BRMS EXPAND SUPPORT FOR DEPARTMENTS DURING COVID-19 CRISIS By Stephanie Todd
For many departments, Teleworking was a wish list item or used in pilot testing for emergencies and/or disasters. But with the spread of COVID-19, all County departments faced an unprecedented challenge in keeping employees safe at home, but still working. In uncharted territory and unfamiliar with remote technology, the departments needed a way to continue "business as usual," and that's when ISD’s IT Team provided guidance. County departments faced limited devices, and employees required various options of remote access from home. The departments needed a secure way to access their applications and files, and continue their communication with their teams. That’s when the Business Relationship Management (BRM) team expanded their support to all Departments to anticipate the department's business needs and ensure the right technology.
As ISD was testing new Enterprise Cloud based options for remote access, the BRM team started to reach out to all departments to gather remote access requirements. Some employees had County-owned laptops, but the majority of employees would be using their home computers. This led to security concerns. How did we know if their home PC was patched? How were they going to access their applications and files that were on-prem, just like they were in the office? Each department has their own set of critical applications that needed to be accessed by their employees. IT staff from many departments were used to utilizing SSLVPN for their remote access, but this needed to be reserved for the essential front -line workers. Many different scenarios had to be covered for all departments.
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