End Points or End Users – Where’s the Focus?
End Points or End Users – Where’s the Focus? by Marty Parker
More and more, UC vendors are touting their "end points’" or, in some cases, "experiences" as the focal point of Unified Communications (including collaboration and social networking). Some of this is shown in Dave Michels’ recent UC Client Round-Up slide show on NoJitter.
Also, the emphasis on the client has shown up lately in vendor presentations from Avaya (the Avaya Flare Communicator on the iPad and the Avaya Flare Experience on the Avaya Desktop Video Device), Cisco (their new Jabber client combining WebEx Connect, Jabber, Quad and Cisco Unified Personal Communicator), IBM (the upcoming or “Next” version of IBM Connections), and Microsoft Partners (highlighting the integration of Lync with SharePoint, Exchange and Office).
These examples of developer creativity are usually accompanied by a long list of the device types – tablets, smartphones, and custom desk telephones – on which the client functionality can be delivered.
So, these are pretty exciting times as the core functions of communications (presence, directory, instant messaging, e-mail, social posting, blogs, wikis, voice, video, app sharing, conferencing, collaborative workspaces) are being overlaid with all these versions of communication dashboards known as UC clients.
But, do we have the focus quite right? Seems like we have gotten into a consumer-like world of prepackaged software end points rather than into a world designed to fit the end users. Perhaps it’s too soon to expect more. Like automobiles or the early Sony Walkman, perhaps we need to wait out this proliferation of one size fits all before we begin to architect and deliver user experiences that match the user, not the technology.
Our UniComm Consulting experience shows that most enterprises have about half-a-dozen major use cases, i.e. half-a-dozen unique combinations of communications technologies selected to match the workflows and business processes of the users’ roles in their public or private sector firms. Of course, the use cases are quite distinct by industry, but the use cases within specific vertical industry sectors will be pretty consistent. Just look at all the specialized software to support sales people, inpatient care providers, educators, manufacturing teams, retailers, investment bankers, and others. The unique nature of that software reflects the uniqueness of each industry and role. That should, in turn, be reflected in the communications tools needed for those industries and roles. We’ll watch and see.
Of course, smartphones and tablet are exciting. And UC clients to provide communication controls on those devices are even more exciting. But those are just a stop along the way to far more purpose-built user interfaces. When those arrive, we will likely look back and comment about, "how quaint those early UC clients were."
So, what are the options while the market is evolving to more of a focus on end users rather than on end points? Here are some suggestions:
- To some extent, it is possible for the administrator or the user to configure the current UC clients to highlight the functions the user requires most often to do their job. But that’s only to a minor degree today. Still, configuration is worthwhile, perhaps using some "crowd-sourcing" or "team-sourcing" to share the most productive configurations across high-performance teams.
- The vendors or the Value Added Resellers (VARs) and System Integrators (SIs) could begin to produce templates for their UC clients to match the various vertical industry sectors such as those mentioned above. We are seeing this already in case studies about configuration of collaborative workspaces in vertical industry roles such as professional services or product development.
- Package the communication functions into "Communication-enabled portals." In this format, the work environment for vertical (see list above) or horizontal (HR, expense reporting, purchasing, travel, etc.) tasks is presented to the user as an integrated desktop or mobile web page with built-in communication functions. In this way, the user has the tools they need without shifting to another interface and re-entering or cutting/pasting information. We are seeing a number of case studies in this area, such as insurance industry portals to support brokers during the underwriting process.
- Design and deploy Communications Enabled Business Processes (CEBP) solutions. This is a step further than the comm-enabled portal, since it builds the communications directly into the workflow or into the job-specific software mentioned above. Examples of this include building presence and click-to-communicate into software packages for sales (e.g. Salesforce.com), education (e.g. Blackboard software), or health care (e.g. Cerner, McKesson, Amcom, and others). We are also seeing creative CEBP uses of presence and IM to avoid phone or video calls altogether by redesigning the business process workflow.
- Provide mashup tools to facilitate any of the above approaches. Some UC providers are already packaging their functional elements so that the VARs, SIs, customers, or end users can select, invoke, configure, and re-assemble the communications tools needed for a specific job into their own ideal user experience. Some UC vendors can support quite a bit of this already.
Some of this has already happened. Have you signed for a UPS or FedEx package on a wireless device lately? That’s certainly a CEBP application. Or, have you checked a rental car at the airport and been handed your completed receipt within seconds? Another vertical market, job-specific example. So, this is all possible and the architectures and the tools are increasingly available.
So, let’s have a celebration of how far we have come – the new software UC clients are fantastic! Then, let’s take the energy from the celebration and start out on the next leg of the journey, i.e. the creation of UC experiences that match the users’ roles in their core business processes, rather than matching the form factor of the latest shiny object.
See you along the road ahead.
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