If you were to walk into the executive headquarters of some of the fastest-growing small businesses in the world, you wouldn’t find a sleek reception desk, a climate-controlled server room, or rows of desktop towers. You might find an empty room, or no room at all, and it’s all thanks to the Post-Desktop Era.

The notion that the office is a physical anchor for computing power and data storage is obsolete. Forward-thinking business leaders have realized that tying their operations to physical real estate and local hardware is not just a waste, but an operational bottleneck that actively hinders their growth.

Today’s businesses demand agility, and that comes from minimizing, or even erasing the office footprint. Here are three ways businesses are realizing this vision.

Cloud-Streaming the Complete Desktop

In the past, running powerful corporate applications and accessing secure files required a high-end, expensive local computer, and if the computer was lost, damaged, or stolen, operations ground to a halt.

Nowadays, businesses can use virtual desktop infrastructure to much more convenient effect. Instead of running programs locally, an employee’s laptop can function as a “viewport” of sorts. The operating system, applications, and files are all essentially streamed to the device securely from a high-performance cloud data center.

This means that employees can be using any approved device to access your business’ resources; it’s all handled in the cloud, and corporate data never needs to touch or reside on a physical device.

Isolation via Micro-Perimeter Endpoint Security

Operating without an office means you don’t have a physical building firewall to protect your team, which comes with its own unique set of challenges.

For instance, every wireless network you connect to can become a potential minefield—especially since you don’t know who or what is on it. In the post-desktop era, security follows the user, not the building, so you can take advantage of this by equipping your team with advanced tools like next-generation antivirus and endpoint detection and response solutions. These help each standalone device act like its own standalone security perimeter.

If an employee connects to a compromised airport network, for example, the endpoint’s automated routing and built-in protection will isolate the device immediately, rendering any attacks from external threats neutralized before they infiltrate your cloud.

Identity as the New Corporate Firewall

With a decentralized workforce, physical keys and keycards are replaced by digital identity governance.

Access is dictated by zero-trust network access and strict multi-factor authentication. Systems constantly verify who is accessing the data, what device they are using, and whether their security posture meets compliance baselines. This all happens before access is granted, so you never have to worry that someone is accessing something they shouldn’t.

This gives you the peace of mind of knowing that no unverified user can access your system.

When you have a business that can fit inside a backpack, you have ultimate operational leverage. You can be free to think ambitiously about your business without worrying about commercial real estate leases. If you want a business that can scale, you can do it without a hitch with Dresner Group. We’ll help you figure out how to grow your business while sustaining healthy operations. Learn more today by calling us at (410) 531-6727.