Flexible Workplace and Unified Communications
When we talk about IT and Unified Communications, often we get very hyped up about the technology and its features. Marketers and salespeople should always try to link features to situations that will add value to a business. As a Cloud Unified Communications provider, we are big on using our own technology internally to understand its true value and to be able to show its value to partners. We also internally promote a flexible workplace where results are the measure of our team, not where they are – something that UCaaS allows us to do.
As a parent of a now 1.2-year-old often the real value of Unified Communications becomes less about a value proposition and is a real asset when its flexibility allows me to manage my needs at work, and ideals of being the best parent possible. On a Monday afternoon at 1:35 pm, had just started a conference call with two external people to Access4 using the BroadSoft MyRoom collaboration functionality. I had dialled in from my desk phone when my wife called on the mobile. My wife will generally only call during business hours in an emergency. This has more to do with her demands at work than my views of self-importance. She had called to advise that her mother who was minding our daughter for the day had locked herself out of the house and effectively was wandering the streets with a sleeping 1.2-year-old in the pram. My wife’s demands at work meant she couldn’t leave work at that point.
Being easily mobile is one of the true tests of Unified Communications and with the click of a button, I was seamlessly able to move the call from my desk phone to my mobile whilst still having control over the conference call. I was able to then get into the car without disrupting my call, without having to dial people back, without having to put people on hold. Our BroadSoft solution seamlessly moved the call to my mobile as a data call over the mobile carriers 4G, then was able to negotiate the handover to my car’s Bluetooth system.
I was able to drive home quickly, open the house or more accurately point and click the garage door remote and drive back to work all without having to cancel a business call or disrupting the meeting. The technology had truly enabled my competing needs for those 30 minutes. This is what cloud unified communications should be able to do. It took the technology and turned it into a real asset that allowed my work to be something I was doing, not a location I was fixed to.
Now off to talk to my wife’s business to implement Unified Communications for them.
