Five Key Takeaways from Day 1 of UC Expo 2017
At times, being in a Microsoft office, one can forget just how much we’re part of the fabric of the way people live and work every day: from the way we make our to-do lists, to the way we analyse complex information. That’s why it’s always refreshing to get to an event like last week’s UC Expo, the largest unified communications and collaboration event in Europe, at the ExCel in London. While there was a lot covered over the course of the two-day event, here were my five key takeaways:
1. Communication and collaboration are evolving
A few interesting statistics from Tiffany Wissner, Microsoft’s Senior Director, Skype for Business: employees are on twice as many teams as five years ago. The amount of time employees spend engaged in “collaborative” work has increased 50%. As we see this increase in collaborative environments, we also see the need for new ways of working together. There’s a need for a universal toolkit for collaboration: one where email, chat, video, voice and content collaboration all work together seamlessly (as they do in Office 365). But then Tiffany discussed the evolution of collaboration in Microsoft Teams which delivers on four core promised to create a digital workspace for high performing teams: chat for today’s teams, a hub for teamwork that is customisable for each team, and provides enterprise security that teams can trust. We think this approach to collaboration will take customers’ unified communications programs to the next level.d
2. Keeping you connected requires a lot of moving pieces
One of the things that struck me, as I wandered through Microsoft’s Partner Zone was just how many ways Microsoft, and our partners, are helping to connect users and make their unified communications journey a success. This included folks like Nexus Open Systems who are helping businesses plan and execute their move from legacy systems to true unified communication using Skype for Business. There was Polycom, who can integrate existing video solutions with their secure voice, video and content solutions to work seamlessly in Office 365.
Perhaps my favourite stop in the Partner Village was at the Plantronics booth. As someone who works in a lively (i.e., very noisy) collaborative environment, I’ve come to appreciate how much of a difference having the right endpoint device can make. In chatting with one of their account managers, he described how Plantronics’ experiences in a similarly lively (i.e., very noisy) environment at a Microsoft campus led to the development of the Voyager Focus UC with advanced noise cancelling and immersive stereo sound.
3. “If you build it, they will come” isn’t a strategy for UC
Here’s a stark statistic from the sessions at UC Expo: 70% of change initiatives fail to meet their goals. Just adopting the latest unified communications technology (whether on-premises, in the cloud or in a hybrid model) isn’t a recipe for success. A few different presenters provided some practical advice for getting the most of one’s unified communications initiative. Chris Martini (VP Skype for Business at Voss) described a systematic approach to UC that includes understanding and maximising legacy data, and taking into account key elements such as bandwidth, endpoint devices and geographical differences in one’s strategy. Perhaps the most useful (and easy to remember) approach Chris described were his four A’s – adoption, assurance, analytics and action – as the building blocks for successful deployments.
Microsoft also provided practical tips for successful deployments in their aptly named session “Learn how to successfully deploy Skype for Business.” If you’re responsible for UC adoption, success is as much a mindset as it is a methodology, not about mandating new business processes, but viewing your organisation’s users as partners who you take with you on the journey. Our research has shown that this approach increases speed of adoption, and subsequently your return on investment. And while we have a number of tools to help you have a successful Skype for Business deployment (from Value Discovery Workshops, to Customer Immersion Experiences, to Fast Track), it starts a partnership approach to ensure that both technology and end users are on the journey together.
4. Artificial intelligence has now entered the meeting
While much of the conversation on the floor and in the sessions was about enabling people through unified technology, there was a definite thread about the way we engage with machines though artificial intelligence. Simon Michael, Senior Tech Evangelist at Microsoft, talked about how the democratisation of AI is bringing bots and natural language processing to unified communication. While he discussed the availability of these APIs for all developers through Microsoft Cognitive Services, I couldn’t help thinking of the practical applications within a UC setting.
The natural scenario that comes to mind is real-time voice translation in Skype for Business. Imagine a Skype meeting between stakeholders in Tokyo, Sao Paolo, Berlin and Slough – all speaking their native languages, but all understanding each other through the artificial intelligence built into Microsoft Translator. Another near-term application – which developers can create now using the Microsoft Bot Framework – is a chat bot integrated into other parts of Office 365 that could participate in calls: taking notes, providing verification (e.g., “hey Cortana, did we cover the FY18 Operations Plan last time?), or assigning follow-up actions in Teams.
5. The future of work is still about people
This idea of artificial intelligence interwoven in our daily lives, creates quite a bit of buzz, and was one of the main topics covered in the panel session “The Future of Work.” In addition to panellists from Vodafone and Fuze, Rich Ellis, Senior Director for Microsoft Office discussed the proliferation of devices and meetings, and the potential for AI to help us keep on top of this deluge of information. As Vodafone’s Phillip Fumey noted, natural language processing (a function of AI) could be used to help capture the 80% of organisational knowledge that is never captured.
Keeping the collaboration conversation going
All in all, day one of UC Expo provided a lot of food for thought, from moving from legacy telephony to bots and AI. It is, of course, just a starting point for a wider conversation on the ways that unified communications and collaboration is changing how we live and work. To continue with the discussion, download our ebooks Five Reasons your IT Team Will Benefit from a Collaboration Suite, and Five Tips for Improving your Collaboration
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