Business Communications Continue to Evolve

Business communications has come a long way. Then again, maybe not so much.

Whether you think business communications has moved forward in a real way in recent years depends upon your employer, at least in part. It also hinges on your effort in exploring and employing the tools available to you – either via your employer or as a consumer yourself.

By now we are all familiar with the bring-your-own-device trend. And as workers have brought their own devices to their work lives, they’ve also used – and continue to use – the apps of their choice to get business done. That includes such well-known apps as Skype and Slack, and many lesser known mobile apps.

But it’s not just the consumerization of business communications and the broad availability of apps that have changed how organizations and their workers function. It’s also about the move away from circuit-based and toward IP-based networking. It’s about the migration from premises-based to cloud-based solutions. And it’s about the renewed push by business communications solutions providers to drive investment in their product suites by adding team collaboration, video, and AI-powered capabilities.

Years ago companies like Vonage appeared on the scene to offer lower-cost calling to consumers and businesses. That opened the door not just to cost savings, but also to bring other IP-based capabilities into business communications suites.

Later, the cloud gave rise to a new movement allowing businesses to buy communications and collaboration as a service. That has allowed cloud adopters to avoid upfront equipment costs and ongoing maintenance costs. And it’s enabled them to rest assured that experts will keep their services up and running, and they’ll have access to the latest and greatest business communications capabilities.

And now we’re seeing unified communications as a service providers expand their suites further with artificial intelligence, machine learning, natural language processing, and robotic process automation. These technologies can allow businesses to do more targeted contact center agent coaching, faster meeting transcription and annotation, and expedited delivery of the most effective messages to business customers and prospects.

Edited by Maurice Nagle