Communications Your Way – When You Want It, Where You Want It

Finding it hard to find people? Getting fed up with your company’s phone system? You’re not alone.

Computerworld Hong Kong ** just did a survey of its readers, and found that users are generally tired of their company’s phone and email systems - and are looking for alternatives with increasing enthusiasm. Two-thirds of the respondents, in fact, said they had serious concerns about their current system and saw considerable room to communicate better.

Just how did they want to communicate? Well:

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55 percent of the respondents were already using instant messaging regularly at work
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42 percent were using videoconferencing
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29 percent were using person-to-person VoIP tools like MSN Messenger.

In other words, the lack of decent communications at work means people are bringing their home communications technologies with them to the office.

And why not? Today’s Internet-based communications have opened up a whole new frontier for communicating. Once people are connected to the network, IM and presence-based applications let other people find out whether they’re available to talk with the click of a mouse. Another click, and they’re connected, via voice, video, text chat, Web conferencing or any other method.

Anywhere, anytime communications

The expectation of instant connectivity, regardless of which devices are being used, is a sign of the times. In this new era of communication - called ’Hyperconnectivity’ - people use many devices to communicate, and everything that can be connected to a network, is connected.

The Computerworld Hong Kong survey supported this:

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91 percent wanted presence capabilities built right into their corporate applications
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94 percent wanted easy access to voice, video, presence and other tools from within those applications

Judging by users’ overwhelming desire for better communications, it’s clear that Unified Communications (UC), which breaks down the walls between email, voice, video, IM, presence and other applications, is the thing that many of those dissatisfied two-thirds of companies are looking for.

Working on a document and want to reach someone? Type their name into the toolbar of any Microsoft Office application, and the ICA system will automatically find them, let you know if they’re available, and establish your communications session for you. OCS handles all the interaction with the Microsoft environment, while the CS 1000 handles all the back-end telephony stuff.

The end result is pure magic. You can reach the people you need, when you need them, using whatever devices or applications are most appropriate at the time. The end result: happier, more productive and efficient employees who see their company’s communications system as an asset - and not a liability.