The True Cost of Lost Productivity

As most business owners would agree, time is money, so increasing your workplace's productivity should be a top priority. Though you may not always recognize it, bad IT could be holding back your day-to-day operations from being fully productive. Learn how the cost of lost productivity can affect your business and why working with a managed IT provider can help you avoid it.

How does bad IT contribute to lost productivity?

Outdated hardware and software can be a massive source of lost productivity for businesses across all industries.

“Any time you and your employees spend waiting on a slow computer to load or perform its basic functions, you're losing productivity,” explains Jason Monroe, Solution Consultant at Bit-Wizards. “If you're sitting through lengthy updates during work hours, that's lost productivity. If you're having to troubleshoot issues with your computer or software-based tools, again, you're losing productivity there. All these things add up very quickly.”

IT-related security failures are another major cause of your workplace and employees being significantly less productive.

“Let's say your business falls victim to ransomware or a phishing attack because you don't have the proper email security measures or password practices in place,” says Monroe. “Now, someone has taken over your email or your files and encrypted them. So, you and your employees are basically being held hostage, and you're not able to work or serve your customers. Security failures often lead to a complete loss of productivity in situations like these.”

How does lost productivity cost businesses financially?

Any time you lose sales or billable hours because bad IT partially or fully prevents your employees from doing their jobs efficiently, your business loses revenue.

“If it's taking your employees two to three times as long to get their work done or conduct a sale because of slow or glitchy computers and software, that's a huge financial drain on your business,” explains Monroe.

Monroe says that when non-IT employees spend time trying to resolve IT-related issues, it's also a waste of money.

“In these scenarios, you're experiencing downtime while paying your employees to do a job that's not getting done.”

Finally, if reduced productivity in the workplace is causing your customers or clients to lose faith in your business, that's costly to fix.

“If customers can't trust you to conduct business in a timely or efficient manner, that can severely damage your reputation,” says Monroe. “And then you might have to offer special deals and discounts or use marketing and public relations services to help you change public perception. That's extremely expensive, not to mention time-consuming.”

How can a managed services provider make businesses more productive?

When employees or business owners troubleshoot IT problems, they tend to spend excessive time trying to fix issues that an IT professional could fix in minutes. Additionally, businesses often decide to live with problems and apply workarounds that waste even more time, rather than finding a real solution. Both scenarios kill productivity, and working with a managed service provider (MSP) is the best way to avoid them.

“Partnering with an MSP allows you and your employees to focus on your jobs, automatically increasing productivity,” says Monroe.

Boost your company’s productivity with Bit-Wizards

With Managed IT Services (MITS) from Bit-Wizards, our team takes a proactive approach that ensures your computers are updated, secure, and running smoothly.

“We're constantly monitoring your equipment to try to prevent issues that could cause loss of work, time, or money,” Monroe says.

Our IT professionals can also implement and manage cloud-based services for your organization. According to a Microsoft study, businesses that leverage Office 365 programs and other cloud computing resources contribute to significant cost savings and productivity increases.

“Cloud services can make daily functions, collaboration, and communication more productive than ever,” says Monroe. “Bit-Wizards offers a number of cloud services, including Office 365 migrations, infrastructure optimizations, cloud migrations, and more.”

Finally, if you do have any IT problems along the way, our team is ready to help whenever you need assistance. All our Managed IT Services clients have access to dedicated help desk support. Our friendly, certified engineers don't want you to waste time on IT troubles. Just file a ticket with our Help Desk, and you can count on our team to fix the issue while your team stays productive.

Ready to reach the full productivity potential of your business? Get in touch.