Hello Clint,
Just this last week we were in a meeting with a new hospital and the practice manager had asked me how long have I been in veterinary medicine. It’s crazy to think it’s been almost 7 years! If you would have told me back in 2014 when I was graduating from law school that I’d be running a technology company helping veterinary hospitals. I would have told you, “You’re crazy!”
But I wouldn’t change it for the world. You all have had such an impact on my life that I have zero regrets. So thank you and thank you for taking the time to read this email.
So this had me thinking…
How many of you have been told by a cloud-based Practice Management System that “Once you go to the cloud, you can turn off your server”. Then come to find out years later that you can’t just turn off the server.
And it gets even more complicated…..
You have your IT company telling you “We have to keep the server for critical IT functions”. Just in the last month, we have spoken with two separate hospitals that are paying on average $1000.00 per month for a cloud server that they don’t need!
So what is it!? Can we be serverless or do we really need a server to function?
The good news is! You don’t need a server once you go cloud-based, we can get rid of it, and here’s why your IT person thinks you need one. I.e. the jobs your server is still performing.
1) DHCP – This is how your computers get an address. Once you go cloud-based you really need a Firewall protecting your network. The best part is that your firewall can also perform DHCP. Thus we move this job to the firewall and away from the server
2) Domain – A domain helps to control logins and printers. But in most hospital settings we all share a “Tech” or “Clinic” login. These logins can be moved to the local computer in what we call a “workgroup”. And most cloud practice management systems have cloud print tools to help map your printers. Thus allowing us to remove these jobs from the server.
3) File Sharing – There are a couple of ways you can handle this so let’s break it into two options. Allowing us to get rid of this job for the server.
a) Move your files to your tech station or lab PC which we can then share and backup for approx $20 per month.
b) Use a cloud file-sharing solution like Office 365 or Citrix Sharefile.
4) Reminder Services etc – You may have a reminder service or coupon service like Greenline that’s running on your server as well. The good news is that these services or apps don’t require a lot of horsepower to run. Thus we move them to the Tech station PC that we’re backing up and BOOM! This job has also been moved off the server.
That’s it! Those are the 4 primary jobs your server is doing once you are using a cloud-based practice management system. While most IT companies are afraid to embrace the serverless environment as they are afraid it will cost them their job. I mean who wants to lose $12000.00 a year in revenue hosting servers?
We do! It’s the future and we stand by our motto “Everything in IT you need and nothing you don’t!” Why spend money on IT that you don’t have to!?
I hope you found that inciteful and had an amazing holiday weekend! My tomorrow bring you lots of puppy appointments!