Cybersecurity: The Investment No SMB Can Afford To Skip
Furtado says the adage “it’s not if, but when” is often applied to cybersecurity discussions for a reason.
“What are you doing to be ready for this inevitable event? Do you have adequate visibility across your entire estate? And that’s both what you have on-prem, what you have in the cloud, what you have with your remote users, and also your data with SaaS providers, because we’re starting to see a lot more regulatory scrutiny on cyber events and regulations around data protection. And all of those regulations say you must protect the data,” he says.
According to the Identity Theft Resource Center, 81% of small businesses suffered a security breach and/or data breach in the past year. Attacks powered by AI were a main cause in over 40% of the cyber events. The Federal Communications Commission recommends teaching employees security principles such as using strong passwords, backing up data on computers regularly and not giving a single employee access to all data systems. Furtado also emphasizes the importance of after-action reports that result in real change.
Remote and Hybrid Work Improvements Continue To Advance
In the remote versus return-to-office debate, SMBs often fall somewhere in the middle, enjoying the benefits of in-person local talent while outsourcing work to remote specialists around the globe. This calls for continued advancements in best-in-class technology products and practices, such as upgrading videoconferencing hardware in the new year.
Furtado recommends asking some key questions: “Are you still doing remote work the same way you did five years ago?” If the answer is yes, yet your business has evolved, your technology stack should too.
“Are you at remote work version 1.0 still, or have you moved to 2.0? Have you done a better job of endpoint management? Have you done a better job of controlling how they connect into your environment and monitoring that again. Visibility extends to people’s workspace, whether it’s in their living room, whether it’s in the office, whether it’s in an airport,” Furtado says. “We have a fiduciary duty to protect the data.”
SMBs with lean teams can look to virtual assistants and AI virtual assistants to transform small business productivity as well.
WATCH: These trends can help modernize workplace technology.
Cloud Transformation Helps Small Businesses Scale
Cost is always top of mind for SMBs, so no-cloud and low-cloud solutions must align with those goals. As more SMBs switch to these platforms to avoid hefty costs from other developer options, they are seeing improvements in scalability and collaboration capabilities.
“Low-code/no-code platforms can provide an excellent way for small businesses to develop their own applications without needing to hire expensive software developers,” Mercer says. But it’s not always a seamless transition, or without issue. “As use and exposure to these applications increase, there are potential scaling, security, software due diligence and lock-in challenges that they should be aware of before investing too much time and money in a low-code/no-code platform.”
The vendor community is also driving more SMBs toward the cloud, Furtado says, into Software as a Service platforms. “Certain organizations, depending on what they’re looking for, may adopt cloud and go all in, but the majority that we see, especially in the small and medium space, are all a hybrid environment, a combination of on-prem technology and cloud technology,” Furtado says. “We don't see that changing anytime in the near future.”
2026 will be an inflection point for small businesses — a chance to audit what’s working, see what gaps exist in security and tech-based opportunities, and learn how to use all available tools and resources to have the most profitable and productive year yet.
