Avaya ENGAGE was an opportunity for celebration, reflection and anticipation.
Avaya could celebrate and reflect upon the impressive progress made under CEO Alan Masarek since his appointment almost a year earlier — not only in exiting Chapter 11 bankruptcy but refining its business strategy, reasserting confidence in customers and shareholders, and outlining a coherent and compelling vision for its future.
"The big theme I asked everyone to come away with, or my hope the takeaway was — undeniably, unquestionably, Avaya is back," Masarek told UC Today in an exclusive interview. "I think that came through in just complete clarity."
"It's been a great journey," Masarek continued. "It's been super busy. I started on August 1, and since that point, we've gone through massive financial restructuring, which has been super successful, a cost right-sizing."
"But all that work we've done on the core business is about resetting product and go-to-market strategies. Resetting things thematically is what we referred to as 'Innovation without disruption.' Organising the company in support of those strategies and then revitalising the culture has really happened. Along the way, our customers and partners have been unbelievably supportive."
Avaya could also take time to feel excited in anticipating what comes next, namely the fulfilment of that vision, which Masarek previously summarised as pursuing the "North Star of CX".
Avaya still has significant UC elements to its business, however. What place does UC have within this star-chasing ambition?
Masarek intriguingly argued that Avaya's UC portfolio is intrinsically linked to its CX-focused strategy — that UC and CX are converging.
"UC is super important, but I think about CX being where the market is going," Masarek said. "Communication companies in the past used to think of themselves in siloes, as in 'I do UC for the knowledge worker' or 'I do contact centre for the agent'. The reason it's converging is that the brands have to differentiate based on customer experience. What drives your ability to deliver a positive customer experience is you have to have that full lifecycle of your customer."
"Think about what every business does," Masarek added. "They go outbound to prospects; the BDRs do that. The salespeople turn some of those into customers. The customers come inbound to the agents, and then the account management or success organisation goes outbound for upsell, renewal, engagement, and those things like that. Those interactions, which are the core of the customer experience, are crossing the front-of-house agent and the back-of-house knowledge worker."
