Using 3rd Party Contractors? Strongly Consider Virtual Desktops

Companies use third party contractors for everything from data mining to specialty skills like development and marketing. It’s a smart way to get jobs done without increasing in-house staff. But it’s not always as easy as it appears.

After finding the right contractors, there remains the challenge of how these workers (who are often remote or working from a vendor’s office) are going to access your company’s vital applications and data. One of the main issues is that contractors are often not using endpoints owned and controlled by your organization. This opens up a host of potential issues around security, access control and compatibility.

Virtual desktops address those issues and a range of other challenges presented by working with third party contractors. Here are some reasons you should strongly consider the solution if contractors are part of your workforce.

You always have to worry about security

Whether contractors are using a personally owned device or an endpoint supplied by their primary employer, you have little to no control over the security of that device. Even if the vendor guarantees a certain level of security in the contract, it doesn’t necessarily mean those promises translate into real action, security and controls. And ultimately, it’s your data at risk.

Virtual desktops allow you to decide on the security and controls and ensure they’re implemented, regardless of who owns the endpoint or how well its security is maintained. Virtual desktops also let you go a step further by prohibiting high risk functions that are rarely locked down on native devices like printing, screen capture and external saving. This level of control means the contractor cannot walk away with your data (either maliciously or accidentally).

Will compatibility hinder productivity?

If an app your organization uses requires Windows or a certain OS version but the contractor uses a Mac or doesn’t keep up with OS updates productivity could stop before it ever starts. This issue can be prevented by ensuring compatibility before a contract is signed, but relying on virtual desktops makes it a non-issue all together.

With cloud based desktops, applications are functional regardless of the endpoint or underlying operating system. It’s like provisioning every contractor with exactly the type of endpoint you’d like them to use, without the hassle or expense of actually shipping laptops.

Are you getting what you’re paying for?

Are contractors getting projects done as efficiently as they could be? Are they actually engaged for the hours they charge or do they log on and sit idle? With traditional contracting, there’s an inherent level of trust. But with virtual desktops that come with environment monitoring and insights, you can see exactly what each contractor is doing.

One Dizzion customer using the Dizzion Control Center discovered that a significant number of agents they contracted from a third party actually only worked for two hours a day. Agents would log on and the company would be charged for all those hours, but the agents were largely sitting idle, not actually producing any results. Without virtual desktops (and the right insight tools) the company would have continued paying for contractors that weren’t actually doing any work.

Make scaling easy

If you do want third party contractors to use your endpoints for security reasons, scaling can be difficult if you’re shipping laptops. Virtual desktops give you several options that make scaling easier.

You can confidently allow contractors to use their own devices without compromising on security or compliance (because they’re working within a controlled environment). You can also provision secure thin clients in conjunction with your controlled, secure virtual desktops. While this solution still requires shipping, it is much more affordable and manageable.