Heart of Texas Network Consultants Blog

Heart of Texas Network Consultants has been serving the Central Texas area since 1992, providing IT Support such as technical helpdesk support, computer support and consulting to small and medium-sized businesses.

Worried Your Workplace Might Be Toxic? Here’s How to Fix It

Worried Your Workplace Might Be Toxic? Here’s How to Fix It

“Toxic” is a buzzword that is often used nowadays, but when it is used to describe a business’ work environment, it needs to be treated with deadly seriousness.

If a workplace is a place people don’t like to be, many drawbacks will ultimately impact operations. Therefore, it is to your benefit to keep your business as positive a workplace as possible.

Let’s discuss how to tell if your company has a toxic workplace and, if so, how to resolve it.

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Sabotage Isn’t Just About Theft

Sabotage Isn’t Just About Theft

Businesses have to deal with a lot of different types of problems, but they often don’t see many of the issues that come from within their company. Whether this comes from hackers, disgruntled customers, or unreliable vendors, every business leader constantly deals with some type of issue. Unfortunately, sometimes these problems can come from inside your company. Today, we look at two employee issues that can potentially cause major headaches for business owners.

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Scope Creep Can Railroad Your Projects

Scope Creep Can Railroad Your Projects

Projects are a big part of the small business model. Whether they are projects to improve organizational efficiency or productivity or projects that are completed for customers, strong project management is extremely important. Scope creep happens when a project becomes less efficient because the demands of the project keep changing. In today’s blog, we will try to define scope creep and how to prevent it from being a problem for your business.

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It’s Important to Know When to Cut Your Business’ Losses

It’s Important to Know When to Cut Your Business’ Losses

“Quit.” The q-word is (at least, in the business setting) one of the worst four-letter words someone can use… usually. In the context you probably first thought of, yes, but there are plenty of times that quitting can directly benefit your operations.

For instance, let’s say you have a project that is eating all of your resources, with no real returns in sight. What do you do then?

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What Should Employers Do About the “Act Your Wage” Trend?

What Should Employers Do About the “Act Your Wage” Trend?

In recent years, several workplace trends have emerged that many employers find challenging. One such trend is "quiet quitting," where employees do only the bare minimum required to keep their jobs. A more recent trend is to "act your wage."

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Productivity is Great… Here’s How to Encourage It

Productivity is Great… Here’s How to Encourage It

Productivity is extremely important for your business' ability to generate revenue and maintain consistent performance. Interestingly, many businesses face similar productivity challenges over time. What can small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) do to improve productivity when it starts to decline? Let's take a look at some strategies to keep productivity high. 

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Can You Afford Downtime? (Here’s a Hint: No)

Can You Afford Downtime? (Here’s a Hint: No)

It’s no secret that things are more expensive nowadays, making it important that businesses have access to the technology needed to generate revenue. Without this access, a business suffers downtime and all the challenges it brings… not something you want to do.

Let’s consider why downtime happens, the scale of its costs, and what can be done to avoid it.

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How to Create Business Goals Designed for Success

How to Create Business Goals Designed for Success

We all want our businesses to succeed… that’s generally the point of running one. However, this will require you to set the right goals and do so correctly.

Let’s walk through the process you should follow to accomplish this.

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How to Use Technology to Support Your Team’s Wellness

How to Use Technology to Support Your Team’s Wellness

It isn’t easy to be a member of the workforce right now. While we won’t cover them in detail, plenty of stressors—related to and separate from the workplace—can easily impact an employee’s performance. As a result, it is often in your company’s best interest to invest in your team’s well-being, and one way to do this is by implementing and encouraging the use of different technologies.

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Are Businesses Really Considering the Four-Day Workweek?

Are Businesses Really Considering the Four-Day Workweek?

There has been a lot of talk about ways to get more productivity from your staff. One idea floated a few years ago was reducing the number of days people work to four. Now, if you think, “How does working one less day improve worker productivity?” you aren’t alone. This week, we will take a look at the benefits of a four-day workweek.

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How to Convert and Edit a PDF File

How to Convert and Edit a PDF File

PDF, which stands for Portable Document Format, is a type of file that business professionals are all too familiar with. While most are aware of and appreciative of this file type, they likely are not aware of some of the more fun and useful features afforded to them. Let’s explore just what PDFs are capable of, including how to make and edit them.

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Different Size Businesses Need Different CRMs

Different Size Businesses Need Different CRMs

Establishing and nurturing positive customer relationships stands as important for any business. A vital tool in achieving this goal is the implementation of a customer relationship management (CRM) platform. While many CRMs share common features, some offer more advanced capabilities at a higher cost. This month, we will explore the suitable CRM options for businesses at different levels.

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Two Places Collaboration Improves a Business

Two Places Collaboration Improves a Business

Enhancing collaboration is pivotal for the success of many businesses, and leveraging technology can exponentially improve collaborative outcomes. The challenge lies in identifying the most suitable collaboration tools for your organization’s specific needs. In this month’s newsletter, we will explore two categories of software that can enhance your organizational collaboration.

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How to Make Templates for Google Docs

How to Make Templates for Google Docs

Templates are a handy feature that popular word processing platforms, like Google Docs, offer to help users create specific types of documents. While there are plenty of prebuilt templates available, there’s always the possibility that you have a need that isn’t filled by one of them.

In these cases, you always have the option to build your own. Let’s go over how, and discuss some of the elements and options that your custom Google Docs templates can support.

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Maybe Don’t Ask Your Staff to Return to In-Office Work (You’ll See Why)

Maybe Don’t Ask Your Staff to Return to In-Office Work (You’ll See Why)

Do you remember a couple of years back when remote work went from being a privilege to the norm? It’s been a while since then, but many businesses have adopted hybrid or full remote operations, and as such, they are able to retain a semblance of normalcy even without the return of in-office work.

Some businesses have managed to get back to the state they were in prior to the pandemic, but there is a reason why a lot of businesses are not pushing the issue. Let’s go over some of them, and why forcing the issue with your employees is not necessarily a good idea.

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4 Problems with Remote Work That You Need to Address

4 Problems with Remote Work That You Need to Address

Remote work offers numerous benefits for both your employees and your business, provided you can overcome the challenges associated with implementing it. One such challenge is productivity, something which employees might struggle with while working remotely. Here are four ways your average remote employee might be challenged by their remote work in terms of productivity.

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Are Your Recovery Expectations Lined Up with Your Capabilities?

Are Your Recovery Expectations Lined Up with Your Capabilities?

Your business’ backup and disaster recovery preparations are a critical part of your continued success as an organization, specifically, how they are measured by two key metrics: your recovery time objective (RTO) and your recovery point objective (RPO).

However, it’s important that you are able to determine what your organization can support in terms of your recovery time and recovery point objectives… but how does one do that?

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Tip of the Week: Three Ways to Help You Manage Your Time More Effectively

Tip of the Week: Three Ways to Help You Manage Your Time More Effectively

Effective time management is crucial for productivity and achieving your goals. Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to be efficient. In today’s blog, we offer three very useful tips to improve your own professional efficiency.

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Five Ethical Decisions Innovative Businesses Need to Wrestle With

Five Ethical Decisions Innovative Businesses Need to Wrestle With

Nowadays, companies grapple with a myriad of ethical challenges, necessitating responsible decision-making to keep the data they store secure. Some decisions that are made straddle the ethical line of right and wrong. Let’s take a look at five uses of technology that are controversial.

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Microsoft Continues to Innovate with AI Tools and Services

Microsoft Continues to Innovate with AI Tools and Services

Artificial intelligence, or AI, is a bit controversial at the moment, but there can be no denying that it will play an important part in the business world in the years to come. In fact, many organizations are seeking to expand their AI offerings and capabilities, including notable companies like Microsoft. Here are some of the solutions Microsoft is offering businesses in terms of AI.

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