The evolving workplace, defined by agile work models (remote and hybrid work), transforming technology, and changing employee and customer expectations has created a new era of communication and collaboration. Today, companies are building ever more complex hybrid solutions for day-to-day interactions, leveraging both legacy equipment, and cloud-based tools.
Microsoft Teams, with its ability to align employees in any environment, enhance meetings, and streamline workflows, has become a central component of the modern workplace. However, it doesn’t eliminate the need for PSTN (Public Switched Network Telephony) on its own.
For companies to access a truly unified communications experience, they need to integrate their phone systems with their collaboration tools, that’s where solutions like Operator Connect come in, offering a simple way to unify teams around the globe.
What is Operator Connect? Bringing Your Own Carrier to Teams
As Microsoft Teams has continued to grow in popularity among business users, organizations have found themselves searching for effective ways to link the collaboration platform to their telecommunications tools. To enable this, Microsoft offers companies a range of options to choose from. Alongside purchasing phone licenses directly from Microsoft, companies can also retain relationships with their existing carriers, through Direct Routing, or Operator Connect.
While Direct Routing gives companies more control and flexibility over their PSTN and Microsoft Teams connection, it requires more technical knowledge and custom integrations.
As Rogelio Perez, RTC Product Director at Telnyx notes:
“What’s really special about Operator Connect is how easy it is to set up. It’s basically click, click, click and you’re done!”
Companies can even use Operator Connect to mobile service providers, paving the way for enhanced hybrid working environments.
Implemented correctly, Operator Connect can enhance global collaboration and deliver benefits to companies in a range of ways, such as:
Enhanced Global Reach
Compared to Microsoft’s phone plans, Direct Routing and Operator Connect can offer companies greater global reach. While phone licenses from Microsoft are only available in some regions, Operator Connect allows companies to access all the connections they need to enable a global workforce. With the right vendor, companies can consolidate regional carrier solutions into a single global plan, creating a consistent communications experience for all team members.
For instance, vendors like Telnyx offer companies access to a global, private network, acting as a licensed carrier in more than 46 locations. Operator Connect from Telnyx offers multi-cloud setup support across GCP, AWS, and Azure to improve network robustness and consistency.
Plus, with Operator Connect, it’s easy for companies to add phone lines and new regions to their ecosystem as their needs change. You can add and remove solutions quickly and seamlessly, from within the Microsoft Teams admin interface.
Improved Compliance and Features
When it comes to using Microsoft Teams as a central solution for calling and collaboration, many companies worry about adhering to compliance standards. Organizations still need to ensure their phone system can support things like E911 emergency calling, something that Microsoft Teams generally can’t offer as standard.
While E911 solutions can be implemented into Microsoft Teams with Direct Routing, Operator Connect can offer a simpler alternative. Telnyx, for instance, bundles feature-rich voice services with US DID and E911 enabled numbers as standard, simplifying communications compliance.
Additionally, with Operator Connect, companies can access more advanced features that can improve both compliance, and user experience. For instance, Operator Connect can support call recording, call transfer, voicemail services, and even high-definition voice codecs.
Improved Simplicity and User Experience
One of the biggest selling points of Operator Connect, particularly over solutions like Direct Routing, is its simplicity. On-premises infrastructure can be complex and expensive to setup and maintain. While direct routing removes some of this complexity, you’ll still need Session Border Controllers, and potentially additional hardware.
On the other hand, Operator Connect ties directly into Microsoft Teams, and your PSTN carrier manages and provides SBCs and trunking for you. Plus, you’ll have full control over your communication ecosystem within the Microsoft Teams interface. This means there’s no need to work with PowerShell, and implement more complex workflows, like you would with Direct Routing.
Operator Connect allows users to provision and deprovision users easily, with no specialist IT skills. It also ensures team members can access all of the calling and communication tools they need within a single, familiar interface. This leads to better productivity and efficiency between collaborating teams, and can even reduce the need for extensive training during staff onboarding.
Reliability and Consistency
Both Direct Routing and Operator Connect leverage the PSTN to deliver consistent, high-quality calling experiences to users. They can support advanced features like call recording, call transfer, and voicemail, and can even support high-definition voice codecs.
With Operator Connect, companies can access this consistency and reliability in an easy-to-use environment. Utilizing the same interface for internal and external communications, user management, and more allows for a more consistent, predictable experience for business leaders and their teams. Plus, with a simplified administration system, mitigating issues is a lot easier.
For instance, with the Telnyx Mission Control Portal, Operator Connect customers can manage, and monitor voice services and connection performance in one place. They can identify issues quickly and use advanced SIP debugging tools to ensure the experience runs smoothly for everyone.
Cost Savings
Direct Routing and Operator Connect can both help companies to save money when it comes to linking Microsoft Teams with the PSTN environment. However, Operator Connect can eliminate the need for additional on-site equipment, as all of the hardware and software required to empower your global teams is managed in the cloud.
Operator Connect can minimize the number of necessary vendor relationships companies need to invest in when aligning their global teams. It can even create economies of scale, by consolidating regional carriers into a single global plan. Vendors like Telnyx can help optimize cost savings, by acting as a licensed carrier in over 30 countries, giving users direct-to-carrier pricing.
Additionally, because you can add and remove phone lines quickly and easily with Operator Connect, you can constantly adapt your strategy to match your budget and changing needs. Business leaders can even use analytical tools for insights into how teams are using licenses, to help with effective resource allocation.
Optimizing Global Collaboration with Operator Connect
Connecting Microsoft Teams and PSTN solutions is becoming increasingly crucial for a wide range of organizations. While Microsoft Phone plans may be a suitable option for some smaller companies, many organizations will prefer to enable global collaboration with a connection to their own carrier.
Direct Routing offers a great way for companies to access a highly customizable and flexible solution for PSTN and Microsoft Teams integration. However, Operator Connect gives organizations the flexibility of a “Bring your Own Carrier” service, with greater simplicity and cost savings.
All you need to do to ensure you’re getting the most value out of this solution, is ensure you choose an Operator Connect partner that offers the right prices, scalability, security, global reach, and support.
