Usually security vendors show a heightened state of awareness to any potential sales pitch but Virgin Media Business has wasted no time in advising businesses to hold virtual meetings instead of facing the possibility of being stranded abroad.

“Today’s disruption serves as another reminder that businesses need to put contingency plans in place to deal with unforeseen events,” said Alistair McKinnon, senior product manager for IP Multimedia at Virgin Business Media.

The impact of volcanic eruptions on project deadlines and productivity has never effectively been gauged in the UK up to now.

However, Virgin claims remote collaboration tools such as videoconferencing can help avoid such instances.

Cloud computing and unified communication provider Outsourcery has also got in on the act by upping the noise about its instant messaging, presence information, voice and video conferencing.

“This technology has proved vital for many SMEs as travel becomes increasingly difficult through a number of natural and weather related events, as well as more normal commuting congestion,” said Mark Seeman, product strategy and development director at Outsourcery.

Perhaps channel analyst Canalys will consider investing in remote working technologies to prevent a recurrence of the cancellations that have seen key employees stranded.

Speaking to MicroScope from Oslo, Alastair Edwards, principal analyst at Canalys said “there are thick black clouds here, it is like Pompeii” before the connection was lost.

With airports closed and flights cancelled across Britain and Scandinavia, marketing execs will need more than a little blue sky thinking to re-define the term the cloud.

22nd April – London – Melia White House Hotel

IT Management has never been an easy task. While large organisations grapple with complexity, scale, culture & change, smaller businesses

Computing sector tops jobs market growth as overall demand for workers increases at fastest rate since 1997, research claims

Demand for IT staff in the UK, both permanent and temporary, rose significantly during March 2010, according to a survey of recruitment agencies by KPMG and Recruitment and Employment Confederation.

IT topped the eight sectors tracked by the report, with demand for permanent IT staff growing particularly fast.

Across all sectors, demand for employees across all sectors rose the fastest since 1997. The survey also found that average pay rose for permanent staff rose and, to a lesser degree, temporary staff during the month.

The supply of both types of staff also rose slightly during the month.

According to Kevin Green, the REC’s chief executive, this positive news is “tempered by public expenditure cuts which are already impacting on recruitment in this sector. Deep-rooted reforms and innovative approaches to public sector resourcing will be needed in order to maintain frontline services.”

Last month, a survey of IT directors by recruitment consultant ReThink Recruitment found that almost half were planning to increase their departmental headcount during 2010.