Your one-on-one meeting with your boss is your most important work meeting. There are many reasons for this, but, crucially, your relationship with your boss has a significant influence on your happiness, engagement, and success at work. However, has your boss has been trained in how to have effective one on one meetings? For that matter, have you? 

One-on-one meetings are one of those vital life skills that they just don’t teach in school.  While it might seem like an intuitive skill, many underlying tricks and nuances can help you get the most out of your one-on-one meetings. As such, we’ll explain why one-on-one meetings are so important, before analysing the skills you need to make your one-on-one meetings count. 

Why are one-on-one meetings so important?

Hypercontext’s recent State of One-on-ones Report provides crucial insights into why one-on-one meetings are so important. After surveying more than 200 managers across 30 industries with 985 direct reports, they found that 94% of managers have regular one-on-one meetings, with 48.5% holding these meetings weekly. 

The most common purpose of one-on-one meetings is to understand and eliminate roadblocks (70.4%), followed by a pulse check on how employees are feeling (60.7%), and status updates for specific projects (53.6%).

Further, those surveyed identified the following common topics that are discussed regularly in one-on-one meetings: 

Additionally, most managers agree that devising a one-on-one meeting agenda should be a shared responsibility. 49% of managers say that both the manager and the employee should contribute to the one-on-one meeting agenda, while 15% say that they own the meeting agenda but wish their employees would. 

Finally, the top three challenges that managers face during one-on-one meetings are: ensuring they’re providing value to direct reports (34%), getting direct reports to contribute to the agenda (22%), and having meaningful, productive conversations (​​17%).

These statistics send two clear messages. Firstly, one-on-one meetings are vital for everything from growth and development to performance and motivation, underscoring why they are your most important meeting. Secondly, many managers wish that employees would take more control of driving one-on-one meetings. 

Below, we’ll explore how employees can do exactly that. 

How to make your one-on-one meetings count

You can’t always leave it up to your boss to tell you what you need to know. That’s not to say there’s anything wrong with your boss. It’s simply that they may be busy, distracted or — worst case — hasn’t received the proper training to manage employees. 

Instead, take matters into your own hands by asking these essential questions in your next one-on-one meeting.

PS: This article includes content from the online course “One on One Meetings with your Boss.” Find out more here, or, access our course on How to manage your employees in 30 minutes a week.

One of the most important steps to optimising your one-on-one meeting is checking in with your expectations. To get started, you might want to ask yourself some of the following questions:

What am I doing that is working and why? Do you want more of this and how?

What am I doing that needs to change? Why and how?

What am I doing that I should stop doing?

What do I want to get out of this meeting? How? 

2.  Growth, personal development, and career progression

Some bosses are great at developing their employees, while others, unfortunately, don't have a clue. Here are a few questions to ask your boss that will help you create a better future:

What future roles do you see as suitable for my skill-set and career progression?

What skills should I develop to do my job better?

What skills should I develop to support my career progression?

What responsibilities can I take over as part of career development or building my network/experience?

Can you please give me X responsibility (because I think I can do a good job at it or it will develop my experience/network)? Some bosses prefer their employees to be proactive. If you want responsibilities, ask for them.

Can you please support me in learning about X? (via coaching or sponsoring training - see 9 Ways to Get Your Company to Pay for Your Training. If you want training, ask for it specifically and justify why it supports your boss' goals.)

What do you think my blind spots are that are holding me back?

What do you think are my strengths that I should focus on?

Are there any people I should develop a better network with? Would you introduce us or put us on a project together?

As Hypercontext’s report identified, alignment to the company’s mission is one of the most commonly discussed topics in one-on-one meetings. To ensure you’re aligned with your manager’s priorities, try asking the following during your next one-on-one meeting: 

What is the highest priority for you right now?

What items are a lower priority? What's the possibility of these being cancelled/postponed indefinitely?

My workload is currently at capacity, is there anything we could reshuffle or reprioritise to help with this? 

Are there any upcoming priorities that I should be aware of? 

Are there any tools we could use to help align priorities more smoothly?

Do you think I do a good job at prioritising? Is there anything I should be doing to upskill in this area? 

Is there anything I need to know about you, the team, or the business?

To do your job effectively and efficiently, you need access to a variety of tools and resources. If a lack of resources is blocking your progress, it’s important to bring this up in your one-on-one meeting. For instance: 

I am struggling with project X, do you think we could source a new tool to help with this? 

Are there any areas you have noticed where we are lacking in resources? 

I am trying to achieve X, can you please help me with Y because of Z?

These questions will show your boss that you're on their side and want to make a meaningful contribution.

These questions will also help you understand your boss better and build a better working relationship with your boss.

Is there anything I can do to help the team run more smoothly?

Need some support with your one-on-one meetings? Go1 can help. Start your free trial today to access dedicated courses on Making your meetings more effective, Managing productive meetings, and many more.

For more insights, be sure to subscribe to the Go1 newsletter to stay on top of all the latest L&D trends. Or, you can book a demo today to find out how Go1 can help with your team’s learning needs.

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We’ll explain why one-on-one meetings are so important, before analysing the skills you need to make your one-on-one meetings count. 

Questions you must ask your boss in one-on-one meetings

This month, it’s a good idea to set aside some time to make sure your company’s social media policy is up-to-date.

Social media certainly has its benefits in the business world, allowing us to connect like never before, and increasing the diversity and volume of recruitment. There’s no doubt that using social media in the right way can raise more awareness of your organisation and what it does. But the world of social media can also have its downside.

We’ve seen many brands damage their reputations – and profits – through social media mishaps. We’ve also heard the stories of workers being fired for their careless use of social media. And with new social media platforms appearing on the scene all the time, it’s important to know the potential risks they could have for your company and employees.

The fact is, your social media policy must be as fast-paced and fluid as social media itself, to keep up-to-date with what’s going on in the digital landscape. That’s why it’s so important that all businesses, large and small, make sure their social media policy is regularly reviewed and updated. So when did you last review your policy?

Meghan M. Biro, founder and CEO of TalentCulture Consulting Group, is a firm believer in annual reviews for corporate social media policies, recommending that companies update their policy at least on an annual basis to reflect industry changes, avoid legal troubles and protect company secrets.

Biro also points out that only 51 percent of people said their employers have social media guidelines.

“Developing a social media policy and keeping it up to date will ensure that your employees are aware of what they can and cannot do, help your company avoid violating any rules and ultimately serve to cover the company's you-know-what,” she says.

The Risks of Social Media for Your Company

In a previous article, we’ve talked at length about why you need a good social media policy for your organisation.

These days, with much of our life being documented online, there is a thinner line between what’s private and public. Many people include details of their occupation and employer on their Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts, meaning anything that is posted on social media could be seen to reflect that company’s organisational values.

Whether you like it or not, the way in which your employees use Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms can have an impact on the professional and ethical reputation of your organisation. It can also lead to serious legal ramifications and security risks for the company.

Things can become even more complex when it comes to protecting sensitive or confidential information. How can you know, or control, what content employees are posting on social media?

To avoid any risk from this kind of situation, it’s vital for all businesses to have a strong social media policy in place, outlining guidelines and expected behaviour from their employees.

A good social media policy will help to define what’s appropriate for staff to post about their company on social media channels. Having clearly defined guidelines means all employees know the difference between what’s appropriate and not appropriate to discuss on social media. This information will need to be regularly updated as the business grows and develops.

Your social media policy can also help to safeguard sensitive data from potential hackers and scams. This is really important if you’ve got employees working remotely, or bringing their own devices into work.

Make Sure All Staff are Aware of Your Social Media Policy

Your social media policy should be part of a company-wide training plan that includes everyone in your organisation.

Biro raises a good point: “Just because Sarah is a Millennial, who works in marketing and Joe is a boomer toiling away on the factory floor, don’t assume that Joe knows nothing about social media, and Sarah is the digital native.”

These days, expect employees of all generations and backgrounds to be using social media. The best way to make sure that all staff are aware of the policy and its guidelines is to run social media training.

Basic social media training will let your team know how you expect them to represent your brand online, and what they can and cannot talk about. You’ll be able to make sure staff are familiar with the key points in your social media policy, as well as who to contact if they have any questions or are unsure of what’s appropriate.

Using an online platform to deliver your social media training will help you reach all staff, regardless of geographic location. You can also find plenty of good online courses that will help you in creating your own social media policy.

Take a look at this short one-hour course on Developing a Social Media Policy. This eLearning course is useful for anyone wanting to know more about protecting their business and employees while using social media. You’ll also receive a free social media policy example for you to download at the end.

Need training for your team? Get started with Go1 Premium now!

Does it seem like you’re spending more time working, but less time actually making progress?

Don’t worry, you’re not alone. When you’re in a position of management, you’ve got a lot of responsibilities and one of them is being in charge of other members of staff. This means you’re their first port of call when they need help with a task.

Delegation is a great way to get things done in the office when there are deadlines approaching on the horizon. It makes sure everyone is productive and works towards goals and success together. Of course, some people are better at delegating than others.

Being able to delegate effectively is an important skill and one that’s vital for business. People often make excuses for not delegating work out to other staff, thinking that they can do the job better themselves.

But, the truth is we don’t have all the time in the world and despite what you may think, you’re not always the best person for the job. It’s a skill to recognize this and know what to do about it.

Delegating is all about working as a team and playing to everyone’s strengths. It makes everyone in the workplace valuable and allows you to contribute your ideas and learn new skills.

If you aren’t delegating properly, you risk wasting time and effort and you can even cost your company money.

While some people are naturally good delegators, all isn’t lost for the rest of us. There are certain core skills we can work on to improve our ability to delegate effectively. That’s where a good delegation e-learning course comes to the rescue!

You need to know what tasks are suitable for delegation and when to ask certain employees to perform those tasks. You shouldn’t be delegating tasks that you should be doing, even if you’re running behind schedule. Delegation isn’t about cutting corners.

The three golden rules on delegation are time – do you have enough time to delegate the task? You have to be able to give sufficient instruction and support, as well as make time for corrections.

The second rule relates to availability. Is someone available for the task and have the skills needed for success? Number three is criticality. Is the work critical to the success of a project or the company?

You should always aim to clarify your expectations, by telling employees what they need to do and why it’s important. Establish checkpoints to make sure everything’s achieved on time.

It’s crucial that the person decides how to achieve it and you shouldn’t take much control over the task after it’s delegated. Be sure to define your role and what you can help with, as well as talk about rewards and consequences of a task.

Why is an effective delegation course important?

When you know how to delegate properly, your working life changes for the better. You can be more productive and make sure your team becomes better at their jobs too.

You won’t miss any deadlines and work will be delivered on time – this will avoid you getting stressed and feeling the pressure of other people’s tasks on your shoulders.

With an e-learning course on effective delegation, you can improve your skills and make sure you enjoy these benefits in the workplace.

You’ll never feel overwhelmed by the amount of work on your desk again! Plus, you can be a good manager and lead the way for your employees to learn new skills and have a more fulfilling working life.

Get this course and much more with Go1 Premium now!

Happy New Year! We couldn’t think of a better way to kick off your 2018 than by releasing a stack of cool new updates and tools to help you make this year your best learning year ever!

We have new tools for content creators to gain insights as to how learners are using their content, updates on adding suggested completion dates, a new teaching overview page to let you quickly know how your learners are progressing, updates to both our Awards and Reporting tools, and the ability to change the language of your portal.

You can now specify a date or completion rule on a learning item within a course. When editing a course, click the ellipsis icon (…) for that learning item, then click Settings. You will be able to choose between the scheduled due date being based on commencement of that learning item, or commencement of the parent of that learning item

Note: Due to this addition, we’ve also updated the way in which you access the learning item. When you click on the ellipsis icon for the learning item within the course, you can click View Overview to access the overview of that learning item and Edit to access the edit screen directly.

We have created a new overview dashboard for assessors and content authors which displays a summary of the enrolments and content managed by that user. Users can click through to see the report used to tally each statistic.

You can now see at a glance how your users are tracking against the due dates scheduled for their learning via our new learner enrollments tab. Learner enrollments displays a summary of the enrollments for which you are responsible, along with the due date for that enrollment and a count of the number of days the learner is ahead or behind, in relation to that due date.

Our portal interface now supports English (Australian). You can change the portal language within portal settings and the preference for your account within your user account settings. This primarily impacts the spelling of “Enrolment” throughout the portal.

It’s easier than ever to delegate responsibilities and have your team update training content on your portal. A new content administrator role has been created which allows users with this role to perform all content management actions, without having access to the full rights of a portal administrator.

To make it easier for you to add images to your portal, we have added options that will automatically scale your image to be the correct size so that you don’t need to adjust the image yourself.

Content providers can view a usage dashboard

To allow our content providers to have a better understanding of how users are interacting with their content, we are introducing a new dashboard where users can take a more in depth look into their users, courses, analytics, payments and more.

We now support standalone learning items and awards within awards (up to 4 levels). Simply search for a learning item or award when you click to “Add content” to an award.

We now support assigning credits on learning items within a course. When editing an award, hover over the course card and click on the ellipsis icon, visible from the top right of the card. Click on Configuration, it will open a modal popup. You can select the Child level toggle to allocate credits to the learning items within that course.

The reports tab now shows the child enrolments for that award enrolment, available via an expand/collapse icon to the left of the learner’s name

You can now enrol learners and import enrolments into an award via the reports tab on an award. Click Enrol Users to open a modal popup, containing a list of Learners who are not currently enrolled in that Award.

When you edit an award with the goal Reach a Target or Track Ongoing Learning, you will now have the option to enable external learning records for that award:

If that option is disabled, users cannot add external learning records to their enrolment in the award

If that option is enabled, users can add external learning records to their enrolment in the award via the my progress and learner records tabs

If external learning records are enabled on an award, you can now also enable moderation of those external learning records. Click the Moderation toggle to enable this setting on an award.

If moderation is enabled, external learning records can be added to a learner’s enrolment in the award, but the credits associated with that external learning record don’t count towards the award enrolment until the external learning record has been passed by an administrator.

External learning records can be passed by clicking on the ellipsis icon (…) to the right of the external learning record within the reports tab of an award, and on the learner’s learning records tab, when viewing that tab as an admin, then by selecting Edit. A modal popup will open, asking you if the user passed this enrolment. Enable the toggle and apply the change to pass the learning record.

If an admin adds an external learning record on behalf of a user, it is automatically passed.

If moderation is disabled, any external learning records attached to an award enrolment will automatically count towards the award enrolment credits.

There is a default filter on the Users report to exclude inactive (blocked) users. This filter can be changed or removed through the report filters

You can now filter the Enrolments report by User Status, meaning that you can filter out enrolments from users who are inactive (blocked) from your portal.

Sign up for a free trial today and try it out for yourself!

If you have any questions about any of the updates and improvements listed above, please let us know and our Customer Success Team can help you out!

Kickstart 2018 with these updates to the Go1 platform

Are you creating an online e-learning course that needs a voiceover?

We all know that having a good voiceover for e-learning videos is crucial in communicating ideas and information.

Of course, a lot of time is put into finding the perfect voice for the part. But, in reality the most important part of the voiceover is having a good script. Otherwise, you’ve got no content and nothing to say!

For example, everyone loves Morgan Freeman’s voice and it’s become iconic. But, take away his voiceover script and suddenly it doesn’t seem so great, does it?

Writing a voiceover script is very different from writing an article or report. In fact, it can be quite difficult and requires you to work and develop your skills to get it right.

The difference is that you’ve got an audience and you have to engage the ears and mind. Without an interesting script, you’ll find that your audience loses concentration and key information for effective learning is lost.

At this point, we know what you’re thinking – how on earth will I be able to write a voiceover script? But, there’s no need to worry!

All you’ve got to do is learn what makes a great voiceover script so it’s memorable and captures the audience’s attention from the very beginning.

So, read on to find out our five tips on how to write a good voiceover script today.

Let’s remember that the voiceover becomes the audio for the e-learning course video, which means it’s got to be easy to understand and interesting to listen to. Otherwise, you run the risk of creating a course that’s a waste of your time and effort.

The best way to achieve a good voiceover script is by writing it how you would naturally speak. By this we don’t mean using local phrases and personal jokes, but with lots of informal speech.

So, instead of using your best English like you would in a report, think about how you would explain a concept aloud to someone else in a relaxed setting. Spend time imagining your speech and even practicing saying it into a mirror to see if it works.

This will create a conversational tone, which involves easy language and shorter sentences. This means your voiceover will be easier to understand for your audience and make sure they learn in the process of using your course.

It’s all about making sure the script flows just like you’re having a conversation with your audience. Plus, it also helps to think about what your audience will understand too, as this can vary between sectors and experience levels.

There’s no point in taking hours to say the same thing you can say clearly in five minutes.

Well, perhaps this time frame is an exaggeration, but the point is that you want to communicate the key information simply and make it obvious to your audience what they’re learning.

So, make your points quickly and avoid using awkward phrasing. Your script doesn’t have to be complicated and you don’t need pages of information.

Keep it short, as this will be more effective in e-learning than a long voiceover script. It makes sure your audience are engaged and on board with your video.

In addition, when your voiceover is short and snappy, it’s easier for your audience to take notes and not get lost in the sea of information.

Having a short voiceover script isn’t a sign of failure – in fact, it keeps you on track to success and allows you to create a great e-learning course.

Listing a whole load of statistics or numbers may seem like a good way to communicate the facts you want your audience to understand, but it can also be an easy way to lose your audience’s attention.

After the fifth graph or flowchart, you might notice some people’s eyes becoming glazed over! But, by creating a voiceover script that tells a story and demonstrates examples of what you’re talking about relates the information to your audience better.

People like a bit of personal learning, which they can relate to their own skills or life. Even using first and second person speech can make everything more personal for the audience.

In addition, no one likes to waste their time – an audience wants to know how the course can benefit them, so why not tell them why this course is important?

You’d be surprised just how much positivity can change a learning experience. When you’re writing your voiceover script, keep the language you use positive and upbeat.

This will transfer to the person reading the script when they’re communicating with the audience. Being positive is more likely to keep people engaged and interested in the course, rather than being all doom and gloom!

You’ve got to remember that you’ll be able to hear how your script should sound in your head, but you’ve got to communicate your vision on paper to your voiceover reader.

Don’t be afraid to include bold, italics and underlines in your script to get your point across and emphasize the words you want to stand out and stress to the audience during the recording.

And there you have it – how to write a good voiceover script! With these five tips, you can create a script that’s going to add value to your e-learning course and make sure everyone learns something from the video.

Learning is more than just visual elements – it takes a good voiceover script to relay important information and allow the mind to process it properly.

This week, we’ve been talking about things you can do to start the new year off on the right foot, to help make 2018 your best career year yet. Taking the time to invest in your professional development is top of the list when it comes to boosting your career.

Whether you’re aiming to land a promotion, secure your dream job, or move your career in a new direction, spending time on professional development will help you get where you want to go.

Doing this will also show employers – both current and potential – that you’re committed to improving your skill set and capabilities, through continual learning and developing. And you’ll also be proving this to yourself, while growing more confident in your skills all the time!

If you’re going to get serious about professional development in 2018, you’ll want to check out what’s on offer through online learning.

Online courses are one of the easiest and best ways to help you get from where you are right now to where you want to be in the future. There are eLearning courses covering a huge range of professional development topics, from role-specific skills like programming and graphic design, to plenty of courses aimed to improve your interpersonal soft skills such as communication, teamwork and dealing with change.

Ready to get learning? We’ve hand-picked five of the best online courses to help you take control of your professional development and kick start the new year on a positive note!

Improving your communication skills can be a great place to start if you want to stand out from the competition and reach your career goals.

Because regardless of where you work or what you do for a job, being able to communicate with colleagues, stakeholders, clients and senior leaders is one of the most important skills for any employee. And if you want to move into a management or team leader position, you’ll need to know how to communicate effectively with your team.

This online course, How to Communicate Effectively, will help you find the right methods and channels of communication, to help lead you to more engaged and productive working relationships.

You’ll leave this course with plenty of tips and tricks to use, and a clearer understanding of the environment you're trying to create within your workplace. Added bonus – improving your communication skills won’t just benefit your work life – you’re bound to see positive benefits in your personal life also.

Another skill that’s incredibly valuable for professional development is knowing how to work well within a team. Which also means knowing how to handle and manage team conflict.

Many people naturally tend to shy away from difficult conversations or conflict – if that’s you, you’re not alone! But unfortunately, avoiding conflict won’t make it go away. If anything, it will only make it worse, as negative emotions continue to boil under the surface and grow larger in magnitude.

When members of a team are in conflict, it can also begin to affect their other team mates, causing rifts and division and resulting in a toxic work culture.

With the eLearning course How to Manage Team Conflict,  you’ll learn how to get to the bottom of team issues, learning practical ways to tackle conflict head on. The course will provide you with plenty of tips for how to communicate and restore balance, while helping you to become an ace team player.

If you work in a customer-facing role, you’ll want to be sure your service skills are up to scratch. But improving customer service skills can greatly help your career, no matter what position you’re in – because we all deal with customers daily, whether they’re external or internal to the business.

Good old-fashioned customer service is still one of the most important factors when it comes to deciding to do business with a company. It’s no good having the most up-to-date tech gear or fancy office suites if your business doesn’t deliver on customer service. And these days, with the huge impact of social media, providing good customer service has never been so important.

89% of people say they’ve stopped doing business with companies because of poor customer service – that’s a huge percentage! This online course, Customer Service Success, is designed to give you the skills you need to provide great customer service, so you don’t become one of those companies.

The course content has a strong focus on improving your listening skills, as without this fundamental skill you won’t be able to respond to your customers’ needs.

You’ll also learn about paying attention to your body language and gestures, as well as the words and language you use in the work environment. All of these things have a significant impact on how customers perceive you and the company you work for.

Just as customer service is central to many other jobs outside of the retail or hospitality industry, project management skills can be super important for employees in all kinds of roles.

When it comes down to it, project management skills are a set of techniques and tools that focus on helping you to achieve goals and manage your workload more effectively.

As an employee, taking the time to improve your project management skills can be a great way to boost your career, while making yourself more valuable to employers and building your confidence at work.

Project Management Fundamentals takes you right from the beginning of PM, so it’s great for anyone who is new to the subject or is keen to start their study from scratch.

The online course explains the basics of project management, including:

Establishing project goals and objectives

You’ll receive plenty of practical tips for how to keep your project on track, manage your project team and report on project performance.

All jobs have their unique challenges and stressors. In our increasingly fast-paced world, employees should do their best to be aware and conscious of the potential signs of low mental health or burnout and to take action before it starts further impacting their health.

While online courses can’t replace the guidance and expertise of a mental health professional, they can help individuals understand more about the importance of taking care of their mental health in the workplace. These resources can also help managers and employers learn how to support their employees in this area, which is incredible important.

Take a look at Positive Mental Health. This eLearning course provides a good foundation for understanding the various components of mental health and wellbeing and has plenty of information on particular tools and methods that can prove helpful in promoting positive mental health in the workplace. It wraps up the equivalent of a day’s course in an online format that you can get through at your own pace, and in your own safe environment.

You’ll learn about self-care in relation to good mental health, wellbeing and resilience, and how to identify specific methods which can be applied to support people experiencing low mental health.

Remember – professional development training needs to be continual, not just something that you tick off once a year. It requires ongoing investment of your time, focus and energy, to get the best results. So make it your new year resolution to keep it up all year round!

5 courses to kick start your professional development in the new year

Do you have a lot of remote workers in your company?

If the answer’s yes, you’ll find you aren’t alone. In fact, there’s more people working remotely and out of the office than ever before! This offers a lot of benefits for the company and it can also create a great working environment for a lot of people.

It’s often seen as a way that you’re not stuck in the office from nine to five during the week and you can work when it suits you. But, don’t be fooled – this doesn’t mean working remotely isn’t short of challenges!

One of these challenges is definitely IT security and the dangers that are lurking out there for sensitive information and electronic devices. Of course, a lot of people don’t realize the dangers of IT security when they work remotely or are traveling for business until it’s too late.

Just because you aren’t in the office, doesn’t mean you aren’t responsible for company information. The truth is, you’re just as responsible and have the same duty of care as other employees based in the office.

Every organization in the world has IT security and cyber defense strategies to avoid sabotage from external threats. It’s important for remote workers to do the same.

This is all about how all kinds of companies have suffered information security breaches and opens up your eyes to the risks you face as a remote worker.

Businesses can suffer from reputational damage and have important information stolen, as well as big financial costs. But, a lot of breaches are actually caused by human error and when you’re working remotely or traveling, this threat can increase.

Of course, there’s other risks that apply when you’re out of the office, such as losing a mobile device, someone looking over your shoulder to steal personal information and not having good enough security protection, such as firewalls and anti-malware software.

There’s even insecure wi-fi hotspots in public spaces opening up the floor to hackers getting into your data.

It’s important to treat company data and any property the same way as if you’re working in the office to minimize hazards. Be vigilant to ensure you don’t leave your devices anywhere or someone isn’t looking at your information.

Other ways to minimize hazards include hiding your devices when you’re out of the house, use a lock screen and creating passwords. Plus, don’t mix personal stuff with business devices.

For electronic risks, avoid using public Wi-Fi when you’re accessing sensitive information - only use trusted networks and private browsing. It’s all about looking out for scams.

You can also encrypt your files, use up-to-date virus protection and make sure you’re backing up your data on a regular basis.

Backing up your information is very important. This means making copies of your computer data onto other storage devices, so it can be used if your device is affected by malware or viruses, or even stolen.

This means you don’t lose data – you can restore it. Remote workers are responsible for doing this and making sure everything’s protected. Otherwise, you risk losing critical data for your company, as well as facing legal and regulatory penalties for your actions.

Backups don’t take long. Know what data should be backed up and schedule backups to take place. Try not to use thumb drives since they’re easily misplaced. You can even put on a password or use encryption for extra security.

Don’t forget to test backups every six months!