As IT managers, how often do we have to explain why we
cannot do things with our networks? When our business managers have
problems or plans, how frustrating is it when we have to explain
how long things will take, or how much they will cost? How nice
would it be to respond with, 'yes, no problem'? Or even to suggest
improvements that we can make for the business? Now that would
really make you a hero!
Integrating your voice and data networks could help you and your
team to finally get on the front foot. By putting a new level of
simplicity and flexibility at the core of your company, it allows
you to be responsive to the business, and the business to be
responsive to its customers.
How can convergence make you more responsive to the business? Let's
look at some of the typical scenarios we have found when BT helps
customers with convergence.
For example, your finance director might suggest putting the
accounts, admin and purchasing teams together so that they can work
more effectively. They can all fit into one of your rooms, but that
means moving people upstairs, reconnecting them all to the same
file and print services, and then setting up the incoming phone
numbers to 'hunt' for people in the right teams. Wouldn't it be
great to say you could do that quickly with minimum disruption to
you, the teams involved, customers or suppliers?
Or maybe your MD wants to open a new office in the north. She has a
limited budget, but wants calls to be routed transparently between
the offices, and she wants people in both offices to have access to
centrally-held company information. Wouldn't it be great to tell
the MD that you've already planned for this scenario, and that
essentially you just need an extension of the network?
Or, then again, maybe your sales director wants to grow sales by
recruiting new people to cover Wales, the West Country and
Scotland. The FD is worried about the cost of cars, petrol, hotels
and wasted travel time. The obvious solution is to recruit people
local to each area and have them work from home. Wouldn't it be
great to say that you've planned for this and can provide remote
access for data and voice both quickly and easily?
At BT, we find customers look to a converged network to make these
scenarios easier, faster and cheaper to deal with.
With voice and data on the same network you can unplug those people
downstairs and plug them back in upstairs. With IP telephony, a few
minutes' work on your PC can have all the phones ready for use
upstairs and the customer and supplier phone numbers set up to
'hunt' for a free person from the right team.
With a single network and security regime, that second office can
be plugged straight in with a new WAN connection. With IP telephony
there's no need to order a new voice switch - just plug in some IP
phones, set them up from your PC and everyone is part of the same
phone system.
And those new sales people? With a converged network they can be
connected to the network, secured with the central security regime
and plugged in to the office voice system in double quick
time.
So a converged network lets you respond quickly. The basic
infrastructure is both in place and flexible, administration and
changes are simpler and faster, and big changes (such as new
firewalls or voice switches) are not required when new sites or
remote workers are added.
Critically, a converged network gives you the confidence to say
'yes', and an assurance that changes need not take over your
life.
Simply put, going for convergence today means that you 'can do' in
the future. It's often impossible to predict what changes are
coming, but with convergence you put a level flexibility and
simplicity into your IT, that lets you respond like a hero. n