Keeping a digital workforce in the loop with unified communications

Illustrating the fundamental shift in corporate dynamics in the past decade, tech expert Robert Strohmeyer juxtaposed the office place he knew at the onset of the 20th century with how the modern office place functions today in a recent article for PCWorld.

As he mentions, the office in 2000 was defined by synchronicity. Employees all conducted their daily duties under the same roof, entered the office at a predetermined time, broke at uniform times for lunch, were expected to be in the same conference room for meetings and communicated primarily in-person.

Fast forward to March 19, 2012, when Strohmeyer composed the article. As he states, the modern day office is asynchronous in that advances in technology have enabled employees to work on their own schedules with a newfound ability to maintain productivity outside the office and while traveling.

And in this infrastructure where live real-time meetings are becoming functions of the past, Strohmeyer mentions that social collaboration tools – often in the form of unified communications (UC) – are necessary to maintain cohesion in an increasingly mobile workforce.

For example, with collaborative project management tools afforded through a UC platform, all corporate updates and maintenance throughout every department will be shareable and trackable.

With synchronous chat, multiple participants can be collaborating on a single project even if they are geographically dispersed by thousands of miles.

And with video conferencing capabilities inherent to UC platforms, Strohmeyer mentions that all employees are able to rely on one collaborative toolset that provides valuable face time for “colleagues who seldom see each other in the flesh.”

Considering how a UC infrastructure will enable “digital thinkers” to keep themselves in the loop of corporate happenings, it would benefit any number of businesses to make the transition by partnering with a managed IT service such as CTI Technology that can supply UC solutions and ongoing support.

And in this infrastructure where live real-time meetings are becoming functions of the past, Strohmeyer mentions that social collaboration tools – often in the form of unified communications (UC) – are necessary to maintain cohesion in an increasingly mobile workforce.