Benefits In The Future of Unified Communications
The benefits of Unified Communication systems have emerged front and center for businesses of all sizes. Business communication is likely the number one priority, not only for business owners, managers, and employees, but for the clients and customers businesses serve each day. None of the products or services that are provided in the business world today would be worth anything if we didn’t have proper access to communicate across all these channels to carry the message of what is being offered. Not long ago, a world-wide pandemic unexpectedly changed all the rules of how businesses run and challenged the way we do things as a workforce. Those with the proper technology in place, and those willing to embrace new technology that evolves with the future of work, unified communications included, fared the best in these trying times.
UC has enabled many businesses to keep going forward in this remote work environment, almost as if nothing had happened. Given the spotlight on Unified Communications now, and given many businesses have signaled that remote work, at least in some form, will remain a part of the company even when it’s time to go back to a physical workplace, many people are asking, “what’s next” for UC?
“The Future of Work” Unified Communications Explanation
Let’s focus on Unified Communications before we get to that question, though. At the very least, UC should include presence and instant messaging capability as part of a mobile client who works on laptops and smartphones. And within that IM capability, there should be the ability to make phone calls on that client. And that client should not only be able to handle peer to peer phone calls for those on the client, but it should be able to handle phone calls from outside the enterprise network. In other words, the client should be able to take phone calls to and from your office phone number. Over the past few years, UC has also started to include screen sharing capability on the client and has started to include video conferencing and collaboration capabilities.
Framework for The Future of Unified Communications
We also need to understand the requirements of a future workplace because that will drive where UC goes. The future workplace will certainly involve anywhere, anytime, borderless collaboration, and communications. Even before the pandemic, companies were reducing office square footage per employee.
The Future of Unified Communications and the Planet
Many companies are also exploring ways to be more socially conscious, including becoming “more green.” This can involve supporting a myriad of carbon offset projects or initiatives that offsets what your company is putting into the environment. And some companies are exploring more mandatory work from home scenarios as that creates less driving and fewer carbon emissions. Being able to help customers remotely would also obviate the need for truck rolls or plane trips to see them. Utilizing video, incorporating IoT for data information about your customer deployment, and utilizing AI to help analyze all that data would play a large role in this overall vision.
The future of Unified Communications systems’ will continue to enable remote work, video, and potentially even tie into IoT communications is critical to realizing this overall vision effectively.
In other words, UC will need to enable more mobility, more collaboration, and more customer service, all while making it easier to use.
In next week’s blog, we’ll look more in-depth at the future requirements and how they might drive UC functionality.