Here is a brief overview of the projects we have carried out to date for Gloucester Cathedral.
Installed fibre optic and structured cabling across the site.
There were many slow broadband circuits around the site. The savings to locally cable the site and discontinue these lines will pay for themselves over the next three years.
Provision a 300mb dedicated Internet Service (Lease Line).
Given the entire site is now cabled means everybody can share one very fast Internet service.
Wi-Fi Solutions across the site including free public Internet throughout the Cathedral.
A centrally managed Wi-Fi solution installed in the main Cathedral, Coffee Shop, Office, Deanery and surrounding buildings. There are pop up pages for the general public rather than hard to remember passwords. All staff log on using their workstation username and password.
Migration of Email to Microsoft Office 365.
The on-premise email server needed replacing. The Office 365 solution has virtually no capital cost and Cathedrals can get many Microsoft software titles free of charge.
New Telephony System.
The site had many different types of lines because no telephone system reached all areas. Everybody is now part of a corporate phone system. This has made life much easier, so we are told by everyone at the Cathedral and the savings have been welcomed.
Proactive Monitoring and Measured Support
Real IT Support comes from Real People…. The endpoints (Workstations, laptops etc) are all monitored 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Each week the necessary system updates & security patches are installed, out of hours, during an agreed maintenance window. On a normal day to day basis there are at least six people working our Helpdesk and four super-tech’s working projects, they are all happy to deal with any of the Cathedral’s technology issues including liaising with third party providers for such things as EPOS, Environmental monitoring or CRM software for example. The support enquiries are either raised through a call or via an email;
Solutions 4 IT believe that IT support described in the paragraph above is fairly standard stuff these days – A bit like an airbag in a car. Where we continue to add value is in taking ownership of the technology. All the Cathedral’s departments are now aligned with a plan and have a technology roadmap for the future. Surveys are sent out periodically to all users to help us gain a better understanding of what needs prioritising. Nothing is set in stone because things will and do change.
Strategy implemented as part of support contract to mitigate and reduce risk of Cyber Attack.
The threat landscape of viruses, ransomware and attack has changed. Like many Organisations, the Cathedral didn’t understand the risks. A training programme is now in place and our multi-layered Security Stack forms part of the remote monitoring behind the ongoing support.