5 Points to consider when deploying Converged voice and Data services

A recent report, CIO Guide to Fixed Mobile Convergance, outlines the importance of organisations understanding of what benefits can be gained for your business by bringing together your mobile and fixed line communications. This understanding is a pre-requisite to ensure that you choose the right platform. It should be "future proofed", secure, build on your existing infrastructure, enhance your workforces capabilities and provide a measurable cost benefit. It is only by prioritizing these reasons can you ensure that the solution you select is the correct one for your business. The top 5 points to consider are:-
1. Productivity
Increasing productivity is one of the most important drivers for implementing converged solution. With on-the-spot access to your organization’s fixed systems, mobile professionals can make more informed decisions. Having a single phone number that customers and colleagues can use to reach your employees no matter where they are means they are never out of touch. Workers can collaborate more quickly by accessing familiar desktop phone features like call transfer and extension dialing right from the mobile device.  If a call is missed, having a single voice mail box means workers spend less time managing multiple messaging systems.
2. Security
Wireless solution security helps to address the need to transmit voice and data in a highly secure manner through encryption, authentication, authorization, access control and firewall protection down to the wireless device level. As wireless solutions continue to build momentum and the subsequent number of wireless devices grows, the demand to manage and secure these solutions increases.
Converged solutions are designed to extend the security and control of your fixed voice network to mobile devices. With highly secure access, your organization can minimize the likelihood that it could be the target of mobile malware attacks, conference call snooping and other unauthorized access. Validation of a user’s voice network credentials over an encrypted data channel between the mobile device and the organization’s servers is leading edge technology and provides a highly secure solution.
3. Future Proofing
Most organizations have made significant investments in voice technologies, but voice communication is always changing and improving. Plotting a path to take advantage of innovation can help your organization maintain control while increasing employee freedom.
Converged Solutions allow your organization to leverage existing infrastructure by integrating mobile devices with fixed PBX-based desk phone functionality. Solutions that support multiple and mixed network technologies (IP/TDM) allow you to extend the life of your existing telecom capital investments while leaving the door open to new ones. Whether you are adding to your voice network or migrating to a new one, the right Converged solution should provide a simple upgrade path that helps keep costs in check.
4. Competitive Advantage
Enabling your mobile workforce to use their mobile device as a highly secure mobile desk phone allows them to answer customer queries faster, to beat competition and to help your organization grow in a global economy. Converged Solutions allows your organization to maintain ownership and control of its telephone numbers, making them a managed asset that customers and vendors are familiar with and that never leaves even when employees do. How frequent is this example, a customer knows a sales representative’s personal mobile phone number and that sales person moves to a competitor, the customer’s loyalty stays with the sales person resulting in the customer following the the sales person rather than staying with your organization.
5. Cost
A Converged Solution opens the door to a variety of cost-control opportunities. In some cases, calls placed from mobile phones to long-distance and international endpoints can be costly. The ability to extend class-of-service control to your organization’s mobile devices allows you to permit and restrict access to services like international and long-distance calling or pay-per-use (i.e., information) services. With Converged Solutions, you can further reduce costs by implementing policies that route mobile calls through your PBX and across the lowest-cost negotiated rate fixed-line networks. Directing mobile calls through your PBX also allows you to audit mobile usage through advanced reporting features which help to reduce time and cost associated with business use billing. These reports can help you better understand current usage patterns, allowing you to plan strategically for future mobile workforce expansion.

Equipping staff with the right tools can enhance productivity, motivation and staff retention. Highly secure mobile email and data applications help mobile workers stay in touch and up-to-date with a wide range of business issues. Extending that streamlined anytime, anywhere access to mobile voice applications is the next frontier in worker empowerment.
paul@mbusinessconsulting.com