Uncategorized Archives | Page 2 of 3

WHAT TO DO: IN A PANDEMIC

With COVID-19 spreading across borders and news headlines, concerns are rising about how to best stop the virus. Given the disease’s aggressive nature, WHO has recommended that every citizen do their part to keep things contained―whether it be more diligent hand washing, putting a temporary stop to travel, canceling events or just staying home.

“The bottom line is: we are not at the mercy of this virus.” WHO Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus maintains that, with global solidarity, coronavirus could be the first pandemic in history that is successfully controlled through individual caretaking measures.

Business across the globe are racing to do their part. In large part this means adopting a more remote work culture. And we see this happening in more frequency as news of coronavirus grows. Amazon has asked its Seattle employees to work from home. Seattle-based rock band Pearl Jam has postponed its North American tour. The University of Washington will close campus once staff and students leave for spring break, opting to continue classes online for the remainder of the semester. And in Austin, Texas, city health officials have cancelled the popular South by Southwest (SXSW) conference.

Although it appears that remote working is picking up speed, for many businesses this is bound to be more challenging than expected. In a recent webinar, analyst firm Gartner conducted a snap poll of the human resource leaders from Asia/Pacific who attended. Ninety-one percent indicated they’d implemented work from home arrangements in the wake of the coronavirus. However, they also said their two biggest challenges were a lack of technology infrastructure and discomfort from employees in remote working.

Like you, Mitel has been monitoring the evolving impact of the coronavirus and forming a complete understanding of how our customers will be affected. As part of our commitment to help you continue working with consistency and peace of mind, below we’ve shared some tips and guidelines that we use to make working from home more comfortable and effective:

Choose The Right Tools

An effective remote working setup is one that is just as good as at the office. And that requires the right combination of tools and processes. There’s no one-trick pony; some days video is what you need and other times chat and file sharing are more productive. The right setup for remote working will give you an array of options along with a good connection to your team and contacts. Let’s take a look at a combination that we find works well:

Cloud-Based Solution

All too often, employees working from home find with dismay that the documents or information they really needed are saved on the computer back at the office. It’s one of the most common challenges of working remotely. Yet when documents are stored in the cloud, employees can access them from any location. And it’s not just documents that are easily accessible. With the cloud, remote workers can also tap into the organization’s vast store of information, from team calendars and workspaces to a colleague’s spreadsheet and the corporate directory.

Meeting Tools

The right meeting tool can transform remote interactions into natural collaborations. MiTeam Meetings, for example, functions seamlessly so it feels like everyone’s working in the same room. One-click video calls allow for ad hoc, face-to-face conversations. You can all edit the same documents, stay updated on tasks, share screens and collaborate in real time.

An All-In-One Workspace

Perhaps the most valuable tool for remote working is one that lets you access voice, video, messaging, presence, audio conferencing, mobility and team collaboration from a single application. With a communications experience that’s consistent whether you’re at the office, mobile or at home, it doesn’t matter were you work. Connecting and collaborating becomes just as effortless and seamless.

Adjusting to remote working is simpler with this kind of persistent workspace. Capabilities like web chat and file sharing are always-on, so you can collaborate in real time. Team members can review, update and expand on project information. You can access project timelines, meeting notes, task lists and ad hoc project comments. Ultimately, you everything you need to interact and get work done without interruption.

Build The Remote Work Culture

Although remote working isn’t new, you and your team may not be prepared to work from home for longer stretches of time―possibly even weeks or months. Here are three ways you can help them adapt more quickly.

Help Everyone Get The Proper Setup

Having the right collaboration tool is the first step. It’s a good idea to survey employees and understand more about their home offices and whether their work environment is set up properly. For example, do they have a separate space to work away from the rest of the household? Is the Wi-Fi speed adequate for connecting via video or downloading large documents? The survey results will help you make appropriate recommendations for setting up home offices as well as understand what gaps you might need to fill.

Set Guidelines For Communication

In the office, managers have an easier time monitoring employee activity. For example, they know when a member of their team steps away from their desk to get a cup of coffee. But in a remote work scenario, if a manager can’t reach their employee she may jump to the conclusion that the work isn’t getting done.

Remote work requires a certain degree of trust, and transparency helps build trust. Set expectations with clear communication guidelines. For instance, ask employees to set status messages each time they step away from their desk or agree on what comprises an adequate response time.

Practice Ahead Of A Pandemic

The time to start building a remote working culture is now, before a pandemic infects your operations. Train your employees to work remotely by sending them home to work for a week or more. A mandated trial will allow you to work out the kinks, ensuring that your business will continue operating smoothly even during a crisis.

There’s another benefit of adopting a work-at-home work culture: you’ll be prepared for a future that is likely to involve a significant portion of the workforce working remotely. As Gartner points out, demand for remote working will increase as Generation Z enters the workforce.

You will need to build a culture and infrastructure that allows employees to communicate and collaborate effortlessly as if they’re in the same room, even if they are miles or time zones apart. For this reason implementing a work-from-home model serves two purposes: it enhances your ability to weather a pandemic and it paves the way for the workforce of the future.

Source:Mitel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

6 COMMUNICATIONS HABITS OF AGILE TEAMS

An agile team is “marked by ready ability to move with quick, easy grace; having a quick, resourceful and adaptable character.” Sounds good, doesn’t it? Who wouldn’t want their teams to be agile?

But creating a truly agile team is no simple feat. How do they behave? What qualities do they possess? In other words, what does an agile team really look like on a typical day? Of course, there are numerous communications habits that characterize agile teams. But some habits in particular can be enhanced with the right technology. Consider, for example, how hosted phone systems and solutions help teams collaborate, share ideas and get more done in their workday. Curious? Here are six communications habits of agile teams – and how technology enhances collaboration.

6 communications habits of agile teams

They’re Always Reachable.

You can’t be agile if you’re disconnected. A hosted collaboration and communications solution, such as MiCloud Connect with Mitel Teamwork, provides a single experience across devices and lets workers seamlessly move from one device to another. Team members are always “on” and thus more responsive. Agile employees work best when they have access to all communications features, even on their mobile devices, so they can keep working no matter where they are.

They Share Information In Real-Time.

Being quick and resourceful requires real-time communications. Hosted phone systems and solutions that mirror conversations across all devices in real time allow team members to keep their finger on the pulse of all projects and discussions. Single-click audio, video and web conferencing, in addition to individual and group chat, keep the lines of communication open at all times. No one feels “out of the loop.” The result? The team makes smart decisions based on the latest information and on a collaborative discussion that takes all viewpoints into account.

They Keep Team Members Informed.

Information is useless if it’s not shared with the right people in a timely manner. Persistent workspaces foster collaboration and allow users to chat, share files and even create tasks. Everyone has access to the information they need to do their jobs, and people know what they’re responsible for. The tasks performed by each team member complements those of their colleagues, with everyone working toward a well-understood solution. Of course, it’s not surprising that well-informed people accomplish more, since they don’t waste time searching for information or make decisions that have to be undone after the fact.

They’re Organized.

We dare you to find an agile team member who’s disorganized. Organization is a critical quality of responsive and adaptive teams. A robust hosted phone system such as MiCloud Connect makes it easy with task management and file sharing. Consolidate conversations and activities into one space for quick access to anything you need during the workday. Calendar and email integration take organization to a new level, keeping team members on top of events, client meetings and messages.

They’re Mobile.

In today’s world, agile and mobile go hand-in-hand. A communications solution is nothing if it doesn’t offer full mobile support. Features such as a mobile app for Android and iOS, Siri integration and Bluetooth support provide teammates the hands-free experience they need to stay connected without being tied down.

They Track Progress On Projects.

Agile teams reach the finish line faster by knowing exactly how far they’ve come and what they still need to do. A virtual workspace app such as Teamwork lets them know what activities still require attention. A personal dashboard makes it easy to see project status, propelling each team member toward their ultimate goal.

All you need is the right hosted phone system and solution

Ready for an agile team? All you need is the right communications technology. A hosted phone system and solution that provides innovative features and functionality can turn any team into a well-oiled machine whose information and ideas flow freely.

In addition to the system features mentioned above, other key items to look for in an agile-friendly system include:

CRM integration, so your team has instant access to customer and client data.
Flexible phone options, such as IP phones, softphones and a mobile app, so people can choose how they communicate.
Ad-hoc audio and video conferencing to share information and get answers to questions quickly.
Business SMS, so co-workers can text each other from their business lines.
Shared contact lists with search functionality, so team members can reach out to the right people when questions or issues arise.

Be graceful. Be nimble. Be responsive. Be adaptable. Be agile. Arm your team with a hosted phone system that makes it easy to talk, chat and share ideas and information easily and quickly. Create an environment that makes collaboration a breeze and completing projects a snap. Make your team the best version of itself. Give them the tools they need to begin your transformation today.

Source:Mitel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

HOW A TRUE COLLABORATION EXPERIENCE MAKES YOUR TEAM A SUPERSTAR

In today’s workplace, the office walls have dissolved. There are people on every team working from home or on the road, in coffee shops or in flight. Their colleagues may live and work in another city, across borders or oceans away. Yet even so, the pace of work continues to accelerate, which means collaboration and communication must be seamless and in real time.

MiTeam Meetings makes collaboration much more efficient and meetings increasingly productive. With all the information employees need available from a single workspace, team members find it easier to work, share and store project details.

Here’s how this new all-in-one collaboration app will enable you to work better:

Connect to the office from anywhere. As a 100 percent cloud-based video app, MiTeam Meetings makes all your contacts, data and documents available from any mobile device or desktop computer. You’re no longer tethered to a physical location. Wherever you are, you have easy access to all the details about your latest project.
Do away with multiple tabs. With a piecemeal solution, it’s all too common to end up with multiple apps, browsers and tabs open across your desktop or mobile device. MiTeam Meetings eliminates that hassle. One window provides a comprehensive view of your work and access to all your communications.
Stay on point. A key benefit of all-in-one solutions is that meetings become more focused and more efficient. When you’re switching among windows, it’s easy to get distracted by unrelated items. But when you never leave the environment, it’s easy to stay on-point and on-task.
Close the conversation gaps. How often do you start a conversation in chat, then realize you’d accomplish more with a verbal discussion? With MiTeam Meetings, you can seamlessly transition between talk, chat and even video.
Hop into a virtual meeting room. More than one person involved in resolving an escalating issue? You can also start instant meetings right from your chat thread or phone call.
Invite all experts―and then some. Many projects require input from a variety of professionals to move to the next level. With its multi-pane view, MiTeam Meetings allows up to 16 of your colleagues to appear on video at once. If more voices are needed, you can invite up to 100 participants to gather on a single meeting bridge.
Always be in the right place at the right time. No matter where team members are (a conference room in the next building, a hotel room 400 miles away or a home office on the far coast), they’re able to collaborate seamlessly. MiTeam Meetings allows you to communicate across time zones and geographies as though you were in the same room.
Keep everyone on the same page. When you want everyone’s input, passing around a key document by email or paper can feel terribly inefficient. But with file and screen sharing capabilities, you and your team can collaborate in real time. It’s faster and more efficient, and ensures everyone is clear on key decisions and agrees on next steps.
Stay on top of work in progress. Some projects have an extended incubation period or are simply ongoing. MiTeam Meetings provides you with a permanent virtual workspace where you can continue to collaborate on documents, in meetings and through conversations.
Avoid losing track of ad-hoc decisions. Projects are often complex with many moving parts. With multiple team members contributing, it’s easy to lose the thread of a conversation. With a persistent chat log, you always have simple access to key decisions or important discussions.
Be confident you’re securely connected. As you update a team document from the road, the last thing you need to worry about is who’s snooping the airport lounge Internet connection. Mitel has you covered. MiTeam Meetings was developed specifically with mobility and security in mind, so you can be sure your work stays under wraps.

As personal and effective as working face to face, MiTeam Meetings offers plenty of advantages. Providing a true collaboration experience, not only will your team will be more informed and reach decisions faster, but it’ll also set new productivity records.

Find out more about MiTeam Meetings or talk to us about how to get started.

This is why many employees use their own mobile devices and gravitate toward standalone messaging and video conferencing apps. But this approach isn’t ideal and, in an effort to be more connected, we find ourselves endlessly switching between applications and logging in multiple times.

For a true collaboration experience, today’s workforce needs an all-in-one solution that lets them communicate and collaborate across time zones as if they were in the same room. With the launch of MiTeam Meetings, Mitel emerges as the only vendor to provide this experience.

Source:Mitel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

TOP 10 BENEFITS OF A HOSTED PBX SERVICE

As part of your digital transformation, you’ve moved your customer relationship management (CRM) application along with some back-office functions, like finance, to the cloud. Doing so has made your business more agile. So, what’s next? If you’re wondering what other tools you can move to the cloud to support business growth, then this is the right time to consider all the advantages of a hosted PBX service.

As you would expect, a cloud-based communications solution offers the basics such as voice calling. But it also delivers many more features than your old phone system, including collaboration tools and integration with other enterprise applications, such as CRM. These additional capabilities mean a hosted PBX service, like MiCloud Connect, can deliver a long list of advantages for your business, from higher productivity to the ability to personalize the customer experience.

If you’re not sure how a hosted PBX service compares to a traditional phone system, you’ve come to the right place. Here’s a look at the top 10 benefits.

The Top 10 Benefits Of A Hosted PBX Service

Improved efficiency and productivity: If you could give your employees a tool to help them work faster and more efficiently, would you do it? Of course you would! A hosted PBX service is that tool. Employees can work from anywhere, while still having full access to the system through a smartphone application. Conferencing functionality, screen sharing and business SMS keep employees in constant contact, so they can get answers when they need them with a single click. CRM integration puts customer and supplier data at employees’ fingertips. The days of wasting time fumbling for passcodes and navigating between systems to get the right information are gone.

Quick installation and ease of use: Change often means downtime and lost productivity as employees learn the ropes of new technology. Not so with a hosted PBX. In fact, plug-and-play functionality means you’ll be up and running in no time with minimal disruption. Training is just as painless, thanks to an intuitive interface that’s easy to navigate. Employees won’t skip a beat. On the contrary, they’ll be singing the praises of a business phone system that helps them be more productive.

Integration with existing systems: Switching to new communications tools can be stressful, especially if you already have other systems in place. The good news is there’s nothing to fear when it comes to integrations with a hosted PBX service. In fact, you and your team will be working faster and better than ever thanks to integrations with calendars and email, CRM systems, web dialers and more. Employees gain the freedom to work with their system of choice, managing calls directly within third-party applications and browsers.

Scalability: It’s easy to add more lines and functionality with a hosted PBX system. Simply contact your provider and they can instantly scale your service up or down. This is an important benefit if your business is cyclical. Imagine having the capability to quickly power up during peak times and then cut back lines during slower periods – without incurring fees. Scalability also translates to innovation. New features and functionality are constantly being added. With a hosted system, you can start taking advantage of new features as soon as they’re available. And if a new function isn’t a good fit for your business, there’s no need to add it in and pay for it. A hosted PBX service is all about options. Think of it as a buffet of features that you can pick and choose from to create the most cost-effective, yet powerful, communications suite for your business.

Adaptability: We already mentioned how a hosted PBX service lets employees work from anywhere, but did you know how many options you get when it comes to the kind of phone you can use? From leading-edge IP desk phones to softphones and mobile apps, employees can talk how they want and when they want. They can even switch seamlessly from one phone to another while on a call – the ultimate in flexibility and freedom.

Enhanced collaboration: A hosted PBX service actually encourages collaboration among employees. Join a web, audio or video conference call with a single click. Use individual and group messaging to communicate with colleagues quickly and easily. Create workspaces for teams where you can chat in real time and share important information. The array of tools at your team’s fingertips keeps communication and the exchange of ideas flowing seamlessly. The result? A network of employees that are connected, informed and armed with the tools they need to perform their jobs to the best of their ability.

Superior customer support: Provide the ultimate in customer service with contact center integration. Call routing supports inbound and outbound calls, as well as web, email and chat requests. Reporting features and call recording let you monitor and track progress, so you can staff appropriately, improve call resolution times and provide better training for new call agents. Omnichannel support lets you meet your customers in their preferred medium, increasing satisfaction and loyalty.

Budget flexibility: With CFOs shifting more IT investment from CapEx to OpEx, a hosted PBX service becomes even more attractive. Why, you may ask? Well, for starters there’s nothing to install. You don’t have to purchase any hardware, which can be a costly capital expenditure. With the vendor managing maintenance, your talented IT team stays focused on business growth initiatives. What’s more, subscription pricing is more predictable, so the CFO has more control over his budget. And with mix-and-match options, you pay only for the services you need now – with the ability to add or remove as your business changes. The bottom line is you don’t pay for things you don’t want, and what business owner doesn’t like the sound of that?

Reliability and security: Regardless of the size of your business, reliability and security are critical to success. With a hosted solution, the stress and headache of maintenance and updates lies with the provider. This is where choosing a vendor with a solid reputation makes a big difference. MiCloud Connect, for example, is built on Google Cloud, so you can rest assured you’re getting a dependable and secure system so you can sleep easy at night.

Be a better manager: As odd as it may sound, a hosted PBX service helps you be a better manager. Detailed call logs in tandem with advanced analytics show you how sales and marketing campaigns are doing, how well customer service is performing and more. A hosted system that’s easy to use and manage lets you step out of the trenches and focus on more strategic initiatives to grow your business. Advanced features such as a mobile-first design, collaboration tools and native integrations keep your organization running like a well-oiled machine. Rather than fixing things under the hood, you can drive at top speed toward success.

Our list could go on, but we’re pretty confident that by now the advantages of a hosted PBX service are clear. A business phone system that puts advanced features in the hands of your employees while giving them the freedom to work anywhere – all while optimizing budget flexibility – is what you get. We challenge you to find a solution that can offer this winning combination. From where we stand, the choice is clear – hosted PBX for the win!

Source:Mitel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

WHY WE LIKE VIDEO MEETINGS BETTER

If you go to any telecommunications conference or tradeshow, one thing will be apparent: the era of video collaboration is here. Competition for a customer’s video meetings business has grown fierce as each vendor offers a “true collaboration experience”. Hardware vendors are providing all kinds of accessories from cameras to speakers to switches that make connecting in a video huddle room as easy as the press of a button. We as consumers are desperately trying to find some way to make meetings more productive. Why shouldn’t we? Mitel research discovered that more than a third of our workdays is spent in meetings. And, while we consider them ‘valuable’, meetings simply aren’t productive.

So, are video meetings a gamechanger for business? In many ways, yes.

Video Promotes Employee Attentiveness

As companies grow, the need for employees to collaborate remotely increases. In the past, audio and web conferences provided the perfect environment to multitask. It was not uncommon to have at least one participant offer a long pause after being asked a question. Much time was wasted in lack of attention. But, with video, you can see when someone isn’t engaged in the meeting; there are visual cues that they aren’t paying attention. And now it only takes being caught unaware once before you find people are more compliant and stop multitasking. The end result: meetings tend to be more productive.

Video Helps Remote Employees Feel Connected

Ubiquitous high-speed mobile internet combined with capable unified communications and collaboration tools have empowered more employees to work anywhere at any time and on any device. However an HBR article suggests that more than half of surveyed remote employees often feel disconnected from the larger organization and frequently report allowing issues to persist for days or even weeks compared to their locally based colleagues. These feelings affect employee performance and satisfaction and, ultimately, the organization suffers as employees quit.

Video allows employees to participate and have the level of human interaction that they may not have working from home all day. While it may be important to bring remote employees into the office for important meetings, it’s impractical and expensive. Video has proven to be a much better alternative. Remote employees who use video report feeling more connected to their colleagues and increased trust as a result. We are social creatures who need to feel part of a whole. Video can facilitate that ― and it can even save a person’s job.

Video Can Be More Useful

In each of these cases, the communication channels we used were siloed in such a way that we needed to move from one application for chat to another device for voice, to another application for video. It doesn’t have to be that way. When we consider our mobile devices, we can chat via text message, promote from the same interface to a phone call, and on the phone call screen, we can transition to a video call.

Now that we, as a workforce, have adopted all three of these communication channels (text, voice and video), it’s time to bring these together under one unified system. We don’t need to cross launch other applications to continue a conversation. These create communication seams that slow our ability to connect and cost more to support multiple applications than a single application that does all three.

Video Is The New Meeting Space

It’s clear that video brings value like no other to meetings. Participants not only gain a sense of comradery, but also new levels of focus, connection and communication. It’s the meeting method of choice and paving the way to more seamless and available communications across the enterprise. A bonafide game-changer, it is gaining momentum across the globe. Where does video live in your business? Has it become your new meeting space?

Source:Mitel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

Business Communication Mistakes To Avoid

Effective communication is at the heart of every successful business, no matter the size or industry. In today’s diverse global business environment, effective communication skills will definitely set you apart from your peers and competitors.

Here are some common communication mistakes we are all guilty of and it would be best to avoid:

Discussing Sensitive Information Through Email

How many emails do you send and receive a day… 10, 50, 100? It’s efficient and effective; without it, we’d all probably have a few problems to say the least! We are so reliant on email that it’s easy to forget the company privacy policy when trying to get through a busy day. However, with the leak of countless confidential emails belonging to prominent organizations over the last few months, now more than ever, it is important to think twice before we hit “send”.

Failing To Train New Employees On Their Desk Phones

It’s easy to assume that people know how to use their email client or smartphone, but what about their desk phone? With all of the models and variations out there, the features and functionality of a new desk phone may be completely new to your recent hire. That’s why it’s important to make sure they are trained on it. Any good business phone provider, including Introtel, will provide training services to your staff.

Failing to Respond to Voicemails

There’s no rule on acceptable time to respond to your voicemail messages. Instead of responding quickly with incomplete information, it is better to wait to respond when you are able to address everything in the message. Furthermore, if your caller asked you to call them back, don’t send an email. Likewise, if they give you the option to respond by email or by phone, use the method that best helps you communicate your point. The main goal is to give your caller the information they need, in the timeliest manner. In general, people in our offices respond to voicemails within the same business day or at most, up to one business day later.

Speaking More and Listening Less

To stay on top of any situation, stop speaking and listen. When you listen more than you speak, you open yourself up to learning and empathy — which in turn help you accomplish more.

Transferring Customers To Numerous Departments

Having dedicated representatives to take customer calls is one of the most important customer relationship management plans you can put in place. If you have ever called a company and been transferred to department after department, you understand how frustrating it can be. That’s why as a business, you should have a plan to deal with sales inquiries, complaints, and general questions. It may sound simple but all too often, businesses fail to plan for this and therefore risk losing customers.

Are you guilty of making any of the communication mistakes above? Let us know in the comments section!

By the experts at Introtel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

3 HURDLES TO ROLLING OUT COLLABORATION TOOLS, AND HOW TO OVERCOME THEM

As your business grows, life gets complicated. What could be achieved with a phone call before now involves a lot more people. To get their work done, your employees need to collaborate easily with each other, and with external partners and customers.

The workforce – and its expectations – are changing rapidly, too. A recent PwC study found that 41 percent of millennials prefer communicating via email or some other electronic means rather than in person or over the phone. To accommodate their preferences, businesses need a collaboration and communications solution that’s mobile-first and cloud-connected, like MiCloud Connect. Cloud communications provides them with greater flexibility and support for different styles of work.

BYOD And Shadow IT

Because our world is so connected – via email, social media, smartphones and more – employees walk in the door with all their own mobile devices, apps and expectations. On one hand, this bringing-your-own-device (BYOD) to work can save your small business money in hardware expenditures.

But here’s the rub. If your organization doesn’t provide good collaboration tools, employees will find their own. You can easily end up with a software Tower of Babel. In fact, one recent report found that the average employee uses more than 16 different cloud services, approximately three different content sharing services and up to three different collaboration services. Is your head spinning yet?

The result is lost productivity and inefficiency. Team members get frustrated because of the lack of consistency in the tools they use across different projects. The company can easily lose control of secure data. And it doesn’t look great to customers and partners, either. Using “freeware” and inconsistent or unreliable apps projects an unprofessional image.

Let's Roll

Your organization needs a consistent, easy-to-use set of team collaboration and communications tools. But before you make any decisions, it’s helpful to review some of the typical obstacles businesses encounter when rolling these out — and how you can overcome them.

Obstacle #1: “It’s A Really Cool Tool But It’s Not Integrated Into The Rest Of Our Systems.”

If this is the case, then it’s not a really cool tool. It’s going to be another headache. You need a collaboration solution that connects all the dots — email, calendar, files, your company directory. For example, a cloud communications solution empowers employees to manage calls from a web browser and connect directly from emails or calendar events. They can set up audio and video conference calls with a click and even invite outside parties. A robust collaboration tool should also include desktop sharing, individual and group chat, built-in VPN and business text messaging. You want to give your employees the ability to communicate and share ideas over multiple channels, switching easily from one to another.

A hosted Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) system can deliver all this and more. By choosing a cloud-based solution, you free yourself from legacy phone systems, so there’s no more worrying about software upgrades or buying new hardware.

A VoIP solution also allows your staff to be mobile, maintaining quality even when they’re on the road or working remotely. Because they’re connecting via a web portal, communications remain as consistent and reliable as if everyone was at their desk in the office.

Obstacle #2: “Is This Going To Make My Life More Difficult?”

Another common obstacle to rolling out new software is employee resistance. But maybe they’ve got good reasons to resist. Because a new tool can have a big impact on people’s daily work life, management has to explain its purpose and business value. For instance, will the tool help sell more product, reduce costs or improve productivity? Will it make employees’ lives easier? Any change is difficult, so people need to know what’s in it for them. If there isn’t a strong business case, people just won’t go along.

Here’s an example: McKinsey reports that on average, workers spend almost 20 percent of their time looking for information inside the organization or trying to track down colleagues who can help them. What if this new collaboration tool could help staff quickly learn the availability of a colleague? With presence technology, employees can set their status and how to best reach them.

To strengthen acceptance of the new tool, first identify your users and their needs. Do you have employees working out in the field or remotely? Do you have staff that needs to collaborate on projects, share files and conference often? How about sales and service staffers (e.g., the contact center) who need to quickly reach internal experts or field personnel? Any collaboration tool you choose must meet the needs of all these users.

Obstacle #3: “How Long Is This Going To Take To Learn?”

We’ve all lived through painful software upgrades. If the learning curve is too steep, you’ll lose people and, in the end, they won’t use the new system. That’s why it’s crucial to find a collaboration and communications tool that’s intuitive and easy to use right out of the box. You also need a vendor who’ll be there after the sale, ready to answer questions, provide training and customize a solution that works for your business.

The beauty of a BYOD environment is that there’s little to no learning curve. People already know how to use their devices. And with a VoIP phone solution, your staff can access all functions and business information through a web portal. The interface is consistent whether you’re sitting at your desk or in your car.

Finding The Right Collaboration Tool

When it’s time to simplify your communications system, make sure you cover these points with any vendor.

Does it have these team collaboration features? Be sure that your VoIP phone system will have easy and secure file sharing, point-to-point video and persistent communication across multiple channels. It should also enable real-time private and group chat and real‐time video chat from desktop and mobile devices.

Does it have robust team communications functions? Any VoIP phone system worth its salt will provide presence and awareness information, single-number reachability and dynamic profiles that modify communications options and routing. It should also have a mobile-first design so that employees can communicate from any web-enabled device.

Does the phone system work with our current IT framework? You want to make your life easier, right? Then you’ll need a system that complements your existing IT infrastructure so that it’s easy to administer and it lowers your total cost of ownership.

Source:Mitel

Share this post:

Want to learn more about one of the products or solutions mentioned above? Send an email to

SEVEN WAYS GIVING MACHINES A VOICE WILL TRANSFORM FIELD SERVICES

Science fiction scriptwriters relish in giving machines a voice. Just look at 2001: A Space Odyssey, Star Wars and Interstellar. Their movie robots are know-it-alls, quick to voice opinions, and act as foils, usually in the midst of a life-or-death repair.

It’s a good thing real machines aren’t as villainous as Hal the supercomputer. Today, the opposite is true: machines are do-gooders, more likely to make users happy. In a recent survey, 85 percent of IT decision-makers say they believe machine-to-people interactions will positively transform the customer experience.

But it’s not only customers who stand to benefit. When you give machines a voice in field services management, you create a world of possibility, from more efficient scheduling to opportunities for new revenue streams. Here are just a few of the ways giving machines a voice will transform the industry.

A chatbot solved my problem. The 80/20 rule applies to field services management: your teams will spend 80 percent of their time on 20 percent of repairs. But you can flip that rule with artificial intelligence. For example, the first place customers turn for help is your website. By offering chatbots as the first line of support, you reduce the need to dispatch a representative. Using artificial intelligence, chatbots are able to diagnose and resolve routine issues without the need to involve a human.
R2-D2 to the rescue. Remember how the little robot is always alerting Luke to engine fires and other mechanical breakdowns? Today, sensors can assess conditions and detect problems early. The Internet of Things makes it possible for machines to dispatch a technician before the customer is even aware of the issue. With machine learning, the mechanism may even be able to repair itself.
Traffic jam ahead. Rerouting. With GPS integrated into your field service management app, a technician has real-time access to optimized directions, speeding his journey to the customer site. The machine provides the most direct route and helps the tech avoid accidents, construction and other obstacles.
Give me context. Artificially intelligent contact centers, with CRM applications integrated, provide mobile field service teams with customer history and contact details. Service is streamlined further if you use APIs to integrate inventory management applications. The technician now has a real-time view into the availability of replacement parts. He can also upload an image and use artificial intelligence to identify the part and order it.
Dispatch made smarter. Machines can find and dispatch technicians using criteria such as location and skillset. The ability of AI to synthesize a wide variety of data points will be transformative for field services. “This disparate information — weather, traffic, skillsets, customer needs — will, when crunched by AI, improve field-service scheduling. The right technician can show up at the right place at a precise time, rain or shine,” Salesforce’s Michael Chou wrote in VentureBeat.
My truck is my office. Field service workers spend more time in their trucks than they do in the home office. By embedding communications into their field services management app, you can simplify the entire process. For example, with the ability to upload images on-site at the customer’s location, the field service technician can have a productive conversation with an office-based subject matter expert about how to complete the repair.
Mystery solved. When technicians face a problem they haven’t seen before, they ask a virtual assistant for help by speaking into their mobile phone. AI software can find the answer quickly by tapping into a database of problems and resolutions.

It’s no wonder 95 percent of IT decision-makers see customer experience improvements as an important part of the digital transformation. In field services management, giving machines a voice is about more than team efficiency. Opportunities abound for increasing both customer satisfaction and revenue.

Source:Mitel