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A world of virtual offices and virtual participations
As a large number of organizations are today open to allowing their employees to work from home, the concept of a ‘virtual office’ is picking up gradually. In this context, UC technologies can play a pivotal role, as employees can join a videoconference, or initiate a conversation in a secure way—all from the comfort of their home. Says Dinesh Sehgal, Regional Director, India, Tandberg, “In today’s business environment, it is not about where you work from, but the results you deliver. It is now essential that employees have access to real-time communication technologies.”
 As the adoption of UC technologies continue to accelerate at a fast pace, old concepts are gradually getting replaced by new ones. For example, typically, the extension on the desk phone is tied down to the location of the desk. Traditionally, when employees change their desk or location, they change extensions. However, with the advent of UC technologies, your extension can be carried to the place you work. “With integrated systems, today you can log in from any desk, from any location across the globe, and your extension number will pop up and get assigned to the phone on your desk. In short, your extension number will follow you, wherever you work. This is the true essence of IP,” says Chandru Kavichandran, Business Manager - Converged Communication Services, IBM India / South Asia. This can prove to be extremely useful especially for organizations that have a global presence and where employees frequently travel between locations.
The growing acceptance of virtual or teleworkers has prompted vendors such as Cisco to launch a virtual office solution which allows organizations to provide the same level of connectivity and features seen in a typical office network to home workers. Says V C Gopalratnam, VP (IT) and CIO, Cisco India, “As connectivity links get stable and more bandwidth becomes available, virtual office solutions can totally transform the efficiency and productivity of enterprises.” To enable effective collaboration, Cisco has even provided its employees with soft phones installed on desktops and laptops, which can be used to initiate conversations with colleagues.
 In the future, as UC technologies evolve to a point where they become more affordable, their usage will become more common even in homes. “There is a very big untapped potential market for using UC as a service for home users. Using such solutions, families can participate virtually in live marriages and family functions from anywhere in the world,” opines Damanjeet Kaur, Director, Marketing and Media Communications, PeopleLink Corporate Solutions. The same concept can be extended for holding annual board meetings or shareholder meets.
In essence, UC technologies are truly groundbreaking in nature, and can be applied to any industry. For example, in the future, a UC system can intelligently help you chart your route. By interfacing with the messaging system, the UC system can check your Outlook Calendar and note that you have an appointment at 10 am. However, as it checks the weather report (from a weather website), traffic congestion (via Google maps), and your location coordinates (using information from the nearest cellphone tower), it interprets that you will be late for your appointment. Accordingly, it sends you an alert early in the morning, advancing the time that you would have normally taken to leave from your home. As one can see, when multiple systems are unified, the impact can be truly transformative in nature.
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