I can tell you that there is one portion I am very excited about which is that both the House and Senate versions of the bill include funds for medical professionals to bring their practices into the digital age - including implementation of systems that do e-prescriptions, electronic medical records, and practice management software. As regular readers of our newsletter recall, we announced a new partnership several months ago with gloStream (http://www.glostream.com), which is one of the few companies with an EMR system that is CCHIT Certified. To say our team is excited about leveraging government assistance to help doctors finally move their practice forward into the age of technology would be an understatement. I can say from my perspective at least that one part of the proposed stimulus package will have an immediate impact on THIS small business!

On a different note, I am hoping you will indulge me this month with a solicitation for assistance. We are still operating under the attitude that itSynergy refuses to participate in any economic downturn, and as a result we are HIRING! We posted an opening for a new Technology Advisor position (which is our name for what most would refer to generically as 'outside sales') on Monster yesterday (http://tinyurl.com/b4v5hg). If you know of anyone that fits the bill, please pass that link along to them and encourage them to apply.

Have a great month!

How to Keep Your Job Without Losing Your Mind
reprinted with permission from the HP Small Business Center

Finding a good work-life balance is difficult in many professions, but the business field is one that is particularly associated with long hours, unusual schedules, and a general inability to leave work at the office. The volatile and demanding nature of the job leaves many professionals wanting to reduce their work commitments to make more time for their personal lives.

If you're one of those overworked souls, here are a few ways to avoid burnout and restore sanity to your work schedule.

Share Contact Information the easy way with Electronic Business Cards

Traditional paper business cards are a time-honored and effective way to get business and contact information out to current and prospective clients.

But these days, a lot of business is done in e-mail. So how do you make sure that people know how to reach you?

Try an Electronic Business Card (or EBC), part of the Contacts feature in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007.

An EBC is simple to create and you can easily give it professional polish or personal style by adding your company logo or a picture of yourself. And when you use an EBC as part of your e-mail signature, customers and friends will see it in a format that looks good and is easy for them to save.

Watch the demo to see how easy it is to create, customize, and share an Electronic Business Card.

System Engineering Corner Notes from the Network Engineering Department: Note to readers: As our network engineers work with all of you across our entire customer base, they observe trends and issues that many people have in common, or that many customers will find helpful to know about. This section is designed to give them a mechanism to communicate those issues to you, with the hope that YOU might benefit from.

Why Upgrade to Small Business Server 2008?
By Mark MacLachlan, Infrastructure Team Manager

Over the course of the past few months I have had the opportunity to discuss server upgrades with a number of Small Business Server customers. The level of interest seems to be dependent on the age of the customer's current server or is based on a desire to gain more functionality that will enable the business to be more agile or allow the technology to be leveraged to achieve company goals.

To be honest, there isn't that one killer application or enhancement that we all would like to see. In fact, at first glance there is little different between SBS 2003 and SBS 2008. Each is a great server offering, each will safely store your files and route your email to you and each offers tools for remote access. Digging a little deeper into the offerings we can see there are a number of improvements that might be easy to overlook.

Remote Web Workplace: RWW has been enhanced so users no longer are confronted with a huge list of PC names to connect to. Instead, users are directed right to their primary PC.

CompanyWeb: SBS 2008 now offers Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. WSS is easier to manage and offers tighter integration with faxes by introducing a new Fax Center feature. WSS integrates with Outlook 2007 for mobile access and is also available through Remote Web Workplace.

Exchange 2007: Probably the most enhanced component of SBS 2008 is the inclusion of Exchange 2007 for email. Exchange 2007 provides an Outlook Web Access experience that is virtually identical to Outlook 2007. Exchange 2007 can also link to your IP based phone system through Unified Messaging (UM). UM is an amazing piece of technology that allows you to communicate with your Exchange mailbox in natural language. Imagine telling your voice mail "I'm running ten minutes late" and having your voice mail reply "I've moved your meeting back ten minutes and notified all attendees of the change."

Windows Server 2008: Windows 2008 is the bedrock that SBS is built on. This new server is considerably more secure than Windows 2003 and offers some really great technical enhancements and new features. New tools included with Windows 2008 make PC management easier and make it easier to roll out printers, desktop icons or drive mappings. There is even a new feature called File Screening that allows a server to be configured to prevent the saving of forbidden file types such as MP3 files!

On their own, the feature enhancements of SBS 2008 may not be compelling enough to some business to make them want to upgrade. When evaluated collectively, they offer a comprehensive solution for Small Businesses that are worth the upgrade. Customers who have been trying to squeeze as much life out of their existing servers can rest assured that the new SBS 2008 is a stable, sound and secure upgrade.

February 2009
In this issue

 □  Welcome
 □  Keep Your Job
 □  Electronic Business Cards
 □  Engineering Corner
 □  Referral Program
 □  SharePoint Custom List

itSynergy Referral Program

Can we buy you dinner and send you to the movies? How about make a donation to your favorite charity in your name? Earn rewards for referring new customers to itSynergy. For more details, please visit here .
 

Organize Your Files Using a SharePoint Custom List
By Lori Johnson, Collaboration Specialist

Your SharePoint site (known to many of you as Companyweb) can solve a number of organizational problems, including some you didn't even know you had.

Let's say you have a number of files spread across multiple network drives and folders, as well as files uploaded to one or more Document Libraries on your SharePoint site. Each directory or library might have different permissions structures that you don't want to break or have to reinvent just to consolidate all your documents into one location. So how do you create an Index of sorts for one-stop shopping in order to save time when looking for a specific document without taking on the laborious task of a major reorganization of your files? It's easy - just make a custom list in SharePoint by letting Excel do all the work. (Chances are you don't have a SharePoint whiz on staff, but every business has its share of Excel gurus!)

First, you'll want to give some thought to categorizing your data and then organizing it into an Excel spreadsheet, which will serve as your master outline prior to importing it into SharePoint. There are various ways in which to do this, and your server's directory structure might already provide a general idea on the best method for your organization's needs.

Read more

Quote of the month

Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve,
 too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love,
 time is eternity.

--Henry Van Dyke

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