Unified Communication does not believe in tears-easy to use and difficult to deploy

"Unified Communication" sounds easy: it enables employees to have the ability to communicate freely and switch between desktop phones, mobile phones, and other terminals, you can receive incoming calls, send and receive instant messages, and attend video conferences at will to improve productivity and work efficiency.

However, for IT managers of enterprises, deploying a unified communication system is actually not that simple. "When we need to migrate everyone to the unified platform, we have encountered great challenges ." Said Sonny Reid, global network director at Legrand North America.

Detailed plan is important

A Unified Communication system integrates a variety of technologies: people can reply to emails through voice messages, or read emails in the form of voice messages, which can convert instant messages into phone content, you can also receive phone calls from the office at the airport. This leads to the biggest challenge: When the above applications of enterprises adopt different technologies, it will become very troublesome to implement the unified communication system.

Elizabeth Herrell, analyst at Forrester Research, a market Research consulting firm, believes that the difficulties faced by enterprises in deploying a Unified Communication System include system interoperability, system stability, and user training. If any of these items is not properly resolved, the upgrade of the enterprise communication system will fail.

"Deploying Unified Communication is not a single solution, but a system project ." Herrell warned all IT managers interested in Unified Communication. "If we lack a clear understanding of the entire and all-in-one communication system and do not understand how the entire enterprise's users will benefit from the Unified Communication System, it is impossible to successfully deploy a Unified Communication System and give full play to its value.

Jay anth Angl, an analyst at Info-Tech Research Group in London, believes that some factors related to the basic network will also affect the deployment and implementation of the Unified Communication system. For example, deploying a Unified Communication System on a network that cannot support new data traffic will inevitably lead to failure. Therefore, the Unified Communication project requires a large number of detailed planning and testing.

Sonny Reid believes that to achieve the success of Unified Communication deployment, it is important to pay attention to details, such as helping end users learn how to enter and use different communication modes of the Unified Communication System. "There are no examples of successful deployment that can be copied or referenced. The only reason for success is that we have fully prepared and carefully planned the deployment ."

In addition, phased implementation and gradual implementation of unified communication can help enterprises avoid many accidents. Sonny Reid planned to deploy Cisco's Unified Communication System at one point and one point in Legrand's global branches. In this way, we can sum up and learn a lot of experience in the previous deployment and implementation process, including how to deploy, how to conduct user training, and how to use these experiences to the sites deployed later, you can avoid a lot of detours.

Joseph T. Massey Jr, CIO technical consultant at Atlanta Emory University. It is believed that, in order to successfully deploy and implement the system, it is essential to fully understand the operation of the entire system and the requirements of end users. Emory University's Unified Communication System uses Avaya's technology to integrate fixed telephone and mobile phone systems to implement VoIP, unified messaging, conferencing, and other communication functions. "The most difficult part of the implementation plan is to figure out how the system works ." Massey said. Some people need to fully understand the architecture and user requirements of the Unified Communication System, and be ready to solve possible problems at any time-and this takes time. "I think it is worthwhile to spend at least a few weeks preparing in advance. If you don't want your Unified Communication System to go down at any time, spend more time and effort ."

New and old combinations reduce costs

Jim o'brien, vice president of technical services at ReHabCare Group in St. Louis, said he could avoid minor faults in the early stages of the system and reduce the confusion of end users, in addition, by introducing the company's original PBX system and telephones into a new unified communication system, the overall deployment cost is reduced.

The company's Unified Communication System uses ShoreTel's equipment. "Taking full advantage of the old telephone system and integrating it into the new Unified Communication System can reduce deployment costs, so we don't have to replace the entire 450 fixed telephones in a weekend."

Bob Haldane, Operation analyst at Payworks, believes that using a Unified Communication System that is easy to design and manage can avoid many deployment and implementation problems. Since the company did not hire many specialized Linux technical experts, Haldane decided to use the Windows-based Unified Communication solution provided by Objectworld. "In this way, we will not feel powerless because we do not have enough technical staff in the deployment and application process ."

Haldane believes that it is very important to find a supplier that can provide fast response and reliable technical support services. "The system may be faulty at any time, so there must be a rescue phone that can be called at any time and accessible at any time. In this way, you can get technical support whenever a problem occurs ."

Angl of Info-Tech believes that the lack of adequate training will cause a lot of trouble for the newly deployed Unified Communication System. For example, the end users are confused and confused in the system, it is likely to cause a fault. "We must take user training as part of the overall deployment implementation and help users by setting help menus on the desktop. If you do not need these new features, the entire system is white ."

Legrand's Reid believes that the company's troubles in implementing Unified Communication deployment are largely due to insufficient training. "Because we have suffered a lot from this problem. If we can start from scratch again, we must do a good job in user training ."

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