Johan Oberg asks: is web collaboration tomorrow’s email?

 Today, both email and the mobile phone show how technologies which were once the almost sole domain of an exclusive group of ‘super users’, have become ubiquitous, both in terms of breadth of users and their power to impact positively on the efficient running of the business.
 
Building on the legacy strength of audio conferencing tools already well-established in many businesses, the latest multimedia web collaboration solutions – integrating audio, video and the web – are poised to have a similarly dramatic impact on companies looking to maximise their agility and responsiveness in an ever-fiercer competitive environment.
 
So how to select the right communications partner and solution to achieve the very real benefits to be had?
 
Determine the need: The first, and most important, step is to determine precisely the needs of the business, in order to ensure the most effective solution.  On the face of it this sounds obvious, yet many companies fall at this first hurdle and so are ultimately frustrated that the investment fails to deliver the return anticipated.
 
A common pitfall is to concentrate too narrowly on one particular objective – often the need to save money – to the exclusion of other important goals, such as improving internal and external communications, reducing the environmental impact of the organisation’s activities or enhancing the work/life balance of its staff.
 
Who is responsible? In response, it is important to appoint a manager responsible for the total delivery of web collaboration services across the organisation.  By involving senior management from all departments, including procurement, marketing, sales, training and communications, a set of needs will emerge which can only be met by a more broadly-based collaboration solution.
 
Similarly, across a commercially diverse or global business, it is important to take into account the needs of different subsidiaries, demanding a solution which is global in scope but which can be tailored to meet the linguistic, commercial and technology needs of each local marketplace.        
 
Matching business needs: Don’t be seduced by ‘whizzy’ technologies: rather, focus on how, as a business tool, the solution can meet the specific requirements of the organisation by providing better ways of working.  As a result, it is important to work with a supplier who can provide expert, consultancy-style support in determining and agreeing the range of needs and then matching the appropriate technology response.
 
All vendors will claim to be ‘customer-focused’ of course, so it is important to determine those who can evidence a real understanding of both the individual company and the sector in which they operate.  In addition, they should have a strong track record in delivering a range of collaboration solutions – including audio, video, web and multimedia – in order to be able to provide the best answer to the issues identified rather than ‘shoe-horning’ the problem into the narrow range of solutions it can offer.
 
Web collaboration: Audio conferencing solutions in isolation have proved increasingly restrictive in providing an effective alternative to physical communication.  In bringing together voice, video and the web, the latest multimedia technologies provide the opportunity for more effective dialogue, both up and down the value chain, by providing the facility to share documents and make presentations - in real time and with simple ‘point and click’ demands.
 
Further, a single supplier and single user interface to meet the organisation’s full multimedia requirements will ensure greater simplicity and consistency, leading to faster deployment, lower training costs and faster return.   
 
Ease of deployment/ease of use: In addition, the decision-maker should compare how easy it is for conference hosts and participants – both internally and beyond the firewall – to gain access to each conference.  Solutions which use standards-based Ajax technology, for example, remove the need for plug-ins, Java Virtual Machine or downloads for participants, enabling easy, ‘click to join’ access via any combination of Desktop VoIP, PSTN or audio streaming and from any browser.