As the world continues to suffer the shockwaves of the COVID-19 pandemic, companies in the communication and collaboration landscape, like Mitel, are working hard to help their clients. Recently, Mitel announced the arrival of a new offer for customers that want to try their cloud video conferencing and collaboration solutions for free, for up to 6 months, discounts on its UCaaS service in addition to special pricing to enable remote working for the on-premises portfolio.
What’s more, the Mitel brand is consistently rolling out useful information and guides on its website to help partners and end-users alike cope with the sudden rise in demand for remote working solutions. I spoke to the VP for Cloud Sales for EMEA and APAC, Rami Houbby (pictured, above), to learn about Mitel’s recommendations for companies in these trying times.
How is Mitel Helping Businesses Right Now?
Countless organisations have been forced to abandon their offices and embrace the remote working landscape like never before, as governments strive to reduce the spread of COVID-19. As a result, business leaders are finding themselves searching for budget to support a new portfolio of technology for cloud collaboration and video conferencing and to find effective technological solutions that can deliver business continuity in these unpredictable times.
To assist these businesses, Mitel is offering 6 month free trial of its collaboration and communication software MiTeam Meetings. According to Houbby, this is just the first stage in a series of programs that Mitel will be bringing to the market.
“Some people and organisations aren’t used to this new remote working environment, and we’re trying to make it easy as possible for them to make the transition”
“We’ve published a number of articles on our website for people who need advice on how to work effectively from home. At the same time, we’re delivering educational and empowerment promotions to deliver the technology that people need, in a way that fits with business budgets and addresses business needs.”
Rami told me that Mitel has been using its own collaboration and communication tools for years, and they’ve seen more people progressively embracing remote technologies. Now, however, companies are under more pressure than ever to make the change. This will accelerate digital transformation and change the perception of remote working in the future.
What Do Companies Need for Remote Working?
A lot of companies are now asking themselves whether they’re better off investing in team collaboration, UC, or video conferencing technology to suit their new remote working needs. According to Rami, the answer to that question is “all of the above.”
Houbby told me that the objective for companies right now is to maintain human connections in a virtual space, while driving productivity and business continuity. “Our partners have what it takes to advise their customers on the solutions that they need most, by examining their current workforce and the ways that they work best.”
However, Mitel believes that companies will need access to a wide range of communication options besides just video conferencing or instant messaging. “We all have our own preferred channels of communication, and companies need to be able to cater to all of these methods. Some people will want to move straight to video, others will prefer to stick with instant messaging. You want a solution that can give you access to everything at once.”
What is the Benefit of Working with a Partner?
While there are various freemium tools that companies can buy and install online, Mitel emphasises the importance in working with partners on this remote working migration. One of the biggest issues that’s often overlooked, according to Houbby, is the infrastructure level when installing a new remote working solution. Integration with existing UC or telephony infrastructure to maintain a seamless user experience which positively impact productivity is also important. Partners know how to do that work – OTT purchased online is highly unlikely to be able to integrate.
“People get carried away, looking at the application layer. That’s really fun and exciting, but you also need to understand the limitations of your existing infrastructure, and the requirements that you might have to upscale that too.”
“Having the right partner in place that understands your bandwidth and connectivity is essential”
Companies that simply jump into the first free offer that comes along could find that they don’t have the right foundations in place to support their evolving workplace. “You need to avoid the risk of a bad experience and disappointment. If you don’t, the ramifications on your business could be severe.”
Working with partners also helps to ensure that companies have the right security and strategy in place too. Partners can help to streamline user adoption by making provisioning and training easier. What’s more, they can also deliver the kind of security that businesses need to make sure that data and processes are protected in a remote landscape. “Subscribing to a service without a partner could expose companies to security risks, issues with GDPR compliance, and more.”
How is COVID-19 Impacting the World?
I was keen to get Rami’s insights on how the COVID-19 epidemic and the change to the landscape will impact the world as we know it in the future. “We have seen an almost universal transition to home working now. A lot of teams are going to get used to this experience and want to continue with it. It’s almost a historical divide of the time before corona (BC) and after corona (AC)” borrowing terms coined by Thomas Friedman’s recent article in the NYT”
According to Houbby, it seems likely that a lot of businesses are going to have a first-hand opportunity to see how well these remote working strategies work when it comes to things like improving productivity, reducing costs, and enhancing efficiency. “Particularly in small business areas, a lot of companies are going to see how effective this new strategy can be. There’s going to be real evidence that performance levels aren’t going to drop.”
In the meantime, partners like those in the Mitel community have an opportunity to show their customers just how useful they can be. This is a time for partners to stand up and prove that they can deliver incredible solutions to unpredictable problems.
To learn more about the free offers available from Mitel for those who want help working remotely, you can visit the Mitel website here.
