Our business has now switched to remote working in the cloud.

Up until now we have been using a traditional client-server model in an office but going forward we will do all of our work in a hosted environment from anywhere.

Working in the cloud is the third stage of a project that has seen us move to a paperless environment and migrate our email, diaries etc. to Office 365. But what does it all mean for a business in the 21st century?

Efficiencies of remote working in the cloud

Two obvious efficiencies are that we can substantially reduce our rent and other office costs and that updating software for all staff is a much simpler process.

Although we can’t do without some kind of physical office presence, it does not have to accommodate everyone as mostly our people can work from home or from clients just as easily as working from the office.

We will ensure that everyone gets together once a week to share information, solve problems, run training events and stay in touch but for most people on most days there will be no reason for an office commute – at least an hour a day saved for most staff.

Growth opportunities

Hiring staff to meet growth in the business changes a little – there is a huge emphasis on everyone being self-reliant. But if this is part of our working reality then we simply bake it into the recruitment process.

When a new staff member joins they do not need any office space, they are simply added as a new user in the IT system and off they go.

We are based in South West London, but if we wanted to have a City or West End presence we can have one without any set-up costs.

Cloud accounting software

Our view is that the current crop of cloud accounting software solutions is simply not very good. They will improve but that will take time.

By embracing remote working in the cloud we continue to offer our clients the best accounting solutions available but also the benefits of working in the cloud.

Like all new technologies there will be teething problems and new working practices to adopt but so far everything has been pretty seamless.

There are five days of Tube strikes forecast for London in the next two or three weeks – not a problem!