Models for adopting Unified

Communications

Avinash Rao
avinash.rao1@wipro.com
Wipro Consulting Services

ISPIM conference 2008 at Singapore Management University, Singapore

 Models for adopting Unified Communications

1. INTRODUCTION

Businesses today are facing unprecedented pressure in sustaining their performance with
utmost efficiency. Organizations are driven by multiple factors like globalization, fast decision
cycles and distributed team collaboration which require them to work at an ever increasing
pace. There is undying pressure on employees to constantly amplify productivity and maximize
profits of the organization to the best possible extent.

With enhanced market shares and customer satisfaction being key goals of any organization,
strong communication systems and effective operations are key drivers to success. An
organization can achieve efficiency, improve collaboration and enable new ways of work if they
have a strong, seamless communication system.

Enter Unified Communications.

2. UNIFIED COMMUNICATIONS (UC)

UC is a business process which aims at simplifying and integrating all forms of communications.

UC is a collective of capabilities that enables:

-
- Seamless user experience using a variety of devices;
- Communication across older and newer generation infrastructure, using quick and
secure instant messaging;
- Presence to help individuals connect with others around the corner or around the globe;
- Web and video conferencing capabilities that facilitate rich and productive team
collaborations.

UC is often implemented with a combination of software and hardware. A successful

implementation of UC can automate and consolidate all forms of human and device
communications into a common user experience.

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 Models for adopting Unified Communications

3. ADOPTION OF UC

There are three basic objectives (with a respective implementation approach) for adopting UC in
organizations:

 Cost reduction: Replace the existing telephony and communications infrastructure with
an IP network based infrastructure.

 Increased collaboration: Communicate seamlessly across time zones over multiple

media with the use of presence.

 Generation of a shared global context: Usage of chat, wikis, blogs and other social
components of a unified communication strategy so that teams across the world share
their thinking and develop a shared context.

3.1 Cost Reduction

Companies opt to replace their existing communication systems with an integrated IP based UC
system. Desktop and telephony communications are integrated (Voice, Data and Conferencing)
to provide a superior communication infrastructure at reduced Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).
Companies are realizing 20 to 40 percent reductions in their annual voice operating costs
compared with legacy networks.

Usage of UC has had significant impact on the IT overall cost of the company. Generally, the
costs to the company for voice communication are not fully visible to IT departments, as many
elements are hidden in the operating costs of other business functions, and these costs are
reduced or eliminated by the use of UC.

While this approach provides companies with quick, incremental gains, it is unlikely to transform
the organization; in addition, competitors will soon gain parity.

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 Models for adopting Unified Communications

3.2 Increase Collaboration

Companies deploy presence in order to increase decision making and responsiveness, providing
flexibility in communication end points (videoconferencing, phone, email, handheld devices).
Teams seamlessly share code, files and data across the common infrastructure while there is a
huge break down time zone and organization barriers.

UC’s Collaborative Pillars

Pillars UC Solution
Anywhere-access to real-time and synchronous
communications
Unified voice mail, e-mail, contact, calendar, IM, and presence
data
Enriched applications with presence-enabled contextual
Unify Business
communications
Communications
Powerful, built-in mobile and wireless access
Extensible platform for integrating collaboration with line-of-
business applications
Security services allowing secured communication with
business partners and customers
Help get distributed teams “on the same page” and
collaborating together
Enable decentralized authoring with team workspaces, blogs
and wikis
Provide structured authoring with centralized workflow and
process controls
Empower Teams Through Include presence, IM, and conferencing capability directly in
Workspaces team workspaces and portal sites
Allow teams to work together from different locations, within
and across organizational boundaries
Integrate document and records management with desktop
productivity applications
Create team dashboards for tracking and monitoring key
performance indicators

Deliver line-of-business applications directly to mobile devices

Provide mobile access to people and corporate data
Reduce costs with remote device management and
Enable Work Anywhere
administration
Lower telephony and travel costs with powerful, available
communications services

Increasing collaboration provides organizations with benefits from increased responsiveness and
better decision making that far outweigh the investments in UC infrastructure.

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 Models for adopting Unified Communications

3.3 Generate a Shared Global Context

Companies use blogs, wikis, and other interactive UC tools to develop real time collaboration
and solutions to problems and bottlenecks, along with an effective way to disseminate
information. Communication Enabled Business Processes (CEBPs) are developed across partner
companies. Boundaries between work groups and teams are blurred and barriers to
communication reduced as information dissemination, feedback and discussions happen in real
time.

A CEBP example

In claims processing, the organization’s goal is to decrease claim close times and improve their
closure rate. However, this process is often hampered by several inefficiencies - the paperwork
process can be manually intensive; time-sensitive dependencies on member signatures exist,
resulting in significant delays in the approval process.

A CEBP solution would be implemented to automate and communications-enable the claims

process with embedded UC services like: reminders, alerts, and notifications.

Quantifiable business results could include: decreased close times; greater agent/specialist
productivity, enabling them to spend more time adjusting claims rather than fielding calls on the
claims; increased revenue and member satisfaction/retention.

4. A ROADMAP FOR UC

In order to enable new ways of work and innovation, organizations must adopt CEBPs and
answer the question – what can we do with this capability that we can’t do today? The roadmap
below helps customers understand their current as well as desired capability and develop a
roadmap to develop the UC capabilities.

A roadmap for adopting Unified Communications

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 Models for adopting Unified Communications

Conclusion
Before implementing Unified Communications, companies need to understand the primary
benefit that they desire from Unified Communications. Identifying the main benefit helps
companies understand the best implementation of UC for the organization. Implementations
can provide benefits ranging from cost reduction to increased collaboration to a infrastructure
to develop a shared global context.

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 Models for adopting Unified Communications

About the Author

Avinash Rao is a Sr. Business Consultant with the Product Strategy and Architecture (PSA)
consulting practice in Bangalore, India. To understand how Wipro PSA can help you for your
Unified Communications implementation, please contact avinash.rao1@wipro.com .

About Wipro Technologies

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