Meet Lauren Ruff: brilliant channel account manager and new, first-time mum to baby Axel.
Like the rest of us, Lauren’s had quite a year.
She went off on maternity leave from her role as UK, Benelux & Nordic partner lead at global voice giant Sangoma just six weeks before COVID struck.
And last month, exactly a year later, she returned…to a whole new world!
In those momentous 12 months, all of us have been forced to change the way we live and work; maybe forever.
And – with unified communications at the epicentre of that seismic shift – the timing of Lauren’s absence and return means she has the perfect perspective on a post-pandemic future that has the potential to turbocharge the sector for years to come.
Lauren told me:
“Day one of my maternity leave feels like a lifetime away now. Axel arrived two weeks early, which meant that my leave hadn’t actually started! I’d spent the previous few weeks visiting my amazing partners and customers; talking up new products, thanking them for their business, and saying an emotional goodbye for a year.
“I was supporting lots of businesses as they considered moving their PBX to the cloud or migrating gradually via gateways. Many were nervous and struggled to get past what they perceived to be barriers. They were saying things like: ‘It isn’t broken, so why do I need to fix it?’
“Home working wasn’t a thing, security was a big issue, and businesses were wed to a CapEX model as opposed to an OpEX one. Axel came along and I hit pause. I presumed I would pick up a year later; with the same businesses and the same issues.
“Six weeks later, COVID had hit and the UK went into the first lockdown. Suddenly, working from home exploded. My husband Stuart swapped his office for our spare room.
“I was so concerned for my partners and customers. I wasn’t at work but the scale of pressures they faced was obvious. Of course, I was loving being a new mum but my work is such a huge part of who I am and so I just wanted to get out there and help.
“I kept in touch with a few of my customers and they told me how the pandemic was accelerating the move into the cloud for so many businesses and how remote working was fuelling nothing short of a unified communications revolution. I couldn’t believe my timing!
“Watching Stuart manage a new way of working from home – with both of us looking after Axel – made me realise the strain families were under and how technology was going to be key to keeping business running and keeping people in jobs.
“It also showed that people COULD work remotely from home and that the previously-perceived barriers were surmountable. It showed that two-way trust between employers and their staff was possible and that unifying communications between businesses, their customers and their employees was actually more productive and more cost-effective. The fact that it also provided people with an improved work-life balance was the cherry on the cake.
“Axel is 14 months old now and my maternity leave has come to an end.
“Now my timing is perfect as I’ve experienced first-hand a year of being at home and, now I’m back, I understand the issues businesses face. I think that makes me better-equipped to help Sangoma’s partner community guide its customers through this technological revolution in a way which benefits all parties.”
“Whilst I was away, Sangoma also launched the amazing Switchvox solution in the territories I look after – enabling users to do everything that they used to do at their office desk, but remotely; anywhere they want”
“It’s a brilliant app-based solution that transforms the pure telephony as well as joining-up the accessing of account details and the completion of any resulting actions, all via the user’s own mobile phone linked directly to their business systems. It’s easy to install and just works!
“Technology – and UC in particular – has been at the heart of the COVID-19 response and I’m sure that will continue to be the case as a new hybrid working model develops. Certainly, for businesses working with Sangoma, it’s a case of deploy how you want, communicate how you want, buy how you want. And that REALLY is a revolution.
“Now, of course, I am juggling career and motherhood; just like thousands of other women in the channel.
“Thankfully the end of lockdown looks like it’s not far off now and we can all kick on into a bright, transformative new future.
“Hopefully giant strides this time…not just baby steps.”
