Home Articles & Features How businesses can protect themselves from losing their digital work

How businesses can protect themselves from losing their digital work

However you save your work, there’s no guarantee it will be there when you go back. Working out the reason for the loss and trying to recover the document is extremely frustrating and highly time-consuming. And in business, time is money.

Why You Lose Work Dictates How You Find It

When you rely on your hard drive or on-site servers to keep your work safe, there are many reasons a file – or, worse still, an entire folder – can go missing. The way to recover your work will depend on how you lost it in the first place. There are four major ways this can happen and a straightforward fix.

The Why – Accidental File Deletion


Amending information and saving directly to your computer’s hard drive is something we’ve all done. But saving work without a back-up and recovery solution is one of the biggest causes of data loss. All it takes is a momentary lapse of concentration or a slip of the mouse as Office prompts you to save your file. And bam – your file’s gone t and is replaced by a sinking feeling in your stomach.

The How – Check Auto-Save Then Delve Deeper

Using software like Microsoft Office should mean you can rely on the in-built recovery system to automatically back-up your work. Click on File> Open > Recent Documents to find the last saved version of your work. Depending on your settings, this might mean you only have to wave goodbye to ten minutes’ work.
However, sometimes auto-save doesn’t work. In this case, you can try searching the whole of your PC for your document by typing the file name into the search function of your computer.

In some cases, your software will change the file name to a temporary one beginning with ~. If in doubt, search for this symbol instead and sort by date to reveal any temporary files that may have been created. If that doesn’t work, try downloading reputable software to recover your data.

Should all this sound like too much hard work, there’s an alternative to prevent files disappearing in the first place.

A Better Solution – Software That Saves For You

One way to avoid this problem is to ensure you have proper workflow procedures or back-up and recovery strategies in place. Or you could adopt a cloud services solution where your files are created using software hosted on remote servers.

Microsoft Office 365 is one such option. It has all your favourite programmes so you won’t be slowed down by changes in functionality or appearance. And it reduces the risk of losing files by automatically saving every document in a backed-up online system. All you need to do is make the switch and let the technology care of the rest.

The Why – Work Is Overwritten

Often when we collaborate on a document with colleagues, multiple versions are passed around by email and version control regularly falls by the wayside. Which means no-one’s quite sure which is the latest version and whether all changes are reflected. In an effort to tidy up busy inboxes, ‘old’ files are often deleted only to find the latest version is nowhere to be found.

The How – Search Your Emails

Try tracking down the most recent record in your emails. You know the name of the file, so this should be possible although time-consuming. If one person has deleted their copy, try to remember who sent it and ask them to resend the attached document. Be warned – this can be highly embarrassing if you need to ask a customer.

A Better Solution – The Same Software Online

If collaboration is key to the operation of your business, using a cloud-based version of Microsoft Office will free your teams to work efficiently. The programmes allow users to:

  • access a single copy of a document
  • make real-time changes
  • provide an audit trail of who’s amended what
  • forget about the need for version control
  • reduce email traffic associated with sharing documents

Cloud services also enable you to give permissions to people inside and outside your organisation allowing intra-organisational working. And data access can be granted and restricted on a need-to-know basis. Not only does this ensure a streamlined workflow, but it reduces the data security risks inherent in emailing documents and information.

The Why – Viruses and Malware

Computers and networks are attacked daily by a range of viruses and malware. Damage can differ greatly, but it often impacts operational software and stored data. With tighter controls over personal information via the General Data Protection Regulations, losing data can mean increased regulatory scrutiny, fines and reputational damage.

The How – Ensure You Have Back-up and Recovery Plans in Place

If your servers and PCs are damaged by viruses or malware, you will need to cleanse your systems before reinstalling operational programmes. Your data backup systems should contain most of what you’ve lost, depending on how frequently you copy your files and systems.

However, recovery systems aren’t immune to cyber attacks. If they’ve also been impacted, you’ll need to consult with a specialist IT firm to see if anything can be recovered. Then it’s time to look at what you’ve still got and re-build from there.

A Better Solution – Cloud Services with In-Built Back-up and Recovery

Protecting your servers and backing up your work can be expensive and costly in terms of time and resource. And you may not be able to afford the best protection on the market. That’s why many businesses are turning to the cloud to host their systems and software.

Respected providers like Microsoft have the buying power and technical expertise to ensure only the very best protection is in place. By buying into their online services, you can rely on your systems to be secured against even the most determined hackers.

The Why – Server Damage

When everything your business relies on is hosted in an on-site server, disaster can strike in many ways. Although fire and flood are less common occurrences, spilled drinks, power cuts and human error aren’t.

The How – Quality IT Support

In the case of damage, backup procedures will only help your business stay up and running if you have another server, ideally hosted off-site. This relies on having two servers in place which means double the cost in terms of floor space, maintenance and support.

If you have a back-up server, your on-site IT support or a local IT partner should be able to get you back up and running. Depending on your set-up, the switch-over may take time, putting your business on the back foot and irritating your customers.

A Better Solution – Off-Site Cloud Solutions

Hosting your servers remotely may feel counterintuitive – out of sight can feel out of control. But more SMEs are turning to cloud services for a level of protection and business continuity most can’t afford on their own.

Armed to the teeth with security, cloud-based servers provide visibility and control of your systems and services. And the right set-up will ensure your storage needs are met both now and for the future.

The way we save, store and handle our data is a major underpinning reason for data loss. By paying for cloud services to securely host your systems and software with market leading back-up and recovery, you’ll be in safe hands.

Article written by Stockport based San-iT