And the winners of our survey are ......

We've finally managed to capture the moment as our winners collected their prizes. How easy was it to win? This easy .....  they simply responded to our 5 minute survey. Now for the moment we have been waiting for, presenting our three winners.

And the winners of our survey competition are:

• First prize winner - Faiza Arendse – won Seagate 1TB external drive
• Second prize winner - Lillian Kattan – won Canon Inkjet Printer
• Third prize winner - Joerg Masche - Samsung Digital Camera

First prize winner - Faiza Arendse – won Seagate 1TB external drive

Second prize winner - Lillian Kattan – won Canon Inkjet Printer 

Third prize winner - Joerg Masche - Samsung Digital Camera

Congratulations to all our winners and a sincere thank you to everyone who has responded to our survey. Your feedback allows us to service you better.

Lessons from a growing company ... especially around public holidays ...

Public holidays are great, but a chinese-torture to employers. Not only do holidays need to be paid for, but staff on "stand-by" need to be scheduled and backup plans put into place.

What can you do to minimise downtime and make the most out of public holidays:

• Know your staff schedule
  It is important to know who takes time off in between public holidays but assume staff not on your scheduled leave list will also call in "sick".
• Have a "backup-backup" plan

  For public holidays where "stand by" staff are not on call, have two or three alternate numbers clients' can call for assistance.
• Re-adjust deadlines

  The month of consists of 18 working days. Of these the 8th, 15th and 29th are Fridays and the 9th, 16th and 30th are Mondays.
  
  Scenario 1: 25% of your staff call in sick on either the Friday or Monday, this leaves your workforce very thin. Communication to clients' that any projects in April will add "X" amount of days to the project deadline will save any shouting matches from happening later in the month.
• Plan ahead of time
  The two major disruptions in the year are April (Easter) and December (Christmas). Knowing this and planning ahead will save you from those stressful situations arising during the holiday time.

Either way, in between the back up plans public holidays exist and if you can, try and enjoy it.

Highlights from the ITWeb Social Security Summit

Attended the ITWeb Social Security Summit at the Southern Sun, presented by Kaspersky Lab and ITWeb. Stefan Tanase, Senior Security Researcher from Romania, flew in just for the event and delivered his presentation.

The top tips highlighted were:

• Malware is becoming more complex
• Networks have three layers of ways targeted attacks can happen.
• Company networks
• Devices connecting to the networks
• Social media platforms
• Kaspersky Labs process 70 000 malicious programs daily
• More and more worms are created for additional platforms such as Mac

Top 5 threats for business:

1. Targeted attacks
2. Information leakage
3. Social networking account gets compromised
4. Malware distribution ("customers" can post to your wall and their machines are infected)
5. Social networking - information available freely available 

Tips for staying safe:

• Know your "social" friends
• Be "security aware"
• If you're not sure about something, don't post it
• Companies need to realise that blocking these sites is not the best idea. Educate your staff and create policies around usage
• Scan your pc for Malware every few days
• Update your Anti-Virus software every few days

View the Kaspersky Lab products here.

For information on eNetworks Anti-Virus products, visit our website www.enetworks.co.za

Congratulations, Dumisa Melane for being nominated as "Top Black Female Entrepreneur"

Our hearty CONGRATULATIONS, from all of us at eNetworks, to Dumisa Melane, one of our Directors for being nominated a finalist in the: 

"Top Black Female Entrepreneur"

category for the Metropolitan Oliver Empowerment Awards (MOEA) 2011.

Nominated along with other phenomenal women such as:

• Nokuthula Luthuli – Bloom Marketing 
• Zolelwa Molapisi – By Design Marketing Group
• Dumisa Melane – eNetworks
• Pria Hassan – WOA Fuels & Oils (**Category Winner**)
• Johanna Mukoki – Travel with Flair

Dumisa currently fills the role as Customer Relationship Manager at eNetworks and has been with the company for ten years.

Well done Dumi ..... we're proud of you!

More about the MOEA - 2011

A decade of empowerment progress came to a spectacular climax last night (Thurs. March 24) with presentations to the country’s foremost champions of empowerment in the public and private sectors, among major corporates and across the ranks of small, medium and micro enterprises.

10th Metropolitan Oliver Empowerment Awards (the ‘Olivers’), the mark of BEE distinction for transformation leaders, were bestowed by guest of honour and keynote speaker Mr Thembelani Nxesi (Deputy Minister of Rural Development and Land Reform) at the Sandton Convention Centre before an elite audience of political and business leaders and media personalities.


The Olivers are hosted every year by Impumelelo, a pioneering publication dedicated to black business success, and organised by Topco Media in partnership with headline sponsor Metropolitan, the leading life assurer and investment solutions provider."
- Extract sourced from official press release provided by Topco Media.


About Topco Media
Topco Media is a leader in South African business-to-business communication, where our primary service and product offerings i.e. Events and Publishing, aim to reward, celebrate and advertise the best in South African business and government; educate; inform; foster relationships; and facilitate understanding on a range of topical issues and subjects.

For more information on how winners and finalists are selected, visit the MOEA Website.

A glance at where the world is moving toward ...

I am a lady, but not any kind of lady, I am a lady who is completely and utterly in love, no, obsessed with technology and the way the world evolves around it. I love it so much that I made a career out of it. Fourteen years later, here I stand. Every now and then, I gaze at what is, what was and what will be?

The evidence that technology is made the world flat is irrefutable. Those of us who are technophobes are being roped in by new user interfaces such as touch screens and voice activation. Gone are the days where one could shy away from being connected and gone are the days when we could simply disappear for days without an IM, DM or SMS asking "where are you?" Yes, technology has invaded every sphere of life.
As a consumer, the way we transact online is becoming simpler yet more complex. We demand user friendly front-end experiences, safe and secure back-end experiences and because of our assumptions that is should be there, sometimes, we fall prey to hoax sites and scams.

Here are some tips to keep you safe online:

• If the company is a relatively new one, search for it via GOOGLE and BING, legitimate companies have a track record, even the new ones.  If you cannot find anything on them, step away from the browser!
• Look for Trust Seals or Digital Certificates which indicate that the company belongs to some kind of membership organisation or has been verified by a trustworthy company.

• When transacting online, ensure that your browser displays a secure lock and https (not only http).

• Browse around to see which other companies offer the products you are looking for. This will give a relatively good idea on what to expect on this kind of business website.
• Email the company and ask for information on delivery or products, if they 
• don't respond, this is a bad sign of service and or their non-existence
• respond one week later, also a bad sign, it may take you ages to receive your goods as well
• My Favourite, find them on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. Most companies have profiles set up on at least these social networking platforms and judging by the amount of fans and followers, this is a good indication of the kind of business they operate.

What about businesses? How are they affected? Businesses are being bombarded by information overload, a flurry of new and ever improving web applications and life is starting to move into the Cloud. Bottom line? Businesses need to ensure that:

• their existing processes cater for new set of demands consumers make
• their networks need to be secure and stable enough to handle the extra load due to:
• smart phones
• cell phones
• table pc's
• laptops
• their company policies are modified for information sharing and "leakage"
• their staff pc's, laptops and smart phones are protected against hackers and viruses
• they have a presence on social networking platforms
• they engage with their consumers/customers
• they move to web application environment, since staff are travelling more and working remotely

Tips for business?

• Be VIGILANT against VIRUSES. Audit your existing Anti-Virus packages and update regularly
• BACKUP your data, daily and by the hour
• Monitor bandwidth consumption and make adjustments where needed
• Communicate and engage with your customers, they are starting to expect this as the norm
• Allow your staff to engage on social media platforms, they too are the voice of your company, although audit sites (such as pornographic ones) when monitoring bandwidth

At the end of the day, be careful online but enjoy it. There are so many applications and websites designed to enjoy and make life easier. Knowing how to filter the fluff from the awesomely-incredible is an art you learn over time, but ...... it does happen. 

Info overload because of unsolicited email? We can help!

Checking email first thing in the morning adds the first layer of anxiety for the day. First, we look for important email, but the holy grail of emails seems to be drenched in that which we call "UNSOLICITED EMAIL". One cup of tea/coffee down and we're already "ansi" about the day ahead.

Wouldn't it be great if we could reduce our
email by as much as 90%?

We've spent years researching and testing various ways to do JUST that and have developed a SPAM SCANNING SOLUTION.

How does it work?

• All mail is scored on its probability of being SPAM
• Mail under a certain threshold score, is let as non-SPAM
• Mail over a certain threshold score, is discarded as SPAM, and if there is a valid sender associated with the mail, the sender with be notified of the action taken.

WHAT HAPPENS to DISCARDED MAIL? It is kept for 5 days in the event recovery is required.

For more information on our SPAM SCANNING SOLUTION, download the brochure explaining more.

We care about providing solutions which solve your problems, saving you time and money. Give the brochure a browse, then give us a call.

Staff "Cocktail Shake-Down" in true eNetworks style of course ..

Who says celebrations have to happen at the end of the year? Our motto, celebrate anytime! To get our team motivated for a great year ahead, we gathered all staff for a "cocktail shake-down". 

As our staff arrived at the office, they were greeted with a cocktail demonstration and drinks with colourful umbrellas.

Seeing that the shake-down was a competition, everyone was eager for the games to begin. The participants had a limited time to invent their own cocktail, along with a name for their creation.  

These drinks were judged on: 

• taste
• creativity of name 
• presentation

It was pure entertainment for everyone as the competitors got stuck into their cocktail mixing. Those not taking part in the "cocktail shake-down" watched as spirits got mixed, shakers clattered, blenders buzzed and pineapple flew.

As you can imagine we had some seriously creative cocktails, some that looked absolutely fantastic and others that just looked well...what can I say ... interesting :).

There were three judges (all staff) who had the difficult task judging the cocktails. One of the judging criteria was "taste" and boy did they taste the good, the bad and the down right yukky. The good ones looked appetizing, interesting and ultimately tasted good, but then there were the “special” ones... say hello to “what the hell is that!?!”. 

The memory is scarred by one drink in particular...the "Chunky Cocktail" that looked like it had been cooked up in a lab.  It had an interesting blue-green colour with a strange texture I can only hope was pineapple.

I had the pleasure (or displeasure) of tasting this one. As you sucked on the straw something gets lodged in it (blowing is not an option as the glass is full to the top) and the only option is to suck harder.  Close your eyes and wait for it...WACK, a chunk of pineapple gets shot down your throat with a flourish of strong alcohol.  Shame those poor judges, but they were great sports and did a great job of judging!

A huge THANK YOU to the THREE of them. 

After much deliberation three winners were selected. Taking 1st place was Ezaad and his drink "The Broken Toon nael" in 2nd place was Conrad and his "Vesper Martini", and in 3rd place were Karen and Melanie with their drink "It’s a wrap".

Well done to the three winners who all won prizes for their efforts.

What is a party without the great people?  Luckily, we have loads of them and much laughter, fun, face pulling, drinks and sticky floors were had, as one would expect from a staff-cocktail-party :)

What a great day, when’s the next one :)?