If your business relies on computer files and documents to do its job, you’ve likely worried about the risks of lost data at some point. Saving documents to your hard drive is not always enough to keep your business protected. For instance, if your business’s hard drive becomes damaged, all of your work, and the work of your employees, can be gone in the blink of an eye. Some businesses don’t think about data loss until they’ve experienced it firsthand. But, with all the challenges businesses face when data loss occurs, it’s beneficial to come up with a preventative strategy early on.

As the business world evolves, management has become more innovative. Top managers have begun employing creative strategies to attract and retain top talent, and improve productivity while keeping costs in check. These advancements have not been entirely voluntary, as businesses are often forced to respond to several day-to-day challenges to stay afloat. Here are some of these key challenges:

The days of driving to the office, sitting behind a desk, and working from the same desktop computer for eight hours are becoming a thing of the past. Today’s managers and employees can work from the office, or a client’s location by using mobile devices and laptops. Unfortunately, the growing need for mobility has created new challenges for many business owners, particularly IT managers. How can businesses provide access to files and documents regardless of their employees’ physical location, while still ensuring security and sticking to budget?

Of course, Microsoft wasn't going to miss out on the cloud-computing revolution. In fact, Microsoft spearheaded the change by making one of the first large software-to-the-cloud solution moves with the Microsoft Office 365. Microsoft Office 365 is similar in look and feel to the industry-standard Office suite software, but in contrast, it’s now in the cloud. This move to the online world has helped simplify Microsoft’s licensing into a buy-only-what-you-need approach. It also offers ample additional features, including automatic security updates, and automatic backup. Microsoft Office 365 is a significant change from the decades-old Office software. Think of it as an Office 10.0. It is no longer a simple suite like Word and Excel, but rather, a collaboration-based solution.

Virtualization has changed the way we think of the office. What was once a physical space has now become a network of workers plugged in from various locations. With laptops and mobile phones, even the infrastructure has become less and less rooted in the physical space of the traditional office.

Networks and network security have gone from simple multi-cell organisms into a supernova of colliding devices. As any network admin can tell you, more users and more devices means more complexity. And as networks quickly inflate they quickly become hard to administer.

Microsoft Office 365 offers businesses of all sizes cost savings and productivity gains, which is why many companies are moving to the cloud with Office 365. Businesses receive most of their Office 365 cost savings by moving info management to the cloud with SharePoint and by moving their Exchange email to the cloud.

There is no doubt that Office 365 is a massive success for Microsoft. The software has provided thousands of businesses with simplicity and reliability, and that it is changing the entire productivity software category. The success of Microsoft Office 365 is largely due in part to a strong small business segment.