Washington Works Blog

When was the last time that your organization had an unexpected technology expense blast your IT budget out of the sky? Surprise issues that you don’t plan for could potentially derail your budget for months, or even years, depending on the severity of it. Having a clear idea of what your IT service plan covers is a great way to make sure that you don’t get hit by surprise billing.

Let’s say you’ve got an email that you really need to crank out from home, and pronto. So, you whip out your laptop to get started, and that’s when you spot the menacing eyes of a toddler from across the room. What do you do? Is it even possible to use a mobile device once a toddler has it in their greedy little sights? For this week’s tip, we’ll explore your options.

The Internet of Things may have just entered social consciousness, but people have been trying to add Internet functionality to devices for quite some time. One instance of this is the development and manufacture of smart car technology. In the same way as our services are designed to proactively monitor and maintain your business’ network, a smart car has been developed largely as an completely connected automobile that allows car owners to worry less about their car and to get the most out of their investment and driving experiences.

Budgeting accurately for your long-term IT needs requires an intimate knowledge about technology and IT trends. Compared to other department budgets that are easy to compile by making a few simple adjustments to the previous year’s numbers, your IT budget must take into account the depreciation of your IT equipment for replacement purposes, as well as the cost of procuring the new, cutting-edge solutions that are shaping your industry. Do you have the technical knowledge to come up with an accurate IT budget? If you don’t, you’ll want to employ the services of an IT consultant.

Whether you are looking to prevent theft, curb employee time-wasting, or get a handle on workplace efficiency, security cameras are a solution that prevents and protects you from a wide variety of issues.

What happens when you lock your Windows 10 PC? Unless you’ve changed your lock screen settings, you’re greeted with a dynamic background image that changes every day or so. Sometimes, Windows will show you an image that’s so good that you’ll want to download it so you can look at it more. But how does one go about this? For this week’s tip, we’ll show you how!

Meetings: they’re known in the business world as a necessary evil. However, this doesn’t have to be the case. With a few adjustments, you can create the ideal conditions for effective and efficient meetings.

Fact: There’s a shortage in the IT skills market. Yet, businesses now have more opportunity than ever to make up for this shortage. A simple solution is to outsource your IT services to a managed service provider. You might find that it’s a great way to save time and revenue on a department that’s becoming increasingly difficult to hire for. Here are three reasons why outsourced IT services can resolve the shortage of IT talent.

Cell phones: as much as they’re needed for business purposes, there are definitely times that they shouldn’t ring and interrupt what is going on around you. However, turning a phone’s volume up or down isn’t always the first thing on a user’s mind. Fortunately for Android users, it no longer has to be.

It’s quite possibly the most infamous screen image in computing: the Blue Screen of Death. Encountering this screen will often cause two thoughts to run through a user’s mind: what just happened, and how can I fix it?

So you’ve outgrown your office space and need to relocate. Congratulations on reaching this milestone with your business, but do you know what to look for in a new building? Finding the perfect setup can be daunting, especially if you don’t know what to look for. To help you out, here are four tips to make your transition easier.

Email is a central part of any functional modern office, but if you aren’t proactive in keeping your inbox under control, you could be wasting time on unnecessary messages or spam. If you want to get the most out of your workday, it’s imperative that you take back control of your business email inbox. Here are three ways that yourself and your employees can clean up your inboxes and waste less time throughout the work day.

When you’re planning your business’s technology ventures, how often does your IT budget become a major deciding factor? Chances are that it clings to you like a ball and chain. Wouldn’t it be nice to free yourself from something so limiting? We’ve compiled three ways that you can take some of the strain off of your IT budget.

When it comes to buying technology, sometimes, despite the fact that the Internet offers a plethora of product reviews and detailed information for you to research to your heart’s content, it’s still possible to regret your purchase and decide to return it. In order to combat buyer’s remorse, more services are popping up that let consumers rent products before buying.

For most things in life, two is better than one--except when it comes to smartphones. Anyone who’s ever tried juggling a work-issued phone and a personal device understands how real this struggle can be. Are you experiencing this multi-phone dilemma? Here are some tips to help you successfully merge your two phones.

Having a workflow that works for you is the key to being successful. Sometimes, finding such a routine requires taking some rather extraordinary measures. If you’re looking for ways to tweak your workflow to be more productive, then consider these outside-the-box productivity tips from some of history’s very successful people.

Windows 10’s updates have provided users with entirely new ways to receive notifications, including the ability to sync their notifications via Android’s Cortana app. However, you’ll be happy to hear that you can control how these notifications appear. We’ll walk you through some basic steps on how to customize your Windows 10 notifications.

Moving to the cloud is not an easy task, and it’s certainly not a process that will be the same for every SMB. Therefore, you need to be open to adaptation as the process wears on. Unplanned-for issues might make it difficult to adhere 100 percent to your plans, so if you can’t adapt to that which you can’t predict, your cloud migration is doomed to failure.

Modern office technology is breaking down office barriers left and right. With the proper tools, workers can perform their daily duties anytime, anywhere. This trend is prompting businesses to hire remote workers in order to find the talent they need without being limited by geographical location. Unfortunately, finding a good candidate for a remote worker is easier said than done.

An active Google user will inevitably accumulate a stockpile of photos and videos via their account’s Google Photos app. For this week’s tip, we’ll show you how to download all of this media to a local device.