Like in every great relationship, there are some universal features to look for in a great Unified Communications (UC) partner. So, you've identified your business can benefit from a UC solution. But improving your workplace and business experience through UC takes more than just careful planning and strategic and financial considerations. It takes compatibility.
To help you find your perfect match, here are five areas that are non-negotiables for an effective partnership.
We passionately believe that delivering secure, future-proof technology means putting your people first. So, the most important step when creating a solid UC strategy is to figure out how your people work and what they need to get the job done.
The best UC partner considers whether employees work from home, on the road, or at home, and the devices they use – whether that’s mobiles, PCs, tablets, or a mixture of all three. Once your partner knows where and how, they can create your tailored UC strategy, empowering your people to connect, communicate and collaborate safely and efficiently regardless of location or device.
Cost is always going to be an essential consideration when investing in any new technology but using a single platform from a single supplier can make it easier to achieve cost efficiencies. Not only are you only paying for a single platform, but your UC partner will design the tools on the platform to work with one another, which means no data duplication and fewer teams required to maintain it. A single partner that can deliver an end-to-end quality solution is paramount to getting a successfully implemented service and solution.
When deploying a new telephony and communication solution, a partner should always look at where improvements can be made to benefit your business. Start with identifying if you have any business processes that could benefit from integration with UC apps.
Creating and implementing a UC strategy means your workforce can do their job anywhere, on a range of different devices. However, investing in a partnership with a UC provider ensures your business continues to be at the forefront of technology updates, tracking upcoming technology trends and guiding you through your journey. The innovations that your UC partner implements ultimately maximise productivity, which means more time for the things that matter to your business.
Implementing UC into your business hinges on how well your partner understands your infrastructure requirements. There is no point introducing messaging, conferencing and video calling onto one platform if your current network cannot support these apps. Your perfect UC partner will evaluate your infrastructure, integrating all your communication tools into one platform to ensure your systems work together, not in opposition. This tailored approach ensures that your network is as secure as possible to support remote working if required.
Most importantly, your UC partner should be considering your future infrastructure when designing your UC platform. Maximising growth is a top priority for most businesses and as a result, your UC solution needs to grow with you, ensuring a consistent high quality user experience, regardless of the number of users or tools added to your platform.
When making changes to your business strategy, it can be wise to adopt a staggered approach in order to minimise costs and allow enough time to train your workforce in any new apps or software. To help you ensure a strategic plan to UC implementation, your partner should start by establishing what your objectives and priorities are. For example, is your business looking to relocate or consolidate office space? Are you planning to globalise or connect your remote teams better?
Your partner will then work alongside you during any phased rollout. If you choose to deploy a hybrid model at the start of your UC journey to minimise disruption to your business, your partner can build a strategy to transition your business to cloud only.
And most importantly, your UC partner will consider not just you but your customers too. With multiple options to communicate with your customers at your fingertips through UC, your customer doesn’t need to wait for a response on their query. Good news for everyone.
We’ve all been told there are plenty of fish in the sea and with so many UC options on the market, it is difficult to make a choice. But a solid UC solution is not about an endless shopping list of high-detail hardware features that your workforce is unlikely to use. Instead, your business needs an all-inclusive partner that can deliver complete cloud solutions, is flexible, reliable, and focused on customer service.
There's so much more to UC. To find out how contact centre support can work for your UC solution, check out our Unified Communications Toolkit below.