Winston-Salem Remote Workforce Solutions Consulting Experts

Enlarging your telecommuter workforce may have a significant impact on network architecture, security/compliance, and company processes. Progent has two decades of experience helping SMBs to design, deploy, manage, tune, and debug IT networks that support a remote workforce. Progent can help your Winston-Salem company to pick the right technologies and adhere to best practices in creating and operating a secure virtual ecosystem for telecommuters that facilitates teamwork and delivers maximum value. Progent can provide services that go from on demand guidance for helping you past occasional IT bottlenecks to full project management to help you successfully complete mission-critical initiatives.

Progent can assist Winston-Salem, North Carolina businesses to with any facet of creating a high-performing work-from-home ecosystem by delivering infrastructure design and configuration services, IP voice expertise, voice/video conferencing integration, collaboration platform selection and deployment, public cloud integration, Call Desk outsourcing, cybersecurity, data protection solutions, and centralized management.

Infrastructure for Telecommuters
Configuring the network infrastructure required for a remote work environment can be particularly complex if you have to accommodate a combination of personal equipment like desktop computers and notebooks, Internet routers, and Wi-Fi appliances from different manufacturers and with a mix of operating systems and firmware levels. Progent's background providing online support for both outdated as well as modern IT products in remote office solutions enables you to make cost-effective use of your available network infrastructure and provides you with ready access to top-tire consultants for making necessary upgrades. Support services available from Progent to help you to create a productive work-at-home ecosystem include:

• Virtual Private Network technology allows you to create a secure connection for authorized remote workers to use IT assets situated at your company datacenter or in the cloud. Progent can help your company to deploy and maintain VPN connections between your teleworkers and your key network resources by providing remote VPN configuration consulting. For organizations with Cisco's ASA firewalls, Progent's Cisco ASA consultants can help your telecommuters to set up Cisco's popular AnyConnect software to provide safe VPN tunneling for a broad range of endpoint devices including Windows, Mac, Apple iOS, Linux, and Google Android.
• Virtual Desktop Infrastructure products enable a telecommuter to view and interact with a data center computer's desktop. This technology provides network managers substantial control over the computing environment of at-home employees and offers them a consistent and more productive work experience. Progent's VDI consulting services include Windows Remote Desktop support and Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops expertise.
• Routers attach home networks to the Internet and typically support VPN connections, local wireless networks, and firewall services. Progent can provide top-tier online support for integrating routers from a variety of manufacturers. See router configuration services from Cisco-certified consultants.
• Home Wi-Fi networks, often shared by the whole family and guests, are frequently used by at-home employees to access their router for work. This can cause performance as well as security issues. Progent can help you to mitigate these problems by providing services like Aironet integration expertise, Cisco-certified Meraki wireless deployment consulting, and Ubiquiti Unifi wireless access point setup assistance.
• Internet access methods affect the speed and availability of connections between at-home workers and the corporate data center. Vital processes might require backup Internet connections in the event the primary connection fails. Progent can provide guidance for identifying ISPs, selecting appropriate service bundles, and configuring redundant Internet access. Refer to Internet access integration services.

IP Voice Integration for an At-Home Workforce
Expanding the corporate phone environment to accommodate teleworkers is critical to supporting a productive at-home workforce. A variety of cloud-centric digital PBX products are popular with small and mid-size businesses to server teleworkers. Many enterprises depend on Cisco's current or legacy platforms for IP voice management. Progent can assist organizations of any size to plan or maintain a remote VoIP service that provides the flexibility, transparency and security needed for at-home workers. Progent's Cisco-certified CCIE IP Voice experts can provide high-level support to help organizations optimize their current Cisco VoIP environments to handle a growing remote workforce.

• Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Cisco Unified CM) delivers enterprise telephony features to devices such as IP phones, media processing platforms, VoIP gateways, and mixed media software used throughout the network. Unified Communications Manager supports additional combined media services like unified messaging, voice/video conferencing, and customer collaboration networks. For more information about Progent's CUCM support, refer to Cisco Unified Communications Manager consultants.
• CallManager is Cisco's earlier call-processing software and has been replaced by CUCM. Progent's consultants can assist your company to maintain your current CallManager environment or upgrade smoothly to Cisco's modern IP telephony products. To find out about Progent's expertise for Cisco CallManager and Cisco's other early IP voice platforms, see Cisco CallManager consulting.
• Cisco IP Gateways provide integration with PSTN networks and with clients operating outside the corporate firewall such as telecommuters. Progent offers consulting expertise for Cisco's legacy IP gateways including the UC520, UC540 and UC560 product lines and for modern Cisco Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) gateways. See Cisco SIP gateway integration expertise.
• Other VoIP Platforms supported by Progent include Vonage, Intermedia Unite and 8x8. Progent can assist you to expand your WAN architecture to support these VoIP solutions and deliver as-needed deployment and troubleshooting expertise.

Voice/Video Conferencing for an At-Home Workforce
A wide selection of video conferencing platforms from leading technology companies enable online meetings, video conferencing, chat sessions, and screen/content sharing for both local workers and telecommuters. Many organizations utilize multiple conferencing products to accommodate their different partners and customers. Progent's communications experts can help your organization to manage your current conferencing ecosystem and enhance the engagement of your at-home employees.

• Skype for Business is Microsoft's leading communications platform that supports real-time presence, IM, voice and video calling and conferencing plus the transparent integration of these capabilities within Office desktop and Microsoft 365 productivity software such as PowerPoint, Word, and Excel. Progent offers the expertise of Microsoft-certified specialists who can help you to set up and manage Skype for Business clients to support your remote workforce. To learn more about Progent's support expertise for Skype for Business, visit Skype for Business integration services.
• FaceTime is Apple's group video phone platform for compatible iOS and Mac computers and smartphones. FaceTime runs over Wi-Fi or cellular Internet connections. Newer editions of FaceTime allow as many as 32 simultaneous users for video sessions. To learn more about Progent's consulting 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, Webex services include sharing specific content or screens, presentations that embed rich media such as Microsoft PowerPoint, network-based capture, plus editing and playback for training. For details about Progent's support expertise for Cisco Webex and for other IP video products from Cisco, visit 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 information with features that include voice/video conferencing, persistent chat, plus data sharing. For details about Progent's support expertise for Microsoft Teams as well as for additional Microsoft 365 products, see Progent's Microsoft Teams consulting services.
• Additional Voice/Video 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 you to tune your network infrastructure to run them.

Microsoft Collaboration Software for At-Home Workers
Microsoft's collaboration products are tightly integrated with Microsoft's popular Office suites, providing a rich ecosystem of productivity apps that deliver a cohesive user experience for sharing data and ideas throughout a corporate network and on a broad range of endpoint devices. Progent has provided online consulting services for Microsoft SharePoint and Exchange since their initial publication and can help businesses to configure these flagship collaboration platforms to maximize the productivity 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 on top of Microsoft 365 and integrates with third-party cloud services to deliver real-time collaboration. Designed as a substitute for Skype for Business Online, Microsoft Teams can support chat, audio/video meetings that include screen sharing, calling, cloud voicemail, group email, plus file and app sharing. Teams is tightly integrated with Microsoft 365 and depends on Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, and Microsoft Entra (previously branded Azure Active Directory) for delivering its full range of features. For details about Progent's support services for Microsoft Teams, see solution design and deployment expertise for Microsoft Teams.

SharePoint utilizes web sites to enable collaboration and knowledge sharing by providing policy-driven delivery of content, workflow, and tools for looking through enterprise-wide information silos. SharePoint allows you to create secure web portals that permits at-home workers to see and edit aggregated business intelligence via Intranets (Wikis), Blogs, social networking sites, and Web Parts. For details about Progent's SharePoint consulting expertise, go to 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 consulting expertise, see planning and configuration consulting for Microsoft Exchange Server.

OneDrive is Microsoft�s collaborative cloud storage service, similar to GoogleDrive. Remote users can store files to the OneDrive service, and co-workers anywhere can share them safely through a browser. Included with Microsoft 365, OneDrive allows at-home workers to co-author documents. Revisions made offline are uploaded when you go back online. To find out about Progent's expertise for Microsoft OneDrive, see Onedrive integration experts.

Cloud Integration Services for Telecommuters
Progent can provide affordable remote support for helping organizations to build, maintain and troubleshoot integrated network models that combine internal data centers, remote workers, branch offices, and public cloud services. Progent offers top-tier consultant for all modes of cloud service including Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service, and Software as a Service (SaaS). Progent can help teleworkers resolve problems with cloud access, authentication, and security.

Azure is a popular family of public cloud services that allows you to utilize IT infrastructure, virtual servers, and key apps hosted on Microsoft's extensive cloud. Microsoft Azure features more than one hundred cloud-based services such as the ability to host Windows and Linux-powered virtual machines, scalable cloud storage, messaging, application development with Visual Studio, and data protection. Progent can help your organization to set up VMs on Azure Virtual Machines, integrate cloud-based storage on Azure Storage services, streamline identity control with Azure Active Directory, and plan data backup and recovery solutions with Azure Backup. Progent can also show you how to establish secure connections to Azure services for teleworkers by configuring and troubleshooting firewall appliances and VPN tunnels. For information about Progent's consulting services for Microsoft Azure, see Azure expertise.

Microsoft 365, formerly called Office 365, is Microsoft's growing family of client productivity applications and cloud-based services offered on a subscription basis. Office apps and cloud services are provided in a variety of bundles intended for users ranging from students and households to large enterprises. Progent offers fast and affordable remote contact with experts familiar with Microsoft 365-compatible endpoints based on Windows, Mac, iOS, and Google Android operating systems. Progent can assist you to evaluate the numerous subscription bundles available for Microsoft 365 and configure 365 applications for your at-home workers in a way that delivers maximum business value. For details about Progent's expertise for Microsoft 365, see Microsoft 365 consulting expertise.

Exchange Online is among the most popular cloud-based applications in Azure-hosted Microsoft 365 product suite. Microsoft 365 Exchange Online offers the advantages of lower spending for physical infrastructure, simplified management, dynamic scaling, high availability, and additional advantages associated with public clouds. Microsoft has engineered Microsoft 365 Exchange Online to operate transparently with local deployments of Exchange, enabling customers to build hybrid information systems. Progent's certified Exchange consultants can provide as-needed help to get you past challenging technical roadblocks and can also provide comprehensive project management outsourcing to ensure your remote workers have easy and safe access to your Exchange Online deployment. To learn Progent's consulting services for Exchange Online, go to Microsoft 365 Exchange Online integration and support consulting.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a pioneer in the public cloud arena and is the world's biggest source of cloud services. Progent offers rapid and economical online contact with cloud integration consultants who can help your organization to plan, deploy, manage, and debug hybrid IT networks that incorporate Amazon AWS cloud services with on-premises resources and with other public clouds such as Microsoft Azure. Progent also can provide the skills of Cisco-certified CCIE networking experts to assist your company to create a high-availability network model to make sure your employees have a productive computing environment whether they are working from your main office, a remote branch, at home, or on the move. For details about Progent's support services for Amazon AWS, see Amazon AWS consulting support.

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) is a leading set of public cloud services that provides Infrastructure-as-a-Service and Platform-as-a-Service products. Progent's Microsoft, Linux, and Cisco experts can assist your business to scale your existing IT resources with the Google Cloud, and Progent's DBA experts can show you how to make your key apps cloud ready so your remote workers can take full advantage of Google Cloud Platform services. Progent can assist your business to set up VMs on Google Cloud Compute Engine, design an efficient storage solution with Google Cloud Storage services, and streamline identity management for at-home workers with GCP Cloud Identity services. Progent's experts can also help your organization to utilize GCP's unified management technology to control and monitor your Google Cloud ecosystem. For information, visit Google Cloud Platform (GCP) consulting expertise.

Help Desk Services for At-Home Workers
A sudden, organization-wide changeover to a telecommuter business model, which could be motivated by a pandemic or as part of a disaster recovery/business continuity process, can overstretch even a high-performing in-house Call Desk. Progent's Help Desk Call Center services make it possible for organizations to outsource or supplement their Help Desk Call Center with Progent's online Technical Response Center services.

• Progent's Standard Help Desk support services utilize Progent's extensive team of online technical support specialists combined with enterprise-class ticketing and tracking technology to provide an economical, state-of-the-art Call Center. Progent's Standard Help Desk Services offer an end-to-end solution that addresses all facets of online Level 1 desktop support from initial service requests through ticket generation, screen sharing, issue resolution, and reporting. A browser-based User's Service Portal enables telecommuters to check or revise their current trouble tickets, add information, and append screenshots or relevant files. Support services are delivered at a significant discount off Progent's ordinary Level 1 desktop service rates, and Progent makes available optional fast escalation to Level 2 and Level 3 IT specialists to deal with advanced issues. For details, visit Progent's Standard Helpdesk Services for small and mid-size businesses.
• Progent's Help Desk Supplemental Service allows your business to supplement your current Support Desk organization by sharing delivery of Support Desk support services seamlessly between your regular IT support organization and Progent's nationwide team of PC support technicians and subject matter specialists. Progent's shared Call Center service uses a collaborative support solution based on the number one professional services automation (PSA) platform for managing help requests and trouble tickets, establishing ownership, monitoring progress, and generating reports. For details about how Progent's Help Desk Call Center Augmentation Services can enable your company to provide world-class desktop support to your at-home workforce, see Progent's Call Desk supplementation Services.

Security and Compliance for Remote Workers
Work-from-Home employees commonly utilize their personal computers and often work in a poorly secured physical area. This situation increases their vulnerability to malware attacks and calls for judicious configuration of corporate firewalls, AV tools, multi-factor authentication, remote monitoring, extensive user training, and the development of policies built on leading practices. Progent's seasoned team of cybersecurity solutions experts can assist you to design, implement and maintain an effective cybersecurity solution that protects vital IT resources in environments that incorporate telecommuters.

Firewalls allow you to create a network environment that can be safely accessed by on-premises users and by teleworkers, mobile employees, suppliers, clients, and other stakeholders. Modern firewall devices allow you to configure and manage different access rights to different classes of users and to expand your IT network and modify your security profile as your company evolves and as cyber threats grow more complex. Progent works with both current and legacy firewall devices from all major vendors like Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Check Point, Juniper, and Fortinet. To learn more about Progent's firewall integration expertise, go to firewall integration and support expertise.

Online Endpoint Security Monitoring makes it easy to watch over the disparate computers utilized by remote workers and either reject or spot and respond to the latest cyber attacks like ransomware. With Progent's ProSight Active Security Monitoring services, a lightweight agent is put on each protected endpoint, monitoring all activity and using state-of-the-art AI technology from SentinelOne to detect new attacks before they can spread. When an attack is discovered, ProSight Active Security Monitoring instantly disconnects the infected endpoint device from the network to quarantine the malware. Because the ProSight ASM software agent is autonomous, endpoints remain protected even if they are not connected to the Internet. Progent is a SentinelOne Partner, dealer, and integrator. To find out more about ProSight Active Security Monitoring, visit remote endpoint security monitoring for teleworkers.

Progent's Duo authentication Services incorporate Cisco's Duo cloud technology to protect against stolen passwords by using two-factor authentication. Duo enables single-tap identity confirmation on iOS, Google Android, and other personal devices. Using 2FA, when you sign into a protected application and give your password you are asked to confirm who you are on a unit that only you possess and that is accessed using a separate network channel. A wide selection of devices can be utilized for this added form of authentication such as a smartphone or wearable, a hardware token, a landline telephone, etc. You may designate multiple validation devices. For more information about Duo two-factor identity validation services, see Duo MFA two-factor authentication services for telecommuters.

Security Audits can assess the vulnerability of your network to all classes of outside and local security attacks for a network that incorporates an at-home workforce. Progent can run online, automated security analysis scanning for rapidly and affordably detecting a broad range of security weaknesses that can be found over the Internet. Progent's security audit consulting services, which can be managed by data security experts with advanced certifications such as CISM, CISSP, and GIAC, can help your business to evaluate your workflows and policies and assess your WAN architecture to allow you to design top-level protection for your telecommuters.

Horizon3.ai's NodeZero Pentest Platform is a breakthrough penetration test (pentest) product family that supports autonomous threat assessment of your at-home environment as well as your internal and perimeter networks to help you find, prioritize, remediate, and verify security vulnerabilities before malicious hackers can exploit them. Progent can help you to deploy NodeZero to perform comprehensive pentests of your network perimeter and your internal IT infrastructure in order to determine your current security posture. Progent's NodeZero experts can also assist you to strengthen your existing network security and can help you to design and deploy a cohesive cybersecurity strategy that streamlines management and delivers maximum protection for on-prem, cloud-based, at-home, and perimeter IT assets. To find out more details about Progent's vulnerability assessment services based on on NodeZero's PEN test products, refer to Consulting Services for NodeZero's Pentest Products.

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

Data Protection for Teleworkers
Data Protection covers saving and recovering vital data in order to prevent data loss and minimize recovery time in the event of storage failures due to equipment issues, software hiccups, human error, cyber attack, or other causes. Reliable data protection strategies can be particularly difficult to architect and manage in hybrid environments that incorporate local data centers, cloud resources, and an at-home workforce.

• Backup/Recovery solutions for telecommuters must address multiple kinds of personally owned endpoints. Progent can provide fast online help from consultants knowledgeable about a broad range of products for backing up Microsoft Windows, Apple Mac and Linux/UNIX powered servers and desktop computers as well as laptops, tablets and smartphones. Leading backup/recovery solutions supported by Progent's backup/recovery experts include Barracuda Backup, Azure Backup, Symantec Backup Exec, CrashPlan, Mozy, and Time Machine. To back up data distributed across a hybrid network, Progent can provide ProSight Data Protection Services (DPS), a backup/recovery subscription service that uses cloud-based storage and features granular recovery and centralized management.
• Disaster Recovery/Business Continuity (DR/BC) strategies commonly anticipate circumstances that call for a temporary switch to an at-home workforce. Progent's expert disaster recovery planning consultants and business continuity specialists can assist you to create, document and test a DR/BC plan that addresses the logistics of moving to an at-home workforce.

Unified Management for an At-Home Workforce
Microsoft has renamed and rebundled its endpoint management products under the title Microsoft Endpoint Manager, which includes Intune for cloud-based management of mobile and remote devices and Configuration Manager for managing onsite computers. Microsoft Endpoint Manager provides a unified platform for safeguarding critical data by controlling on-premises, mobile, and at-home endpoint devices.

Intune
Intune is a component of Microsoft's Endpoint Management suite that also includes Configuration Manager. Intune is a cloud service for managing and protecting remote computers and applications. Remote endpoint devices can be user owned or company owned. Network administrators managing the endpoint devices of at-home workers can utilize Intune to provision and validate applications on devices, push updates and certificates, set up rules for accessing information and resources, set passwords, create VPN connections, determine how home-based workers share data, set up threat protection, verify compliance, and erase sensitive information from lost, stolen or decommissioned endpoint devices. Microsoft Intune works with Apple iOS, Android, Windows, and macOS/OS X computers. To learn about Intune and how Progent can help you to use this platform to administer the endpoint computers of your at-home workers, see Intune teleworker device management consultants.

VMware Workspace ONE
VMware Workspace ONE is an advanced centralized Mobile Device Management platform that helps network administrators to keep offsite endpoint devices up to date and protected. Workspace ONE uses VMware AirWatch for unified endpoint management along with VMware's Horizon virtual application delivery technology for access control, application management, and setup management of endpoint computers. Workspace ONE operates with devices powered by Windows 10, macOS, iOS, Google Android, Chrome OS, or leading distros of Linux. VMware Workspace ONE is available by subscription as a cloud-based service or as an on-site product via a perpetual license. Key features of Workspace ONE include rapid remote deployment of out-of-the-box notebooks, immediate onboarding of new employees, policy setting and enforcement for all classes of endpoints, aggregated management reporting and analytics, email encryption, and seamless integration with Microsoft apps and cloud-based services. To learn about Progent's support services for VMware Workspace ONE, go to VMware Workspace ONE mobile endpoint management consultants.

Contact Progent for Remote Workforce Expertise
To get in touch with Progent about building and maintaining a productive work-from-home solution for your Winston-Salem, North Carolina business, call 1-800-993-9400 or visit Contact Progent.