Unified Communications and Collaboration Solution
A 2021 Complete Guide

1. Bria Enterprise

2. 6 UCaaS Trends for 2021
3. Ubefone Case Study

Enterprise unified communications, and the world we live in today, feels very different from a year ago. Online meetings are part of our everyday experience, either for work or to connect with friends. Bumping into someone at the office is something you avoid like the literal plague. To collaborate on ideas and problems, we need new solutions and toolsets.
It’s hard to imagine predicting what 2020 brought, and it’s just as difficult to look; however, companies that thrived in 2020 were defined by key principles that will sustain and grow them into 2021. Successful companies use a few key factors; the ability to be agile, flexible, mobile and having great communications that meet the needs of teams and customers.

COVID-19 has changed how we work

There are several key trends emerging, revolving around enterprise unified communications, from companies that are managing to survive and thrive in these challenging times. The trends that we’re seeing today will extend into 2021 and provide foundational strength to businesses, whatever new adventure next year brings. 

Privacy and security are key elements of any successful company, no matter the size.  With distributed teams and personal devices, it can be challenging to hold high standards for privacy and security.  How do you know if patches are applied, if updates are run? Standard corporate devices may not work in their home, or be available. Selecting software and platforms that allow for administrative control from a centralized system is critical. 

With your team distributed and distracted at home, enterprise unified communications ensures you have a way to communicate with a consistent voice across all platforms, which is essential. Knowing when your team is online, and when they are not, allows you to communicate in the most effective way for where they are at that moment. With real-time presence, you can see if a team member is at their desk and working, away for a moment, or on a call with a colleague or a customer. You can send them a message to let them know you need some information from them or drop them a voice message if you need to send them an update.

The flexibility of omnichannel communications lets you adapt to the realities of work from home. As we emerge into next year, you can benefit from the agility and flexibility of these enterprise unified communications platforms as offices and travel open up, it will most likely not open up all at once for everyone. Bria Enterprise has an excellent interface to allow your teams to connect and collaborate with powerful tools and crisp, clear audio and video. Many companies are embracing the change and reducing office footprints and empowering their teams to work from home when it suits them. The flexibility of great communication tools will serve your team and your customers well for years to come.

It’s no longer acceptable in today’s customer service environment to have a chain of people repeatedly ask you for the same information. Customers are weary of getting bumped from one service agent to the next, misdirected, cut off, and then forced to repeat their account details to the next agent (again). With an enterprise unified communications system, you can pass key customer account IDs securely and safely helping your colleagues connect to customer data quickly. Or secure instant messaging can inform another agent on the customer details or share a document that outlines the core issue. The customer experience is dramatically improved and you’ll also save time for your team along with delighting your customers.

Cloud-based tools provide flexibility and scalability to adapt, however your business changes. With the pace of change and the uncertainties impacting you and your team on a daily basis having your infrastructure available everywhere and consistently backed up and patched seems like an essential feature. Rather than worrying about whether you have enough infrastructure, or how to scale down the infrastructure you put in place last year, you can quickly and efficiently scale to just the right size. Bria Enterprise has an excellent toolset that allows you to immediately transition to a cloud-first strategy using the platform that CounterPath provides. If you’d like to start a pilot with an enterprise unified communications solution sign up and start today.

Video meetings are now standard business practice.  As your team and your clients get more used to having meetings on screen, providing high quality experience will become a key driver of ‘good’ meetings.   There are so many nuances to communication that are outside of what is said that seeing someone’s face and how they react to your information is a key part of communication.  Ensuring you have HD quality video meetings will allow your team to get the best experience. Partnering with a enterprise unified communications company that is constantly developing new tools and rolling them into their suite of software also means as new features are available they’ll be in the hands of your team.

Team collaboration

Email is no longer a sufficient toolset for modern business. Ensuring your team has video, messaging and voice tools to connect is essential. In previous years your team could gather around a whiteboard and sketch out ideas. Now to problem solve or develop ideas you don’t have the same toolsets available. The business challenges are just as urgent, or more so, and your team needs to collaborate quickly. If one team member is unavailable or sick, ensuring their data is backed up on a cloud-based solution and shared with your team is essential. As the new year emerges you’ll need powerful and flexible enterprise unified communications tools that allow your team to connect and collaborate quickly. 

Just as your team needs to collaborate to solve problems and share ideas, you need your tools to collaborate with other software platforms. Powerful connections to industry-standard or even internally developed platforms increase productivity and efficiency by providing integrated access to data. With Bria Enterprise, utilize our desktop softphone or Stretto Platform APIs to integrate your calling solution with CRM platforms, websites, or other applications.

Business is uncertain at the best of times. As our world continues to adapt and change demand for products can spike unexpectedly.  Who knew toilet paper was going to be in such demand in 2020? If your tools are cloud-based and flexible you can take advantage of rapid scalability – either to meet the needs of spikes that catch you off guard, or to adapt your team down to a sustainable size as markets change. Enterprises need the ability to add team members quickly, ensuring all the configurations and preferences are applied. Bria Enterprise allows you to define roles and user groups and add users quickly with a consistent and secure experience for your team. They just download the app to their device, sign in and the server configures all the essential features.

Device independence

Ensuring your team can use their devices to communicate securely, in an environment backed up to the cloud, and monitored by your security team is critical.  For 2021 it will continue to be important as teams are returning to the office, with some staying. It’s important to pick an omnichannel solution that works across devices.

Artificial intelligence

Intelligent agents that help us plan our schedule, route us to a destination, or tell us what the weather is are part of our daily life.  As these intelligent tools make their way into our working world, key features like automatically transcribed meeting notes, research on demand for new ideas, and others will make your meetings more effective.

• Video conferencing
• Real-time messaging/chat
• Broadcasting and webinars
• Voice, including IP telephony
• Voicemail and call recording
• Contact center technology
• Audio conferencing
• Screen and file sharing
• Presence and schedule management
• Quality monitoring and workforce monitoring

• Does the UC support collaboration?
• How will the UC solution be roll out? On-premises? Cloud? Hybrid? Do you need to combine existing on-premises solutions with new UC tools?
• Is the Enterprise Unified Communications platform open and extensible to allow for integrations and interoperability with the tools your team uses daily?
• Will staff be allowed to use their own devices?
• What privacy and security features are included? Are communications encrypted?
• How scalable is the UC solution as demand increases? Does it support long-term growth?
• Is adoption a concern among your workforce? Question the ease-of-use
• What level of customer support is offered?
• How much of your team will remain remote in future?