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Eric Kong
Empowering Businesses with Stability, Security, and Scalability. Managed IT | Cybersecurity | Compliance | Digital Transformation
Eric Kong is the Founder, CEO, and vCIO (virtual Chief Information Officer) of Consilien, an IT consultancy firm he established in 2001.2 With over 20 years of experience in the IT industry, Kong has dedicated his career to bridging the gap between small and medium-sized businesses and enterprise-level IT infrastructure.
Background and Expertise
Eric Kong holds a Bachelor of Science in Aerospace Engineering from Northrop University. His expertise spans various areas of IT, including:
- Business Continuity Services
- Backup Disaster and Recovery
- Data Recovery
- Managed IT
- Network and Infrastructure architecting
- Planning and policy implementation for IT organizations
Consilien
Consilien, under Kong's leadership, specializes in providing:
- 24/7 data and network security
- Managed IT services
- Custom backup and disaster recovery solutions
- Compliance and assessment services for various standards (PCI-DSS, CCPA, GDPR, HIPAA, NIST CSF)
- Managed cybersecurity services, including a Security Operations Center (SOC)12
The company was founded in response to the 9/11 tragedy, with Kong recognizing the need for enterprise-grade tools and practices for small and mid-market companies to survive catastrophic events.2
Professional Approach
Kong is committed to educating clients about the benefits of Business Continuity Services and modern data protection methods. He offers a whitepaper titled "Bullet Proof Your Data" to interested parties. His approach focuses on creating value for clients by leveraging industry knowledge and expertise to align technology environments with business objectives.2
Highlights
📉 Why do businesses struggle during election years?
A member of my executive peer group shared some fascinating insights on this for the technology services community.
This peer group member mentioned his opinion that, going back four presidents and eight election cycles, the data shows there’s been a consistent slowdown in growth for technology service providers.
Why? Because in an election year, the opposition party often talks down the economy, creating a sense of uncertainty—even when the data doesn’t support it.
When uncertainty is high, companies hold back on spending, leading to a decline in services revenue for technology providers.
But once the election cycle is over, businesses start planning again. The uncertainty fades, and the economic outlook stabilizes.
The takeaway? Don’t let the noise of an election year derail your growth. Stick to the hard data, and keep your long-term vision in focus.
How are you navigating uncertainty in your business?
#BusinessGrowth #ElectionYear #TechnologyServices #EconomicOutlook #LongTermVision #Leadership #BusinessStrategy
What Happens When Your QA Fails?
The recent CrowdStrike incident is a critical reminder of the need for thorough software testing and careful deployment strategies.
Looking at what happened, CrowdStrike's backend software testing platform failed. Despite their robust QA processes, the failure of their automated testing led to a massive disruption. This incident underscores a vital lesson: no QA platform can be fully automated.
Most companies claim to have extensive QA processes with multiple phases of deployment. Typically, this includes internal beta testing, public beta testing, and a staged rollout. However, in this case, CrowdStrike's update deployment affected over 8 Million endpoints in the short time it was live.
From this, we've learned a few key lessons:
- Significant Baseline Testing: Ensure all software undergoes thorough baseline testing.
- Staged and Phased Testing: For critical deployments, always implement a phased rollout.
- Minimize Impact: Roll out updates to the least impactful groups first and scale up to more critical systems. If issues arise, you can learn and adjust with minimal disruption.
What have you taken away from the CrowdStrike incident?
#SoftwareTesting #BusinessContinuity #ITServices #Cybersecurity #Crowdstrike #TechIncident #QA #SoftwareDeployment #ITManagement #TechLessons #RiskManagement #EndpointSecurity #ITUpdates #SoftwareFailures #SystemReliability
