Unified Communication Project based on user requirements

In the face of more and more enterprises applying unified communication projects to plan their own communication structures, we interviewed Director Avaya for an introduction, so through her conversation, we can also see that the goal of the Unified Communication Project is from the user's perspective, and our philosophy is also based on the user.

What is the task of information technology? Is it simply that the technology is equipped with the latest and best application software and infrastructure? Should I use technology to solve business problems?

Unified Communication is still a hot technology in the industry. Of course, some companies' Unified Communication Project plans are not a requirement, but a question raised to avoid the leader's worries about backwardness.

Many IT companies have handed over the task to Avaya's managing director of Unified Communication Consulting, Said Shane Yu. He pointed out that this should be treated as a scientific project. "Many of my customers say they do not need to evaluate their needs," Yu said. "They only invest in fashion. I tried to dissuade them, but this still exists ."

In fact, this method is flawed. The technical requirement evaluation should be the first task for an enterprise to start the Unified Communication Project. First, it will affect the supplier selection process. Secondly, it helps determine which applications should be included in the Unified Communication. More importantly, the demand evaluation will provide criteria for determining whether a project is successful or not.

"Some companies ignore the importance of technology demand assessment," says Elizabeth Herrell, vice president and chief analyst at Forrester Research. "The IT department runs a project normally and cannot persuade financial personnel to increase staffing because IT doesn't mean everyone needs IT. The IT department should use instances to describe that they have provided an updated and better way of communication and cooperation. If the technical requirement evaluation is the first step in the deployment of unified communications, it should be done correctly. The first thing we need to do is make sure that appropriate candidates are included from the beginning of the project ."

Technology is not the dominant factor in Demand Evaluation

The company's IT organizations will eventually engage in a Unified Communication Project, and the success or failure of the project deployment will become the evaluation criteria of IT institutions. However, if the senior manager issues an out-of-Practice Instruction, the technical director should correct this opinion and tell him that the business department needs to be involved from the very beginning of the project.

Herrell said: "Demand Evaluation is inseparable from the IT department, and the business department must also participate in decision-making. We found that IT procurement is often the result of collective decision-making, including not only data network experts and telecommunications experts, but also decision makers from other business departments. Therefore, when you start or want to establish a unified communication, the feedback from the business department is very important, because the purpose of the Unified Communication is to help them solve the difficult problems in their work.

Yu said that if you receive instructions to deploy a Unified Communication Project, the IT project owner should insist on cooperating with the business department manager to involve the business department and make IT a stakeholder. "We have noticed that in many cases, the source of project development is from the business department," Yu said. "We found that the sales business owner, regional service and contact center owners are often keen to do this. Because they understand that their competitors or people in other fields are using unified communication ."

Subdivided users

The first step in demand evaluation is to divide users, Yu said. Employees in different business departments have specific communication and collaboration needs. "First, we should segment their customer groups, because unified communication involves many different technical topics," he said. "Most companies do not have only one overall way of working. Different technologies have different applicable groups ."

Yu said that 80% of company employees can be divided into four categories. Once the specific communication needs of each group are determined, the deployment can be carried out for each group. After the deployment is successful, it can be further promoted, this includes promoting implementation to the last 20% employees that are not easily defined.

He said: "One type of people often go on business trips, and the other type is remote office workers. The third category may be a collaboration team in multiple locations. For example, many marketing or research and design teams are distributed across the world. The focus of the Unified Communication Project planning is to coordinate these teams, just like working in the same room ."