Lately, there’s been significant hype about what unified communications is and isn’t, but what’s more important is what it can do for companies: its impact on the business itself as well as its processes.
Unified communications has two main objectives in the business context: providing ability to access a wide variety of communication channels from a single interface, and reducing human inactivity through business process integration. Another important thing to realize is that unified communications is not a solitary product or technology – rather, it’s a solution founded on a variety of formerly siloed components that affect how work tasks are completed for individual employees, workgroups, and the company or organization as a whole. The features of effective NEC unified communications systems are:
- Call control and/or switch integration
- Telephony and online presence and a rules engine
- Messaging: email, voicemail, instant messaging, short message service, unified messaging
- Conferencing: audio, video, web
- Collaboration: document sharing, white boarding, shared workspaces
- Mobility
- Unified client on: softphone, desktop, mobile device, Web portal
There is no “one size fits all” approach when it comes to unified communications; every business has its own unique set of goals and requirements, and will utilize the components that suit their specific needs.
Here are some concrete examples of how NEC unified communications systems can help businesses be more successful:
1. Patient Data Management
The differences between a traditional phone system and an IP telephony system are significant in the context of healthcare and patient information management. IP telephony enables managers to dial directly from their address books and see pop-up windows that come up on their computer screens that show information about a patient’s next appointment when there is an incoming call. Unified messaging also gives them the ability to see and manage voice mail from their email inbox.
2. Real-Time Customer Service Agent Training
Unified communications can serve as a great tool for agent training as it allows more than one person to be on a call simultaneously. When an experienced agent handles a customer service issue, a relatively skilled and inexperienced agent can receive real-time training by listening to the call. This type of training approach is especially useful in the current era of virtual call centers in which an agent from a remote location can undergo training without having to be at the call center’s office premises.
3. Product Availability Verification
When a customer walks into a retail store to inquire about a particular product that they saw in your online store, the store floor salesperson can immediately access the unified communications system’s IP phone information section, browse for the item on the Web, get the product code, and check for availability and presence of the concerned supply staff on the IP phone via CRM integration. Contact them through audio/video/chat call through the same device and answer all customer queries.
4. Information Dissemination in the School Setting
Advanced unified communications systems encompass a broadcast structure that can deliver important information district wide. In the event of an alert or an urgent message, the school principal can call multiple available extensions in the system simultaneously. The principal’s message will be announced on all extensions whether or not there’s someone to answer the call.
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