Farewell 2020 Hello Total Cloud

Looking Back at 2020, Looking Ahead to Total Cloud

We opened 2020 celebrating our 16th year of serving our clients wholeheartedly while looking forward to expanding our technical team and introducing a revolutionary new service to further support our growing customers.

Like many people, our lives changed dramatically in March and we all rapidly shifted to a work from home environment where possible. We are very proud of our efforts to quickly pivot the work environment for our clients and grateful for thei­r patience and understanding during those stressful times when onsite visits simply weren’t possible.

“For many businesses, the sudden transition to a remote workforce highlighted the need for an exceptional technology partnership. We rapidly migrated over 1,200 employees from the office to a work from home environment for our clients when the outbreak began. We’ve been very blessed to continue to support our clients seamlessly and forge new partnerships in this new business climate,” said our CEO Deana Pizzo.

Not all our clients had the opportunity to work remotely. Our good friends at One Parking and in the construction and landscaping industries continued to work onsite, but under new restrictions. And in the world of auto sports, the race must go on! So, we had to get creative and inventive in our support of CORE Autosport and the Porsche Motorsport North America racing team.

Off To The Championship Races
The unique task of providing I.T. support for CORE Autosport and the Porsche Motorsport North America racing team under pandemic restrictions required a great deal of flexibility and technical expertise!

The principal players on the Porsche 911 and 912 racing teams travel from Germany for each race in the U.S. with support from CORE Autosport, based in South Carolina and I.T. expertise from I.T. Solutions of South Florida. A remote operations room was established in Germany and we set up our own Ops Room at our office in Lake Worth, Florida.

Our team established and maintained seamless communication and coordination between the operations team in Germany, the support team in the pits, drivers behind the wheel of the Porsche 911 and 912 on the track, and our own office for the WeatherTech Championship weekends.

“We put a lot of effort into keeping everyone as safe as possible and connected through the remainder of the race season. And we even managed to close out the season with a 1-2 finish at the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring! It was really a thrilling victory,” exclaimed Jason Pizzo, our CIO.

Meet Jared, JP and Collin
By now, many of you have met Jared, JP and Collin, the newest members of the I.T. Solutions of South Florida family! Let’s take a moment to formally introduce you!

Jared is passionate about his family, fitness, and resolving a wide range of technical issues for clients. A US Army Infantry Veteran, Jared has extensive experience with the Office 365 platform and previously provided support directly for Microsoft. Our clients appreciate his friendly demeanor, meticulous approach, and technical savvy.

Jared graduated from Florida Atlantic University with a bachelor’s degree in Economics and has about 10 years of industry experience. In his spare time, Jared enjoys spending time with his family, coaching various sports teams for his children, and preparing for the next Obstacle Course Race.

JP also joined us early in 2020, and he’s been in the field so much we haven’t been able to slow him down long enough to take a picture for our website! To say he’s focused on helping clients with their technology challenges would be an understatement. In other words, he fits right in.

JP has worked in I.T. since earning his Associate in Science degree in Network Administration from Palm Beach State College in 2017. In addition, JP is bilingual, speaking English and Spanish fluently. A native of New York, JP moved to Palm Beach County when he was eight years old. In his free time, JP enjoys hanging out with family and friends, playing video games, and talking and watching his favorite sports.

And finally, meet our intern, Collin! Collin is concentrating on gaining valuable experience in technology and customer service while attending college locally. He is currently enrolled at Palm Beach State and plans to study software engineering at the University of Central Florida. Collin is truly a pleasure to work with. He is always enthusiastic and ready to help in any way he can!

Introducing Total Cloud
As your technology partner, we hold fast to our mission to put your business needs first. That’s why we’ve introduced a new standard in I.T. support: Total Cloud.

Total Cloud delivers all the support you’ve come to depend on, with new features that mitigate today’s rapidly changing security threats and empower your people to take full advantage of the Microsoft 365 environment.

  • Phishing and social engineering testing
  • Security education right to the desktop
  • Mobile device management
  • Full integration and optimization of Teams, OneNote, and SharePoint in your environment

The technology landscape keeps changing. Your business needs to change with it. Total Cloud empowers you to do exactly that. In the weeks ahead we’ll be sharing more about this game-changing program, and specifics on how it can work in your environment.

We think you’ll be as excited as we are.

Awards, Leadership, And More Awards
This year brought unique distinctions and opportunities for recognition of our CEO and I.T. Solutions of South Florida.

In May, Deana earned the distinction of being named to the 2020 Women of the Channel list by CRN®, a brand of The Channel Company. This prestigious list specifically recognizes influential women in our technology channel for innovation and leadership.

Locally, Deana was invited to join the Board of Directors of South Florida Tech. Formerly known as Palm Beach Tech, the South Florida Tech Association is a non-profit 501(c)6 membership association building the software, engineering, digital, and information technology industry verticals in South Florida.

“I wanted to be actively involved in the efforts to position our region as a technology hub,” Deana said. “South Florida Tech takes a holistic approach to fostering a community of technology, innovation, and creativity throughout South Florida. I believe bringing more technology opportunities to our community will further encourage economic growth, diversity, and prosperity locally.”

Deana is also one of the just 55 business leaders in the entire state invited by the Leadership Florida Selection Committee to join the 39th Cornerstone Class program next year!

“I am honored to be selected to embark on Leadership Florida! The program roster contains an impressive list of distinguished business and community leaders throughout the state and I’m humbled to be part of such an esteemed group,” Deana said.

For the first time in company history, I.T. Solutions of South Florida was named a 2020 Florida Companies to Watch finalist by GrowFL.  The 10th annual awards event honors impressive second-stage companies from throughout the state for developing valuable products and services, creating quality jobs, enriching communities, and broadening new industries throughout Florida.

In addition, I.T. Solutions of South Florida earned two coveted industry awards as we have for several consecutive years. This year came with a new and exciting twist in the rankings!

We were named to the 2020 Managed Service Provider (MSP) 500 list in the Security 100 category and ranked in the Top 100 of the world’s premier managed service providers on the prestigious 2020 annual Channel Futures MSP 501 rankings! We ranked 65th on the list of top 501 MSP’s internationally.

“Without sounding like a cheesy awards show, it is truly an honor to make the MSP 501 list. But we are beyond ecstatic to earn the 65th ranking and place within the Top 100 of Managed Service Providers globally,” CEO Deana Pizzo said. “We feel we’ve created something unique and very special with respect to our services and our friendly professional staff. It is truly an honor to be recognized as a global leader in our channel.”

Thank You Sincerely
We would like to express our sincere gratitude for our fantastic client partners, vendors, friends and every team member at I.T. Solutions of South Florida! None of this would be possible without each of you and we cherish our relationship and opportunity to serve you wholeheartedly. Happy Holidays and we wish you a wonderful New Year!