Many prognosticators believe that 2013 will be a, pardon the pun, big year for big data. We live in an age where we face a constant stream of information, and every interaction we have comes loaded with a host of additional content and context. What does all of this mean for the E911 hosted solutions space? Well, it certainly means that we are going to have to rethink some of our basic assumptions about 911 for starters.

As Avaya’s Mark Fletcher points out in his E911 blog, we can no longer accept the idea that emergency response call centers should take calls in the order they were received. When dealing with emergencies, that was never the best idea to begin with, but now that we can use big data to give these calls some kind of context, there is no reason to stick to that old, tired paradigm.

Nowadays, we can move toward the idea that calls can be answered in the order of importance. Even when dealing with true emergencies, there are variations in urgency. Fletcher uses the example of a car accident on the highway. These often generate multiple 911 calls. Using big data analytics, these calls can be filtered by point of origin to match them to the scene of the accident, meaning that they can be grouped together as having equal urgency. In this case, if a call comes in later from a residential landline, it could take priority, because it is clearly calling about some other matter which may have greater urgency.

This is just one example of how workforce optimization techniques can be used to route calls to the proper agents at the proper time. By using the right combination of software and big data analytics, emergency call centers can function with greater efficiency. And, when it is a matter of life or death, a few seconds saved can make a big difference!

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO Miami 2013, Jan 29- Feb. 1 in Miami, Florida.  Stay in touch with everything happening at ITEXPO (News - Alert). Follow us on Twitter.