, video conferencing integration, collaboration platform customization and training, cloud integration, Help Desk services, endpoint security, data protection solutions, and centralized management.

Network Infrastructure for Telecommuters
Configuring the network infrastructure needed for a remote workforce can be especially challenging if you have to accommodate a mix of worker-owned equipment such as PCs and notebooks, Internet routers, and wireless appliances from various manufacturers and with a variety of OS software and firmware releases. Progent's experience providing remote support for both outdated as well as current IT products in virtual office solutions enables you to make efficient use of your available infrastructure and offers fast access to expertise for making essential upgrades. Support services available from Progent to help your company to create a productive work-at-home infrastructure include:

• VPN technology allows you to establish a secure connection for authenticated at-home workers to use IT resources located at your company data center or in the cloud. Progent can help your company to deploy and maintain VPN access between your at-home workforce and your key IT resources by providing remote VPN integration consulting. For organizations using Cisco's ASA firewalls, Progent's Cisco-certified ASA experts can help your telecommuters to utilize Cisco's popular AnyConnect client software for secure VPN connections for a broad range of devices including Windows, macOS, Apple iOS, Linux, and Android.
• Virtual Desktop Infrastructure products enable an at-home worker to see and use a data center PC's desktop. This provides network managers significant control over the computing environment of telecommuters and ensures them a familiar work experience. Progent's virtual desktop services include Windows Remote Desktop support and Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops VDI consulting.
• Routers attach home computer networks to the Internet and typically support VPN tunnels, local wireless connectivity, and firewall services. Progent can provide expert online consulting for setting up routers from a range of manufacturers. See router integration services from Cisco-certified experts.
• Home Wi-Fi networks, typically shared by an entire household and guests, are commonly utilized by telecommuters to access their router for work. This can cause performance as well as cybersecurity problems. Progent can help you to mitigate these problems by providing services like Cisco Aironet integration consulting, Cisco Meraki WiFi installation expertise, and Ubiquiti Unifi wireless access point integration help.
• Internet access methods affect the performance and reliability of connections between at-home workers and the corporate data center. Vital processes might demand redundant Internet access in case the primary connection fails. Progent can provide expertise for selecting Internet service providers, choosing appropriate bandwidth and data volume packages, and integrating high-availability Internet connections. See Internet connectivity integration services.

IP Voice Solutions for an At-Home Workforce
Extending the company phone system to include teleworkers is critical to supporting an effective at-home workforce. A variety of cloud-centric digital PBX platforms are popular with small and mid-size businesses to server teleworkers. Many enterprises rely on Cisco's modern or older products for IP voice management. Progent can help businesses of any size to design or maintain a remote IP voice environment that provides the versatility, convenience and protection required for remote users. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE Voice experts can provide high-level support to assist organizations optimize their existing Cisco IP voice environments to support a growing at-home workforce.

• Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Cisco Unified CM or CUCM) extends advanced telephony features to devices such as VoIP phones, media processing products, VoIP gateways, and multimedia applications used throughout the network. CUCM supports other combined media services such as unified messaging, voice/video conferencing, and customer interaction networks. For more information about Progent's CUCM expertise, refer to CUCM consultants.
• Cisco CallManager is Cisco's earlier call-processing agent and has been superseded by Cisco Unified CM. Progent's consultants can help your company to maintain your existing CallManager environment or upgrade smoothly to Cisco's modern IP telephony products. To find out about Progent's support services for CallManager and Cisco's other early IP voice platforms, see Cisco CallManager expertise.
• Cisco IP Gateways provide connectivity with public telephony networks and with users operating outside the corporate firewall like at-home workers. Progent can provide expert support for Cisco's legacy IP gateways such as the UC520, UC540 and UC560 series as well as for modern Cisco SIP gateways. See Cisco SIP gateway integration expertise.
• Other VoIP Platforms supported by Progent's consultants include Vonage, RingCentral and 8x8. Progent can help you to enhance your wide area network architecture to work with these solutions and provide online configuration and debugging expertise.

Voice/Video Conferencing for At-Home Workers
A broad selection of voice/video conferencing products from leading technology companies enable virtual meetings, video and voice conferencing, chat, and screen sharing for both local users and at-home workers. Many companies utilize a mix of products to meet the needs of their various partners and customers. Progent's communications experts can help you to maintain your existing conferencing ecosystem and enhance the engagement of your remote employees.

• Skype for Business is Microsoft's popular unified communications product that supports presence, instant messaging, voice and video conferencing plus the seamless integration of these capabilities within Office desktop and Microsoft 365 applications such as PowerPoint, Word, and Excel. Progent offers the skills of Microsoft-certified specialists who can assist your company to configure and manage Skype for Business clients to support your at-home workforce. To learn more about Progent's support services for Skype for Business, visit Skype for Business consulting services.
• FaceTime is Apple's multiuser video calling app for iOS, iPadOS, iPod and Mac computers and smartphones. FaceTime works on Wi-Fi or cellular Internet connections. Current editions of FaceTime support as many as 32 simultaneous users for video calls. For details about Progent's support services for FaceTime, visit Progent's FaceTime configuration expertise.
• Webex Meeting Center provides remote conferencing for most desktop or mobile devices. Offered through Cisco's Webex Cloud platform, Webex capabilities include sharing discrete content or computer screens, presentations that embed rich media such as Microsoft PowerPoint and Flash videos, network-based capture, plus editing and playback for future reference. For details about Progent's consulting services for Cisco Webex as well as for other video conferencing products from Cisco, refer to Progent's Webex Meeting Center support services.
• Teams is Microsoft's next-generation replacement for Skype for Business. Teams acts as a hub for conferencing, contacts, and information with features such as video calling, persistent threaded chat, plus file sharing. For details about Progent's consulting services for Microsoft Teams and for other Microsoft 365 products, visit Progent's Microsoft Teams consulting services.
• Additional Conferencing Platforms supported by Progent's conferencing experts include Google Meet, Amazon Chime, Zoom, and Slack. Progent can provide configuration and troubleshooting services for these products and assist your business to tune your WAN architecture to host them.

Microsoft Collaboration Platforms for Teleworkers
Microsoft's collaboration products are tightly integrated with Microsoft's familiar Office families, providing a rich environment of applications that deliver a consistent user interface for exchanging information across a corporate network and on a wide selection of endpoints. Progent has delivered online consulting services for Microsoft SharePoint and Exchange Server since their first releases and can help your company to tune these flagship collaboration products to maximize the effectiveness of your at-home workers.

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 substitute for Skype for Business Online, Microsoft Teams can support chat, video meetings with screen sharing, phone calls, cloud voicemail, group email, plus file and app sharing. Teams is tightly integrated with Microsoft 365 and relies on Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, and Microsoft Entra (previously called Azure Active Directory) for supporting its complete range of capabilities. To learn more about Progent's consulting services for Microsoft Teams, see solution design and configuration expertise for Microsoft Teams and Teams Premium.

SharePoint uses web sites to facilitate collaboration and information sharing by providing policy-based access to data, business processes, and utilities for searching through enterprise-wide information silos. SharePoint enables you to create protected portals that permits at-home workforce to view and update aggregated business intelligence via Wikis, Blogs, social networking web sites, and Web Parts. To find out about Progent's SharePoint consulting expertise, refer to SharePoint integration and application development expertise.

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 details about Progent's Exchange expertise, visit integration consulting services for Exchange.

OneDrive is Microsoft�s collaborative cloud-based storage service, comparable to GoogleDrive. Remote users can save files to the OneDrive service, and colleagues can share them securely through a browser. Provided with Office 365, OneDrive allows home employees to jointly author files. Edits made offline are synced when you go back online. To find out about Progent's expertise for Microsoft OneDrive, see Onedrive integration experts.

Cloud Integration for Teleworkers
Progent offers affordable online support for enabling organizations to build, maintain and troubleshoot cohesive hybrid network models that include physical data centers, remote workers, branch offices, and public cloud services. Progent can provide expertise for all modes of public cloud service delivery including Infrastructure as a Service, Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS). Progent can help teleworkers resolve problems with public cloud access, authentication, and cybersecurity.

Microsoft Azure is a popular platform for cloud services that enables you to utilize IT infrastructure, virtual servers, and key apps running on Microsoft's extensive cloud. Azure includes over 100 cloud-based services such as the ability to host Windows and Linux-based virtual machines, scalable cloud storage, messaging, application development with Visual Studio, and data protection. Progent can assist your organization to set up virtual machines on Azure Virtual Machines, integrate cloud-based storage on Azure Storage services, streamline identity control with Azure AD, and plan data backup and restore systems with Azure Backup. Progent can also show you how to create protected connections to Azure for remote workers by setting up and debugging firewalls and VPN tunnels. To learn about Progent's consulting expertise for Azure, refer to Microsoft Azure consulting services.

Microsoft 365, previously called Office 365, is Microsoft's growing family of client productivity software and cloud services available on a subscription basis. Microsoft applications and cloud services are provided in a selection of bundles intended for users ranging from individuals and households to major corporations. Progent offers fast and affordable remote access to experts knowledgeable about Microsoft 365-compatible endpoint devices running Windows, Mac, iOS, and Google Android technology. Progent can assist your business to evaluate the numerous subscription plans offered with Microsoft 365 and configure 365 applications for your at-home workers to achieve top business value. For details about Progent's expertise for Microsoft 365, go to Microsoft 365 integration expertise.

Microsoft 365 Exchange Online is among the most widely used cloud-based applications in Azure-hosted Microsoft 365 product suite. Exchange Online offers the advantages of reduced costs for physical infrastructure, easier management, dynamic scaling, high availability, and other benefits associated with cloud computing. Microsoft has engineered Exchange Online to run transparently with on-premises deployments of Exchange, allowing you to build hybrid networks. Progent's certified Exchange experts can provide as-needed help to get you through tough IT roadblocks and also offer comprehensive project management services to ensure your teleworkers have easy and safe access to your Microsoft 365 Exchange Online environment. For details Progent's consulting services for Exchange Online, see Exchange Online integration and troubleshooting expertise.

Amazon AWS is a trailblazer in the public cloud computing market and is the world's top source of cloud-based services. Progent offers quick and affordable online access to cloud integration consultants who can help your organization to plan, deploy, maintain, and troubleshoot hybrid IT networks that integrate Amazon AWS cloud services with local data centers and with other public clouds like Azure. Progent also can provide the skills of Cisco-certified CCIE networking consultants to assist you to build a high-uptime network architecture so your employees have a productive computing environment whether they are working from your headquarters, a branch office, from home, or on the road. For details about Progent's expertise for Amazon AWS, go to Amazon AWS consulting expertise.

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) is a leading collection of cloud services that provides Infrastructure-as-a-Service and Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) products. Progent's certified Microsoft, Linux, and Cisco experts can assist your business to scale your existing IT resources with the Google Cloud Platform, and Progent's DBA consultants can show you how to make your key apps cloud friendly so your remote workers can take full advantage of Google Cloud Platform services. Progent can assist your organization to deploy VMs on Google Cloud Compute Engine, plan an efficient storage solution with GCP Storage, and simplify identity management for telecommuters with GCP Cloud Identity. Progent's experts can also help your organization to use GCP's management technology to control and monitor your GCP environment. To find out, refer to Google Cloud Platform consulting expertise.

Help Desk Call Center Services for Teleworkers
A sudden, company-wide switchover to a teleworker workforce, which might be driven by an epidemic or as an element of a disaster recovery plan, can overwhelm even the most efficient in-house Call Desk. Progent's Help Desk Call Center services make it possible for businesses of any size to outsource or augment their Call Center by using Progent's remote Technical Response Center services.

• Progent's Standard Support Desk services utilize Progent's extensive team of online technical support specialists combined with enterprise-class trouble ticketing and tracking software to provide an economical, modern Support Desk. Progent's Standard Help Desk Services offer a comprehensive solution that handles all aspects of online Level 1 desktop technical support from initial service requests to trouble ticket creation, screen sharing, issue resolution, and incident reporting. A web-based User's Service Portal allows teleworkers to monitor or edit their current tickets, add details, and upload screenshots and relevant files. Support services are delivered at a substantial price reduction off Progent's normal Level 1 technical support rates, and Progent makes available optional rapid hand-off to Level 2 and Level 3 IT specialists to deal with complex issues. For details, refer to Progent's Standard Helpdesk Services outsourcing for small businesses.
• Progent's Call Center Supplemental Service enables you to augment your existing Support Desk team by sharing responsibilities for Help Desk Call Center support services transparently between your in-house support staff and Progent's extensive roster of PC support technicians and subject matter specialists. Progent's co-managed Support Desk service is based on a co-sourcing support solution based on the number one professional services automation (PSA) platform for handling help requests and ticketing, assigning responsibility, tracking progress, and generating management reports. For information about how Progent's Help Desk Supplementation Services can help your company to deliver world-class desktop support to your teleworkers, refer to Progent's Help Desk Call Center supplementation Services.

Security and Compliance for Remote Workers
At-home staff members commonly utilize their own computers and usually operate in an unsecured physical environment. This increases their vulnerability to cyber attacks and calls for careful configuration of firewalls, AV tools, MFA-based identity verification, remote endpoint monitoring, thorough user education, and the development of policies based on leading practices. Progent's veteran team of IT security solutions experts can assist your business to design, configure and maintain a compliant security solution that protects critical IT assets in environments that include an at-home workforce.

Firewalls allow companies to build a network environment that can be securely utilized by local users and by telecommuters, mobile workers, suppliers, clients, and other stakeholders. Next-generation firewall devices permit you to assign and manage different access rights to various classes of users and to expand your IT network and adjust your security as your company evolves and as cyber threats grow increasingly sophisticated. Progent works with both current and older security appliances from all leading manufacturers like Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, WatchGuard, Juniper, and Fortinet. For details about Progent's firewall configuration expertise, visit firewall support expertise.

Online Endpoint Monitoring makes it easy to track the disparate computers used by at-home workers and either reject or spot and mitigate the latest cyber attacks such as ransomware. With ProSight Active Security Monitoring (ASM) services, a small-footprint agent is installed on each protected endpoint device, watching all activity and using advanced machine learning and full execution context from SentinelOne to identify new attacks on arrival. When a cyberattack is spotted, ProSight Active Security Monitoring instantly disconnects the infected endpoint device from the corporate network to contain the malware. Since the ProSight Active Security Monitoring agent is self-contained, endpoint devices stay secure even when they are not connected to the Internet. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, reseller, and integrator. For more information about ProSight Active Security Monitoring, see remote endpoint monitoring for teleworkers.

Progent's Duo MFA Managed Services utilize Cisco's Duo technology to defend against password theft by using two-factor authentication (2FA). Duo enables single-tap identity confirmation on iOS, Google Android, and other personal devices. With Duo 2FA, whenever you log into a secured application and enter your password you are requested to confirm your identity via a unit that only you have and that uses a separate network channel. A wide range of out-of-band devices can be utilized for this added form of authentication including an iPhone or Android or wearable, a hardware token, a landline telephone, etc. You may register several validation devices. For details about ProSight Duo two-factor identity validation services, visit Duo MFA two-factor authentication (2FA) services for teleworkers.

Security Audits can evaluate the exposure of your network to all types of outside and local security attacks for a network that incorporates telecommuters. Progent can deploy remote, automated security inventory scanning for rapidly and economically uncovering a broad range of security weaknesses that can be found over the Internet. Progent's security assessment experts, which can be provided by security professionals with advanced certifications including CISA, CISSP, and GIAC, can assist your business to audit your processes and policies and review your network infrastructure to allow you to implement the highest level of protection for your teleworkers.

Horizon3.ai's NodeZero PEN Testing Platform is a breakthrough 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 find, rank, fix, and verify cybersecurity weaknesses before threat actors can take advantage of them. Progent can assist you to deploy NodeZero to carry out thorough pentests of your perimeter and your internal IT infrastructure in order to determine your current security profile. Progent can also assist you to harden your network security and can assist you to design and implement a cohesive cybersecurity ecosystem that streamlines management and provides maximum protection for on-premises, cloud-based, at-home, and perimeter IT resources. To find out more details about Progent's vulnerability assessment services powered by on NodeZero's PEN test platform, see Consulting Support for NodeZero's PEN Test Platform.

Download White Paper: Securing a Work-From-Home (WFH) Environment
To read or download a white paper about critical things to concentrate on for securing a network that includes work-from-home staff, click:
Securing a Work-From-Home Network White Paper. (PDF - 2.4 MB)

Data Protection for Remote Workers
Data Protection covers saving and restoring critical information so as to avoid data loss and minimize restoration time in the event of storage failures resulting from equipment issues, software glitches, operator mistakes, malware, or any other reason. Dependable data protection solutions can be particularly difficult to design and manage in hybrid networks that incorporate local data centers, public clouds, and an at-home workforce.

• Backup/Restore solutions for remote workers must cover diverse types of personally owned endpoints. Progent can provide fast remote help from consultants knowledgeable about a broad range of platforms for backing up Windows, Apple Mac and Linux/UNIX servers and desktops as well as laptops, tablets and handhelds. Leading backup/restore solutions supported by Progent's backup/recovery experts include Barracuda Backup, Microsoft Azure Backup, Symantec Backup Exec, Acronis Backup and Recovery, Mozy, and Time Machine. To back up resources spread across a wide area network, Progent can provide ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS), a backup/recovery subscription service that utilizes cloud storage and features fine-grained restore and unified management.
• Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity strategies often envision scenarios that call for a rapid changeover to a work-at-home environment. Progent's senior disaster recovery preparedness experts and business continuity consultants can assist your company to produce, document and validate a DR/BC plan that includes the process of switching to telecommuting.

Unified Management for Teleworkers
Microsoft has renamed and rebundled its endpoint management platforms under the title Endpoint Manager, which encompasses Intune for cloud-based management of mobile and remote endpoints and Configuration Manager for managing on-premises computers. Endpoint Manager features a centralized platform for protecting corporate data by managing onsite, mobile, and home-based endpoints.

Intune
Intune is a component of Microsoft's Endpoint Management suite that also includes Microsoft Configuration Manager. Intune is a cloud-based service for managing and protecting off-premises computers and software. Remote endpoint computers can be user owned or business owned. Network administrators managing the endpoint devices of teleworkers can utilize Intune to provision and authenticate apps on managed devices, push updates and certificates, configure policies for permission to access information and resources, manage passwords, create VPN connections, control how telecommuters share information, establish threat defense, ensure compliance, and delete sensitive information from lost, stolen or decommissioned devices. Intune works with Apple iOS, Android, Windows, and macOS endpoints. For details about Microsoft Intune and how Progent can help your company to use Microsoft's Endpoint Management to administer the endpoint devices of your teleworkers, visit Intune telecommuter device management expertise.

VMware Workspace ONE
VMware Workspace ONE is an advanced centralized Mobile Device Management (MDM) product that helps network managers to keep remote endpoints up to date and protected. Workspace ONE uses VMware AirWatch for unified endpoint administration plus VMware's Horizon virtual software delivery platform for authorization control, app management, and setup management of endpoint devices. Workspace ONE operates with endpoints powered by Windows 10, macOS, iOS, Android, Chrome OS, or popular distros of Linux. VMware Workspace ONE is available by subscription as a cloud-based service or as an on-site deployment via a one-time purchase. Top features of VMware Workspace ONE include fast remote provisioning of out-of-the-box notebooks, immediate onboarding of new users, policy set up and enforcement for all classes of devices, unifies reporting and performance analytics, email encryption, and tight integration with Microsoft applications and cloud-based services. For information about Progent's expertise for VMware Workspace ONE, visit VMware Workspace ONE remote endpoint management consultants.

Contact Progent for Remote Workforce Expertise
To contact Progent about building and managing a productive telecommuter solution for your London, United Kingdom business, call 1-800-993-9400 or go to Contact Progent.