Embrace 4 new features & support the users who need them.

By Steve Schippert, Lead IT Instructor at Lincoln Tech in Paramus, NJ

For several reasons, Windows 10 is a golden opportunity to establish a career in the IT industry. A career isn't just a job, it's a lifelong progression of growing more and more valuable to organizations. In that process, your compensation should increase with your value. There are some unique conditions happening in the industry over the next 12-18 months, and Windows 10 is right in the middle of it.

The transition from Windows 7 to Windows 10 presents a significant opportunity for the industrious and entrepreneurial-minded tech. If you can inspire users to embrace a few of the new Windows 10 features that will make their busy days easier, you will position yourself as an incredibly valuable new hire.

You will shine in a job interview when you explain how you can do much more than just upgrade desktop computers from Windows 7 to 10. Show how you can help their users make their complex daily multitasking more streamlined and organized. You will separate yourself from most young techs and impress your potential employers by focusing on people first rather than systems.

The search is over. “When can you start?”

Begin to increase your value by mastering four key features of Windows 10 that can really – no, really – help potential employers. Most will go from reluctant or even resistant to wondering why they weren't using Windows 10 a long time ago.

In this three-part series, we’ll look at features of the new Windows Start button and menu, pinning to the Taskbar, Virtual Desktops, and this week’s topic, the Dynamic Lock:

Key Windows 10 Features:  Dynamic Lock

Walk Away, Lock It Up!

Security-minded administrators exhale in a huff when they see an open desktop at an empty desk. They beg their users to please remember to lock their workstations when they step away from their desks. But users are human. They forget. And sometimes security isn't quite as far in the front of their minds as catching the UPS delivery man before he walks out the door without an urgent overnight package to be sent.

As of April 11, 2017 with the release of the Creator's Update for Windows 10, a new security feature called Dynamic Lock is expected to prove both useful and helpful in this regard. Known in inside circles as "Proximity Lock," it uses Bluetooth to pair the desktop with the user's cell phone. When they walk away from their computer, the Bluetooth signal to the desktop from the cell phone decreases. Decreasing beyond a certain level will trigger Windows 10 to automatically lock the workstation, securing it until the user returns and enters their password.

This new feature will likely have some early growing pains, such as updates allowing users to adjust the signal strength (or, in their terms, distance from the desktop) that actually triggers a "Dynamic Lock." Different buildings (with different materials in their walls) will have differing performance, just like WiFi environments. Workstations without built-in Bluetooth will need to be equipped with a small USB Bluetooth adapter (typically less than $20 each). Also, this will consume cell phone battery power, which will be a real factor for the user to navigate.

Even with the growing pains, however, this new built-in functionality - one of several new Windows 10 features - can give peace of mind to both the user and those responsible for securing the network.

Coming next week: a look at new pinning features on the Taskbar, and enhancements to the Start Button.