Who isn’t being affected by all the craziness in our world?  With the global financial markets failing on every continent and economic instability rampant everywhere, this is a time to make sure you’ve got your bases covered.

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity earlier this week to speak to 78 people on “Avoiding a Business Disaster” which I think is extremely relevant to all businesses in all industries.  Not only are companies running on the financial razor’s edge, but the majority of businesses big and small, successful and not-so-much are completely ignoring the importance of protecting their computer data.  

With a bankruptcy rate of 94% for companies that have a major data loss, there isn’t much else to be said. Computers are extremely important in all businesses and the data that get’s created on them is irreplaceable.  I always tell people, “It’s easy to buy a new computer, but there is no store on earth that sells your data!”.  If you lose it, it’s gone forever!  So if you’re not proactive and make the small investment to implement a quality data backup and more importantly data recovery solution, then you are asking for trouble.  It’s not a matter of “if”, but a matter “when” your business will experience computer problems and major data loss.  Computers aren’t perfect, and we the users are definitely nowhere close to perfect.

You must automatically back up your data onsite and to a long-term secure offsite storage provider or you will only have a small chance of recovering your data “when” you lose it.  There are very few backup solutions that actually give you a fighting chance of not losing your data.  Tapes don’t, disk backup doesn’t, and definitely most online only backup providers don’t.  That’s right, online backup sucks too!  Have you ever tried downloading gigs and gigs of data over the internet?  Especially from home / professional online only backup services that you pay less for than a cup of coffee?  I only have one thing to say about the fact that 70% of recoveries fail with most backup solutions… What’s the point in backup, if you can’t recover?

Enough with me ranting.  As you may be well aware, I am extremely passionate about the proper protection of computer data.  It is our business to assure that our clients have the best chance of recovering their data accurately and on-time when they need it most.   It pains me to see that close to 100% of businesses are not using an adequate data protection solution.

There are many factors that make up a proper backup and recovery solution; onsite backup, offsite backup, granular recovery, bulk recovery, security, compression, data integrity, automation, archiving, efficiency, incremental-forever storage, geopolitical location, geographical location, long-term secure storage, customer service, total cost of ownership, long-term data management, future-proofing, affordability, etc…the list goes on and on.  All these factors and many more have been considered by us at Toggle Networks to build the best backup and recovery service available on the market today.

When your world is crashing and it’s taking your data with it, Toggle will be here to make sure you don’t lose a thing.  Now the financial markets crashing is a different story, as we haven’t figured out how to recover your money yet!

In recent news headlines, Kelowna’s name comes up with announcements about the new $75 million dollar gigacenter that is being built by IBM and RackForce (a Kelowna company). The 70,000 square foot facility scheduled to open in December 2008, is state of the art, energy efficient, “green” and totally secure. Upon completion it will generate 100 plus new career positions in Kelowna and area.

The gigacenter is purportedly going to be the largest in North America. That raises the question of why would these organizations choose Kelowna as the ideal place to build this very expensive facility?  Well first you have to have a clear understanding of why the facility is needed at all.

The gigacenter fulfills the huge and rapidly increasing need for IT data storage. The continuing explosion of data that is being generated (much of which must be securely stored and instantly retrievable when required for both business needs and legal and governmental requirements) is dramatically taxing data storage capacity worldwide. The gigacenter is designed with “state of the art” security, highest reliability, greatest efficiency, readily accessibility and “green power”.   Huge volumes of data will be transmitted and stored in the Kelowna gigacenter from all over the world.

Kelowna is a unique but also ideal choice as the site for this type of facility due to our moderate climate, earthquake and flood free history, and we are not in a zone normally affected by terrorism or other strife. Our electricity is reliable and “green” hydro electric and we have a very stable economy and a growing IT work force with an excellent work ethic.

All of this makes both the gigacenter and Kelowna the ideal choice for organizations both big and small wanting to avoid the disaster of data loss and have the ability to assure rapid and comprehensive disaster recovery. 

The Okanagan Valley already has a surprising number of high tech organizations with dozens of website design firms, software developers, custom programmers, computer sales and support organizations and manufacturers whose products and services are based on high end technology. On behalf of my employer Toggle Networks Inc. I am now offering to valley businesses our “state of the art”, data protection solutions that fit all enterprises, small, medium or large. 

The movers and shakers in business and community development have created and are solidly behind a “Silicon Vineyard” initiative with support from the Okanagan Science and Technology Council, the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce and the Economic Development Commission. 

The combination of the development of the Gigacenter whose primary function is the secure storage of back up data, the burgeoning growth of IT enterprises in the valley and the “Silicon Vineyard” initiative, has attracted the interest of IT Disaster Recovery and Avoidance experts.

As an example, on October 7, 2008 Toggle Networks Inc. is sponsoring a seminar  “Avoiding a Business Disaster” (naturally being in the Okanagan Valley the no charge format is a Wine & Cheese).

For further information contact ;

Bob Keeling
 Roberts.keeling@togglenetworks.com
(250) 769.9159

That’s what I told the Toggle team last Thursday at our weekly staff meeting.  You should have seen the blank stares and raised eyebrows looking back at me.  I know most of the team thinks I’ve already gone off the deep end, but this statement still managed to cause a stir.  Fortunately for them I followed up “Stop Cooperating!” with:

Start Collaborating!

I distinctly remember a half cocked expression smacked across Jered’s face and words uttering from his mouth saying “What’s the difference? They’re the same!”.  Jered was completely justified in his reaction, as any thesaurus will tell you cooperate and collaborate are synonyms of each other.  Sure their definitions in a dictionary are almost identical and both roughly mean “to work with others”.  But this is one of those times when the “real” world definition of certain words has come to mean something quite different.  Not so much for the word “collaborate”, but “cooperate” definitely has a different “real” world meaning when applied to most structured organizations where authority is exercised.  Toggle is no different, and I as its self-appointed leader have been asking people to cooperate with me for the last 6 years.  Think about it for a second…what does cooperate really mean.  How about…”do what I say or you’re fired!”…or…”I told you to cooperate with me!”…etc. 

We are taught how to cooperate when we are very young and I think it’s likely the dictionary’s definition is not consulted in this time honored educational right of passage.  It starts as children with our parents telling us to cooperate with them.  Not optionally I might add.  We are then told to cooperate throughout school by our teachers and parents again.  And finally into the business world as most organizations are structured top down with “cooperation” in mind.

So let’s ask ourselves the question, “What would happen if we stopped ‘cooperating’ and started ‘collaborating’ instead?”.  What does that mean?  What would happen to authoritative power?  Would anarchy ensue?  Will people wander aimlessly through the halls of institutions everywhere?  Well, in our organization for the last 3 business days I am happy to report that Chaos Theory hasn’t taken a hold of Toggle…yet.  We’ll have to see what happens in the coming weeks, but so far the idea of collaborating with one another has created a very positive change in our company.  It has generated a level of leadership, creativity and productivity seconded only to the day before a long weekend.  Which is this Friday I might add.  Who knows what will happen!

I’ll leave you with that for now and if I don’t have a mutiny on my hands in the next few days, maybe someone on the team will collaborate with me and post a blog on what it means to “Start Collaborating”.

Most of us have some form of data backup in place. Unfortunately, this tends to lull us into a false sense of security and that keeps us from addressing how well it is doing the job or from upgrading or changing to better, more reliable, automated systems such as TrueVault the “state of the art” solution from the company I work for Toggle Networks Inc.

(This is not a sales pitch, however I do want you to understand that I am totally committed to the belief that TrueVault is the best data protection system in the world and that bias affects the degree of passion that I bring to this subject.)

Here is the problem:

Any data backup system that relies on human action is automatically less reliable and more expensive than a 100% automated “set it and forget it” solution such as TrueVault.

What happens if one of the dozens of possible disasters occur that causes the loss your data and:

• You attempt to reinstall from tape and the data isn’t there?
• Only part of your data is there?
• You find out that the data recovery will take days or perhaps weeks to accomplish?

These are the hidden dangers. What can they do to you?

What are the hidden costs?

 
 Labour is expensive and the typical tape backup systems that is currently the most common method of backup is way too labour intensive. “Someone” (usually a fairly expensive “someone”) has to change the tape and check the logs daily. They usually then have to transport the tape to an offsite location, swap it for the next rotation and bring the next tape back. Occasionally they should test that the data is there and that the  reinstall does work. In the typical installation the total labour involved averages 23 minutes a day. At today’s cost of labour for “someone” , including fringe benefits labor costs $39 per hour so that amounts to $14.82 a day or over $315 a month plus tapes and depreciation of the tape backup system. We are talking over $4,000 dollars a year in hidden costs!     

Maybe it is time to reconsider how you are backing up your data.

Roberts G. Keeling

Being in an IT related job generally tends to be rather stressful.  People tend to think that because us IT people don’t have to do any physically demanding work and just sit at a desk, that the work must not be that hard.  The truth is that nothing could be further from the truth!  Being a developer is very stressful and the further you move up the chain (project management, client management, etc), the more stress compounds.  Obviously, as one who has survived mountains of stress with some level of sanity, I have learned tactics to keep my stress levels at a minimum.  Since I have seen one too many developer and IT person crack terribly under the stress of their job, I figured I would share some of the things that have helped me in the past to tolerate obscene amounts of stress.

1) Clean Up

There is something strangely satisfying about cleaning.  You can clean your house, your car, your work station; whatever needs to be tidied around you.  Not only will you feel immense satisfaction at having solved a problem, you will also take pride in whatever it is you have just spic and spanned.  Working and living in a clean environment that you can be proud of makes you feel in less of a slump and therefore less stressed.

2) Exercise

I cannot emphasize this enough.  If you expect to have a sound mind, you will need a sound body.  Exercise is an excellent outlet for stress relief and contains many, many benefits.  Besides allowing you to clear your mind and escape the stress for a while, exercise allows you to focus and refine your body so that you feel better about yourself.  You will also sleep like a baby if you are getting enough exercise as your body will be tired and relaxed.

3) Vacation

Yes, you should take a vacation once and a while.  I have never seen anyone that could work continuously forever without eventually burning out without taking a break.  I have seen some incredibly strong people go for incredibly long times but in the end everyone needs a break.  I recommend taking at least two weeks a year and it is probably best to not do them together but to stagger them.  I also recommend taking the odd day off.  If you are hyper stressed and you keep working, you will not do very good work.  However, if you take a day off you will likely feel refreshed and motivated and come back and do more work than you ever would have while you were stressed.  Don’t be afraid to take a break.

4) Cut out Caffeine / Alcohol

These two substances can cause lots of issues for their own reasons.  Caffeine will make you wired and keep you going but will ultimately cause you to be jittery, paranoid, nervous and stressed.  Now granted, a little caffeine won’t hurt and is actually good for you, but pounding back a pot to yourself will only irritate you in the long run.  I recommend a good cup of green tea.

Alcohol is on a whole level in itself.  The deadly thing about alcohol is that it self sustains itself.  The deadly circle is to come home and have a drink because you had a hard day.  This can quickly become a cycle where you get through the day just to see that glass of booze at the end of the day.  It is strange in that booze seems like a solution but in actuality your days will begin to get hard simply because of the booze the night before thus sustaining the vicious cycle.  A drink every so often is not bad for you but try to keep it to a minimum when possible and do not use it for stress relief on a regular basis.

5) Get things done

Sounds simple doesn’t it?  The truth of the matter is, when we have a seemingly impossible stack of work to finish, it is easy to get overwhelmed and fuss and fret and get nothing done.  The best thing to do in a situation like this is to simply pick a project, ignore everything else, and get it done!  You will find that as you finish things, you will feel better and better and become more motivated to get things done.  In a worst case scenario, pick the smallest and / or easiest projects and at least get them done.  That way you can still be productive without sitting there worrying about the massive stack of work.

6) Put things in perspective

Note to self.  The world isn’t going to end if a project does not complete on time.  This is a really tough one to get around for people with a high work ethic.  If you have done your best and things have happened that are outside of your area of control, don’t be so hard on yourself.  The world will not end!  Sure, people might get upset (as people tend to do), but if you explain how hard you are working, apologize for the inconvenience and do everything in your power to rectify the situation, most people will be pretty reasonable.  And, if they are not, you have to accept that some things are beyond your control and you should feel proud of yourself for trying as hard as you possibly can.  Remember, you need to take care of yourself so that you can take care of your clients.

It’ been a long time coming.  I finally joined the ranks of ultimate dork-dom and bought myself a pocket protector…oops, I mean Bluetooth headset.  Yes, I have now completely integrated myself into the digital world of communications by attaching technology to my body.  It’s already bad enough that I’m walking around with my BlackBerry hanging off my hip at all times.  Now I feel like I just had an implant inserted into my brain…which will likely be the next step after my new Bluetooth headset.

Why Ryan would ever do such a thing?  Like pocket protectors, it definitely isn’t to make a fashion statement.  It comes from my need for function and the desire to decrease the odds of getting brain cancer from excessive cell phone usage.  There is much debate over cell phones causing harm to our bodies.   Even if it is false and they are totally safe, why take the risk.  I can’t get rid of my phone and want to live a long and healthy life; so if I can take some preventative measures, why not?

The only problem I’ve had so far with the new Bluetooth headset is the overwhelming insecurity I feel wearing it in public.  I’m told by fellow super dork Lee that my insecurities will pass once I embrace the true dork that lies within all of us!

Even if my cell phone won’t kill me, the car accident I may one day have while driving with my knees, with a phone in one hand and a drink in the other will probably get the job done much quicker!

Most people define a disaster as something that affects just them:

• A broken fingernail,
• A fender bender,
• A missed promotion or,
• A pimple may qualify,.

Public disaster definitions may include:

• 911 the Twin Towers Disaster,
• The Sinking of the Titanic,
• The Hindenburg dirigible explosion,
• JFK’s assassination.

I suggest the truth for most of us is somewhere in between:

Ø       The loss of a relative,

Ø       The loss of a business,

Ø       A marriage breakup,

Ø       Serious injury or illness for ourselves or a loved one.

Of these, the loss of a business is probably the only one we can prevent.

I lost a business once and in hindsight it was totally unnecessary. It was a viable, very successful business, growing, profitable and I lost it. Why? Well almost without exception, financial advisors, bankers, and accountants will use terms like; “lack of financial controls”, “inadequate capitalization”,  “unrealistic sales forecasts”, etc.  However that type of advisor rarely has started or held the ultimate responsibility for managing a business and that lack of first hand experience makes their opinion lack value. Or that I value anyway. The “why” was my fault as I failed to follow a principle that my business was based on (preventive maintenance of computers) well duhh! I failed to meet my primary responsibility of protecting my business by failing to anticipate and plan on avoiding any and all disasters!

I’ll come back to “why” in a minute; first let me tell you “how”. My business was a computer service. The computer service industry is one where “the only constant is change”. So one year end when we were completing our financials, our accountant recommended we significantly write down the value of our parts inventory as recent changes in our service offerings had reduced the value of the parts. A simple accounting change that did not have much impact on our bottom line.

Wrong!

Our loan manager at our bank freaked! Her position was that as the parts inventory was a significant asset in support of our loan, we had “torpedoed her!” We met with her and her boss and managed to successfully resolve the problem with an accelerated payment plan.

Wrong!

A week later the bank called our loan.  O.K. lets deal with that. As we were sorting out our new plan and budget to pay the called bank loan, we addressed the fact that we were slightly behind on our submissions of employee withholding to Canada Revenue Agency (nothing new, we had been operating this way for years and CRA had always been co-operative). So we met with CRA explained the bank situation and presented CRA with our plan to pay them up to date and they accepted it – no problem.

Wrong!

The next day CRA faxed out a demand to all of our customers to remit all payments due to our company directly to CRA!

Payday was 2 days later & we were dead! We were totally unaware that CRA had just lost a court battle with our bank to establish who had first dibs on the assets of a company that had failed. So CRA covered their butt, by instigating a proactive strike by scooping up our cash before the bank.

This was my disaster defined. If I had been thorough in preventing, planning for and avoiding the issues that triggered this disaster it could have easily been avoided. So I learned a very painful lesson that to avoid a business disaster you must:

Ø       Research thoroughly (What happens if),

o        There is a fire, flood, earthquake, hurricane, tornado, major power outage?

o        How about a postal strike, a serious flu epidemic, a death or incapacitation of a key employee, a labour dispute?

o        What is the impact of the loss of a key contract or customer, or the technology shifts and some of your processes are suddenly obsolete?

o        Or your IT hardware fails and you lose your data and/or you attempt to reinstall from your backup tape or disc system and the data is not all there.

o         What if the bank calls your loan ?

Ø       Determine what needs to be addressed,

Ø       Identify the mitigation of risks through redundant systems (two banks instead of one), (backup and insurance of key staff), etc.

Ø       Ensure you have the best data backup for your computer (and test it)

Ø       Develop and implement full disaster avoidance and recovery plans.

There is an old saying, “Defining the problem takes you 50% of the way to solving it!”

This is especially true in “Disaster definition” and the design, implementation and maintenance of your Disaster Avoidance Plan.

I know Lee is sooo impressed with his new iPhone, but I’m still diggin’ Blackberry. I’m not entirely sure how Lee managed to go from a brand new Blackberry Curve to an iPhone in under 2 months…but I’m not complaining. I snatched his “old” Blackberry Curve first thing this morning before anyone else could upgrade from their Blackberry 8700!

I know Lee is writing cutting edge iPhone apps because iPhones are “cool”, however I don’t think he relized what he just gave up. This Curve is seriously loaded with everything a person needs in a cell phone packed with a media player, camera, email, internet, messaging, video, Google maps, GPS, Facebook and much much more. I’m even writing this blog entry from it right now. It’s absolutely the best communication device I have ever had, bar-none!

Lee can keep his trendy iPhone. Blackberry is still the best business communication device in my opinion!

It’s T-minus 36 hours and counting till noon Saturday when I’ll be tormented by a very perplexing question.  Do I work or do I play?  Why so perplexing you ask.  Well it’s not too often that my wife and kids leave the city without me for an entire week.  Jae is off to be a counselor at a summer camp, and the kids are going with their Nana and Buba camping at the lake.  

So here I am stuck with a question I usually have no problem answering.  Work is fun and I give it my all each and everyday as a business owner and passionate industry professional.  Play is not something I ever worry about, it just happens for me.   I have a life full of tons of fun with my wife, goofing around with the kids or hanging out with friends and family.  My days are usually so jam packed with family and work that the decision is always made for me.  Was bachelorhood so difficult?  I honestly can’t remember.

Part of me wants to work 24 hours a day stopping only for fluid breaks while pulling repeated all nighters like I did in years past.  The other part is saying beer, pizza, Wii, tee-times, action movies, more pizza and way more beer!!  9 years ago I wouldn’t have hesitated, jumping head long into anything that began and ended with beer…but here I am. 

Maybe I’ll compromise.  I’ll work 16 hours and play for 8, work 16, … hmmm…umm…oh man…I’m not going to make it past the first round of beer.  I’m so confused.  Maybe I’ll just stick to longer than average work days and going to bed early.

Anyone want to join Souk and I at our Sunday morning tee-time?

You can imagine my apprehension when my husband walked through the door last night and asked me how my new friend was doing (I had advised him earlier he had to be particularly nice to me given my robin window strike episode).  I had some errands to run after dinner but in the back of my head I wondered, “Would Ryan swiftly deal with my friend’s suffering?”  I took one last peak at “Robbie” and slipped out the backdoor.

It was dark when I made it back home.  Ryan had been glued to his laptop all evening and remembered my angst only when I swept passed him on my way to the blinds.  Robbie was still there but he was now sitting on a nearby rock.  There was still hope.  As I was getting ready for bed, Ryan ran into the room exclaiming, “Come look, he can fly”.  Oh, our little baby found his wings!  Ryan and I were ecstatic.

Back in the kitchen this morning I heeded all precautions.  Since Robbie’s friends contributed to two earlier morning thuds (although much softer dive bombs than Robbie’s), it was time to bring on the gift-wrap.  I cannot imagine what our neighbors think, “what are they doing decorating their house with Christmas paper in July?”  Alternatively (thanks to Jered Seward), check out http://www.sialis.org/windowstrikes.htm for more preventative measures and what to do in the event of a stunned bird.   According to this site, window strikes kill between 100 million and 1 billion birds in North America each year!

No more injuries by my windows!  Oh happy day in my Toggle office.