Just a quick shout-out for our webinar this Thursday. Registration has been strong and I hope you'll join us. I'll be the featured presenter, and will speak to my recent white paper for ShoreTel about the three paths you can take to UC - premise, cloud and hybrid.
I'll steer you to my last post for the details - everything you need to know about the webinar and how to register is there.
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Monday, April 29, 2013
Do You Have a Mobile Strategy?
That's a fair question, as well as the focus of my latest article for Internet Telephony magazine. I've been writing a monthly column there for a while - Rethinking Communications - and in the current issue, this is the theme I'm exploring.
Mobility is ubiquitous and becoming even more so.There are many things you could do - and should do - but more importantly, you need a plan. This can be a huge topic, and my article touches on three aspects of that - BYOD, BYOI and service providers. All are different, and the mix will depend on your environment, as well as where you want to take mobility - which of course is all about having a plan.
I welcome you to read the article, and hopefully that will help focus your thinking on mobility. Following that, I hope you continue reading my future articles there.
Mobility is ubiquitous and becoming even more so.There are many things you could do - and should do - but more importantly, you need a plan. This can be a huge topic, and my article touches on three aspects of that - BYOD, BYOI and service providers. All are different, and the mix will depend on your environment, as well as where you want to take mobility - which of course is all about having a plan.
I welcome you to read the article, and hopefully that will help focus your thinking on mobility. Following that, I hope you continue reading my future articles there.
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Best in Biz Awards - am on the 2013 Judging Panel
Here's something new. I was recently invited by Best in Biz Awards International to be a judge for their 2013 program, which is underway now. Looks like I'm in pretty good company, including Canadian Business magazine, the Jerusalem Post and the Vancouver Sun. All told, there are 43 judges from 18 countries, including several from Canada.
The awards program is pretty extensive, with both international and regional categories, spanning a wide range of classes, including company, team and personal level awards. I don't know yet which categories I'll be judging, but several are in my scope, and they'll be determined soon. Will keep you posted.
If you're looking for recognition, awards submissions are open until May 17, and for more details, here's where you need to go.
In terms of the judging panel, here's the link with photos/bios for everyone. They haven't quite got my name right, but that will be fixed any day now. For more detail, the press release announcing the judges went out on Tuesday, and from there, feel free to explore the website proper, and follow the tweets - @BestinBizAwards.
The awards program is pretty extensive, with both international and regional categories, spanning a wide range of classes, including company, team and personal level awards. I don't know yet which categories I'll be judging, but several are in my scope, and they'll be determined soon. Will keep you posted.
If you're looking for recognition, awards submissions are open until May 17, and for more details, here's where you need to go.
In terms of the judging panel, here's the link with photos/bios for everyone. They haven't quite got my name right, but that will be fixed any day now. For more detail, the press release announcing the judges went out on Tuesday, and from there, feel free to explore the website proper, and follow the tweets - @BestinBizAwards.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
UC Webinar with ShoreTel - May 2
Busy week here, and I've got another webinar to tell you about that I'm doing. This one is with ShoreTel, and it's coming up quickly - next Thursday - May 2 at 2pm ET.
I recently wrote a White Paper for ShoreTel about the virtues of three paths to UC - premise-based, cloud and hybrid, and as you may know, they are one of a few vendors who can support all three. Each has its place depending on your situation, and both businesses and channels are struggling to make the right choice.
You're welcome to download that paper any time, and if these choices are on your radar, then you'll want to sign up for this webinar. I'll be sharing highlights from my White Paper, and will be joined by a ShoreTel customer as well as a channel partner.
Collectively, this will give you a broad perspective on the drivers for each scenario along with hands-on realities from the field. We're not doing this to tell you which path is best for UC, but to provide guidance for you to decide which path is best for your needs.
I hope you can join us, and to get you there, here's the landing page with all the details along with the registration form.
I recently wrote a White Paper for ShoreTel about the virtues of three paths to UC - premise-based, cloud and hybrid, and as you may know, they are one of a few vendors who can support all three. Each has its place depending on your situation, and both businesses and channels are struggling to make the right choice.
You're welcome to download that paper any time, and if these choices are on your radar, then you'll want to sign up for this webinar. I'll be sharing highlights from my White Paper, and will be joined by a ShoreTel customer as well as a channel partner.
Collectively, this will give you a broad perspective on the drivers for each scenario along with hands-on realities from the field. We're not doing this to tell you which path is best for UC, but to provide guidance for you to decide which path is best for your needs.
I hope you can join us, and to get you there, here's the landing page with all the details along with the registration form.
Monday, April 22, 2013
UC Summit Preview - Lync and the Channel Opportunity
Am wearing my UCStrategies hat here, as the 2013 UC Summit is coming up and starts this Sunday. I'll be there for my second time and am very much looking forward to it.
This time around I'll be speaking as well, and am co-presenting with fellow UCStrategies Expert, Kevin Kieller. We'll be looking at the business opportunity Lync presents to channel partners. It's a mixed bag, but there is money to be made, and more importantly, Lync offers a path to keep your customers.
I'm going to steer you now to a more detailed writeup of mine about the opportunity, which has now been posted on the UCStrategies portal. There's more information there as well about the Summit, just in case you haven't made up your mind yet. Hopefully, my preview article will push you off the fence, and I hope to see you in La Jolla!
This time around I'll be speaking as well, and am co-presenting with fellow UCStrategies Expert, Kevin Kieller. We'll be looking at the business opportunity Lync presents to channel partners. It's a mixed bag, but there is money to be made, and more importantly, Lync offers a path to keep your customers.
I'm going to steer you now to a more detailed writeup of mine about the opportunity, which has now been posted on the UCStrategies portal. There's more information there as well about the Summit, just in case you haven't made up your mind yet. Hopefully, my preview article will push you off the fence, and I hope to see you in La Jolla!
Cybersecurity Webinar for Smart Grid - May 8
Cybersecurity is a complex topic, and I follow it to some degree in the VoIP and IP communications spaces. While the threats are real, it's easy to ignore them until something bad happens. I know this sounds eerily familiar to what happened last Monday in Boston, but these threats are not well understood, and the bad guys just need to be a step ahead of where you feel safe to do their thing.
Some of you know that Smart Grid is another market I stay busy in, and frankly, I can't think of a bigger cybersecurity target to be worried about than our power infrastructure. I'm pretty attuned to this given my focus on the growing overlap between Smart Grid and communications, especially when IP is layered across this.
On that note, I'm wearing my Zpryme hat on May 8, when I'll be moderating a webinar on the importance of this topic for utilities. They have a lot of catching up to do, and as Smart Grid matures, cybersecurity will pose more of a risk unless the right precautions are in place. Joining me will a speaker from the webinar sponsor, ViaSat, along with a cybersecurity strategist from UTC.
This should be of timely interest to anyone in the Smart Grid space, as well as those interested in cybersecurity issues for vertical markets - and this is a pretty big one. Details to register can be found here, and I hope you can join us on May 8.
Some of you know that Smart Grid is another market I stay busy in, and frankly, I can't think of a bigger cybersecurity target to be worried about than our power infrastructure. I'm pretty attuned to this given my focus on the growing overlap between Smart Grid and communications, especially when IP is layered across this.
On that note, I'm wearing my Zpryme hat on May 8, when I'll be moderating a webinar on the importance of this topic for utilities. They have a lot of catching up to do, and as Smart Grid matures, cybersecurity will pose more of a risk unless the right precautions are in place. Joining me will a speaker from the webinar sponsor, ViaSat, along with a cybersecurity strategist from UTC.
This should be of timely interest to anyone in the Smart Grid space, as well as those interested in cybersecurity issues for vertical markets - and this is a pretty big one. Details to register can be found here, and I hope you can join us on May 8.
Thursday, April 18, 2013
UCStrategies Podcast - Innovation Roundup
Don't ask where the time goes - it just does. Blogging for me lately has become like VoIP - it's on a "best efforts" basis - not because I have nothing to say - am just too busy. Also, as you hopefully know, my writing pops up regularly in a few places, so I'm not that hard to find.
One thing I try to do regularly is participate in the weekly UCStrategies podcast, and Dave Michels led a great topic a few days back. Instead of talking about what all the majors are doing to tighten their grip on global domination, the focus was on innovation we're seeing from the smaller guys. As usual, this is where most of the cool ideas percolate up from, and each of us has our own circle to draw from.
I chimed in near the end, talking mostly about Fonolo, and what they're doing with virtual queuing to reduce hold times in the contact center. Aside from making the customer's life easier, this actually saves the contact center a lot of money, and I wanted to cite Fonolo because their solution is built around a specific business problem rather than being a catch-all for a lot of things.
I also added some thoughts to two vendors mentioned earlier in the call - Vidtel and Esna Technologies. Video got a lot of attention on the call, and Vidtel is emerging as one to watch, along with BlueJeans. For transparency purposes, I'll note that I'm an Advisor to both Fonolo and Vidtel, but that doesn't mean I can't speak well of them objectively, especially when I'm also talking about other vendors in a similar light.
Enough about that - it's a solid podcast, and you can check it out right here, right now.
One thing I try to do regularly is participate in the weekly UCStrategies podcast, and Dave Michels led a great topic a few days back. Instead of talking about what all the majors are doing to tighten their grip on global domination, the focus was on innovation we're seeing from the smaller guys. As usual, this is where most of the cool ideas percolate up from, and each of us has our own circle to draw from.
I chimed in near the end, talking mostly about Fonolo, and what they're doing with virtual queuing to reduce hold times in the contact center. Aside from making the customer's life easier, this actually saves the contact center a lot of money, and I wanted to cite Fonolo because their solution is built around a specific business problem rather than being a catch-all for a lot of things.
I also added some thoughts to two vendors mentioned earlier in the call - Vidtel and Esna Technologies. Video got a lot of attention on the call, and Vidtel is emerging as one to watch, along with BlueJeans. For transparency purposes, I'll note that I'm an Advisor to both Fonolo and Vidtel, but that doesn't mean I can't speak well of them objectively, especially when I'm also talking about other vendors in a similar light.
Enough about that - it's a solid podcast, and you can check it out right here, right now.
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