If you have a multi-site business, you’d know it can be a bit of a struggle to connect each location to the next. And we don’t mean just by giving three premises the same name – we mean literally connecting them so the whole enterprise can function as one!
That’s where technology networks for multi-site businesses come in. In recent decades, multi-site businesses could unify by standardising their technological processes, using the same software and hardware across sites and sharing one central IT support resource.
However, as cloud technology has advanced, it’s become clear that the best way to standardise and share information across a multi-site business is to use a central server location. This is especially useful for businesses in the healthcare sector, which can often be some of the best beneficiaries of centralised operations!
Healthcare businesses often need to transmit large quantities of highly confidential data between clinics. A central server allows for this and more – which can improve your business’ efficiency behind the scenes.
Whether you’re looking at using a central server model for your doctor’s surgery, dentist or physio clinic, there are a range of benefits to consider.
What actually is a central server network?
A central server network just means that all of your business’ connectivity tech is operating from one centralised computing device. You likely already have a server room at each of your business sites – so a central server just means you only need to use one.
That one server can function as a medical database for applications such as Best Practice. It also allows for remote app hosting, encrypted storage and backup storage – all of which are incredibly important to the medical sector.
So what are the other benefits?
More cost savings
Having a central server location and a central technology network saves you money because you won’t be running all that extra server infrastructure at each site. It also saves you money on software licensing because the single network means you can consolidate your Microsoft licenses and any other expensive medical database software licenses, too.
More stable connections
NBN Enterprise Ethernet Fibre and other business-grade fibre communications can provide stable communication back to your cloud-hosted servers. This ensures that all clinics will continue to operate with the highest Internet and communications uptime (uptime is a just a fancy IT word for ‘system reliability’) – even without their individual servers.
Better telephony
Cloud-based phone systems can provide truly stable communication to your clinics by using VoIP. Cloud-based telephony helps to ensure your business’ communications continue to operate even in the instance of an outage at one clinic – or you can organise a call centre team to operate at the group level across the business, 24/7.
Better remote work capability
By working with your IT provider to set up simple, secure remote access into centralised servers, your doctors can roam to different clinics in the group with ease. This is a huge bonus for telehealth appointments, which we predict are only going to become more popular! The central telephony system also means your staff can communicate between clinics and to patients without needing to be present at a particular site, or any site at all.
Better data security
There are a lot of misconceptions about data security when it comes to centralised servers and cloud systems – but we can’t go into them all now! One thing to know is that your company data and confidential medical data cannot be compromised if your technology network is done right.
If you’ve got:
- Secure server hosting and storage
- Encrypted communications between clinics and cloud-hosted server infrastructure
- Multi-factor authentication on your email and server systems
… it’s going to be highly unlikely you’ll face any data security issues! And with your security sorted, the benefits of centralised networks for multi-site businesses are plenty.
Inspired to start connecting the dots for your own multi-site business? Xenex can help.
We do technology for smarter business – whether you’re in healthcare or not. We’re a full-service managed IT provider that audits, designs, builds and maintains technology systems for small to medium enterprises without breaking the bank.
A Xenex partnership begins with a free, no-obligation systems audit and ends with a no-lock-in contract. If you want to help your business work smarter, leave your IT management to Xenex!
Check out our service offering or reach out for a free systems audit today:
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