When you think of employee monitoring, your brain may initially jump to large, controlling corporations patrolling their thousands of workers. In reality, this idea is simply a myth, as small businesses can use employee monitoring to build trust amongst their remote teams, boost productivity, increase operational efficiency and benefit employees in multiple ways.

In February 2020, a Time Magazine headline declared, “The Coronavirus outbreak has become the world’s largest work-from-home experiment.” Over a year later, that experiment has been a resounding success for companies and employees who found abundant upsides to less rigid workplace expectations.

Businesses need to act now to survey their supply chain, developing the capacity to anticipate and respond to supply chain risks, minimizing the impact and optimizing opportunity. In March, the world witnessed a curious scene. A container ship longer than the Empire State Building became lodged in Egypt’s Suez Canal, creating an incredible spectacle as heavy construction equipment and a fleet of tug boats tried to dislodge the vessel from the canal walls.

Here’s how small business leaders can position their employees to thrive in a post-pandemic operational reality. The recent pandemic and associated economic fallout were especially challenging for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). The Washington Post estimates that more than 100,000 small businesses have permanently closed, and overall revenue plummeted by as much as 52 percent.

While data security has been an important topic since the internet’s inception, the issue is experiencing renewed prominence as platforms collect and struggle to secure copious amounts of personal information and prevent cyberthreats at the same time. The early 2000s were characterized by unprecedented growth and participation in the digital data economy, but the 2010s saw the creeping consequences of this ecosystem.