John Linton
......identical really in their attitudes to implementing new technology.
I attended a very interesting 'seminar' on a major PABX Suppliers views on using VoIP within large corporate structures (multi-location/multi-country) given by an American PABX designer. I was invited to attend by an acquaintance who is the Australian based IT Director for S E Asia for the company who has implemented VoIP in the 14 Australian offices and 18 offices around the region over the past two years with varying success - he is currently on this third iteration having successively abandoned two of the three previous iterations and continues to struggle with the current attempt. The presentation, and accompanying live demonstrations was as informative as I had hoped and done with that 'large corporation finesse' which is slick, funny and totally informative that only massive US technology corporations seem capable of doing.
Everything worked perfectly and the statistics part of the presentation were encouraging and impressive both in terms of the growing use of VoIP in the US, EU and Asia since 2003 and the widening of VoIP/Database applications being used by, especially, US corporations implemented on the presenter's company's hardware and software. I enjoyed both the 'showmanship' of the superb presenter and the information contained in the main section of his technical presentation and especially the three case studies he used which he did via video conferencing in the companies concerned on three very large screens to three different locations (two in the US and one in Singapore). As a 'show' it was right up there with the very, very best I have seen and in terms of information provided in the most compelling ways it was absolutely superb with almost no word wasted on product/company promotion other than he constantly used his products to demonstrate the functionality that would be essential for any large company to use as the 21st Century continue to move forward.
In the Q and A sessions that were interspersed throughout the presentations/explanations it became clear that the senior IT people from a range of very large Sydney based organisations, while unfailingly polite, expressed views that ranged from the mildly skeptical to "I've had too many bad experiences with VoIP to try again for a while" - this included my host who has used the presenters hardware for more than a decade. There were two people whose input was highly positive and they also used the same hardware but they were a minority. Given the glowing (first hand, live on screen) testimonies of the three case study companies who addressed the same issues and had moved much further on integrating VoIP into their company's mainstream operations and processes it raised the age old reality relating to the introduction of advanced technologies into commercial entities. Ongoing problems with new technology (that works elsewhere) can only be the fault of the individual(s) implementing it or, as my host commented, the lack of something else within the organisation.
I have shown my acquaintance what Exetel does with VoIP and the tight integration we have implemented between our VoIP switches and our customer and other data bases on two occasions over the past year (once after he abandoned his second attempt at implementing a VoIP/CRM system and a few weeks ago when he was beginning a third attempt). On both occasions he commented that he was failing to achieve a more modest implementation of what we had running for over two years at the second time of looking. We didn't stay for the buffet lunch at the end of the 'seminar' (except to profusely thank the presenter for such an informative and brilliantly presented 'show') but had a sandwich lunch before going our separate ways.
Our conclusions were that the only reason that VoIP "doesn't work" in any company that implements it is that the people using it don't want it to work coupled with a senior management that has no interest in making it work. It has, virtually, nothing to do with the supplier of the hardware or the software nor with the size of the company nor with the budget. We came to the understanding that VOIP works identically to any other communications technology:
- it has nothing to do with the VoIP 'solution' - it depends on the planning and execution by the responsible individual
- it has nothing to do with size - companies as diverse in size as IBM and Exetel are equally successful in meeting their objectives
- it has nothing to do with cost - Exetel's Asterisk solution delivers just as well as a $US3 million VoIP 'PABX'
- the three statements above relate equally to corporates and individuals
A very enjoyable 90 minutes which reminded me, yet again, that technology needs to be deployed by people, in both corporate and residential life, who take the trouble to learn about it before they 'plug it in' and then realise, if it doesn't work as they expect it to, it is almost certainly their personal lack of understanding - not the 'fault' of either the technology or the selected hardware and software.