Tax season is complicated under normal circumstances. I think we can officially file 2020 as “abnormal.” Tax deadline extensions compounded with forced remote work due to quarantine caused many small firms a ton of issues.
Some firms had the foresight to have an existing remote work protocol in place that allowed them to close their doors and continue business as usual with their staff working remotely. Other firms have been slower to adopt, assuming that quarantine would be over after a few months, and we could resume life as usual.
Everyone at this point has had to come to terms with the fact that life as we knew it before the pandemic has ceased to exist, we must come to embrace the new normal to face the future. Fortunately, we are alive in the 21st century, and a large portion of our working class, especially tax and accounting firms, can move remotely with high-quality remote work solutions without losing significant business continuity.
The cloud has proven to be a perfect solution for small businesses looking to adopt a turn-key solution to meet their IT needs so they can focus on their core business of serving their clients.
Remote Work Increases Employee Happiness and Productivity
I think everyone was skeptical about their ability to remain productive while working from home with all of the incumbent distractions. The data we have collected from our clients after making the switch would suggest that overall, people are happier, and happier people are more productive.
- Remote work removes the need to commute: The stress of fighting traffic morning and night to get to and from the office can be a significant drain on morale, especially in big cities. Removing this stress frees up many hours a week to either focus more on work or take care of everyday errands, so prime work hours can have less distraction.
- Remote work provides flexibility for family and other responsibilities: Employees no longer need to worry about taking a sick day to prevent bringing a nasty bug into the office. Taking a sick kid to the doctor or sick animal to the vet doesn’t require taking a half-day off from work.
- Remote work means fewer in-office time killers: Never-ending meetings, water cooler chat, being forced to listen to your monotonous boss that drones on for hours about her cats are a thing of the past.
Remote Work Improves the Bottom Line for Tax and Accounting Firms
Looking to the future after we get a handle on COVID19 and get the “all clear” from health experts to return to the office paints a very different picture from just a year ago. After working fully remote for the many months of quarantine, firms will have a few options based on how well their staff has adjusted to the “new normal.”
- Stay Remote: Many firms will have come to realize that the need for an office can be completely eradicated with a cloud-enabled remote working solution. Imagine the savings on lease costs and other expenses from a physical office that could be reinvested into other parts of your business like marketing, innovation, or hiring more employees to grow your business. If your staff is fully remote, your ability to grow your team and the potential pool of employees grows exponentially.
- Re-open the office in a much more limited capacity: Many firms had much larger offices than they needed, planning for growth and expecting unused office space to be filled with new staff eventually. If this new staff could be hired to work remotely and all of your employees don’t need to go in every day, you can make do with a much smaller footprint. A smaller footprint means a smaller bottom line, freeing up more funds to reinvest in growth.
It is a new world for Tax and Accounting Firms that embrace the new normal and adopt forward-thinking, cloud-enabled solutions. There is no better time to invest in a cloud-partner that can build you a remote work environment that is efficient, affordable, adaptable, scalable, and, most importantly, secure.
That’s where Verito Cloud can help. We can partner with your firm to augment your existing IT infrastructure or build a robust, secure IT environment from the group up. We will be there to assist you every step of the way from migration through proactive maintenance, updates, and 24/7/365 monitoring and support.
Moving to the cloud not only improves productivity and efficiency, but it also provides significant risk mitigation against the unexpected, like a pandemic. When it’s necessary to work from home or the road, it’s imperative to have secure anywhere, anytime access to your important business files and apps.
Verito Cloud offers Tax and Accounting Firms:
- A cloud-based remote desktop solution provides access to the same icons, applications, folders, and files available on desktop computers in your office.
- Easy virtual desktop launch from a single icon, on any internet-enabled device
- Complete security because we launch your virtual desktop directly from our servers, located in top-tier US-based data centers with automated daily backups to offsite locations for full redundancy.
When your firm is ready to make the switch to the cloud, we are here to help your business come out the other side better and more resilient than before.
About Verito Technologies
Verito Technologies provides fully-managed, turn-key cloud hosting solutions for all size companies. We host your favorite tax/accounting software on a dedicated cloud server backed by enterprise-grade security that is SOC2, PCI DSS, SSAE compliant, and our strategically located data centers offer a 99.99% uptime guarantee. Automated backups and a 24/7 support team provide complete peace of mind.
