I asked Jamie what he sees as the biggest challenge the UC industry is facing right now, and surprisingly Jamie noted that the CIO’s he talks to at various conferences still don’t have a good handle of what UC is. While they understand it from a buzzword perspective, many CIO’s still think of UC as going from a traditional TDM PBX to using VoIP. And as a result, they don’t see a big opportunity for ROI from UC, and don’t see a lot of opportunity for organizations and CIO’s to get behind the push for UC. Many people still think of UC as a different way to make phone calls. Those of you who’ve been reading UCStrategies.com know that this is NOT the case.

Jamie noted that Aspect itself was guilty of not having a full appreciation of UC when it began its journey, so it can’t fault others for not understanding what UC can really bring to the table. When Aspect’s IT department started doing research into UC for the deployment, they viewed it as piece parts of creating unified messaging or upgrading an Exchange environment or getting voice mail consolidated. Now the entire company sees UC as providing a common communication platform for every employee in the company. UC is a way to put every employee on an even playing field around communicating, regardless of whether they are more comfortable with instant messaging (IM), conference calls, Live Meeting, etc. Aspect now views UC from a holistic perspective – how will it impact all of the company’s constituents, including employees, customers, partners, etc.

Aspect’s biggest learning from its UC implementation is not to approach UC as a technical project. Jamie noted that there are several things companies need to be thinking about:

• How do you get your UC program justified: it’s important for companies to think about how UC will help create a real world ROI. Soft ROI gets rejected very quickly, so if all you can talk about is having a nicer experience, CEOs and CFOs won’t want to hear about it. It’s important to be able to say that you can have a real ROI with hard numbers, showing the real world business impact UC will have on the company. For example, by using instant messaging, Aspect found that conversations are quicker and more informal, which helps them make decisions faster, resulting in faster time to market, faster responses to customer requests, shorter development cycles, etc. – all of which have a hard ROI.
• How will the technology impact your business decisions: the technology behind UC enables companies to do unique things, but companies must evaluate how they want to operate. For example, Aspect decided to let at-home users in North America have 978 area code extensions, regardless of their location, but this was confusing to customers who thought they were calling a local office. This forced Aspect to take a look at how they want their business and office to look in a UC world. As Aspect continues to roll out UC throughout its organization, the company carefully thinks through how the business would use the technology, ensuring that they build the technology to meet the company’s business needs.
• UC will fundamentally change the communication and organizational structure of the company. While the informality of IM has many benefits, companies need to look at its impact on employee communications. For example, most employees may be reluctant to make a phone call to their CEO, but if they see him/her available online via IM, they may send a quick message. This clearly creates a different dynamic within the organization, and people need to be prepared for it.
• Preparing the users: Aspect recommends having a  technology and implementation plan , as well as an  integrated plan  for communications and education. Aspect implemented a project plan for communication, which included information on the deployment plan and the rollout schedules and progress. Communicating what was happening and why was key to getting people to use the UC system in an appropriate way. And of course, training on how to use UC is imperative, including online training, conference call sessions, video training, etc. 
• Take a serious look at your internal IT staffing, as well as the culture and skill set of the organization. If the telecomm manager, email manager, and network manager are in separate groups within IT working under separate mandates, the UC project is most likely to fail. UC really requires a “unified” approach to designing, deploying and supporting your environment.  
• Cultural and regulatory requirements vary around the globe. In India, for example, calls that terminate in India must go out through an Indian telecom provider, while in Europe it is best if calls appear as if they are going to and from local numbers. These things must all be taken into account during the planning process.

In summary, here are some points companies need to think about during their UC journey:

1. What is your endpoint model or goal? Do you want to enable mobile workforce to get their office phone to work anywhere, consolidate voice mail and email for your sales people, etc. It’s critical to think about your end goal before pulling the trigger.
2. What’s the ROI, and how will you pay for this – is it a nine-month payback, 12 months, etc.?
3. How will UC impact the various constituencies in the company – what does it mean to each of the constituencies and how does this impact your deployment methodology?
4. Are you local, regional, worldwide? Again, this will impact your deployment methodology.
5. Look at your IT staff and how they work together.
6. Assess your telecom and network contractual obligations - this will tie back to ROI.
7. Only after going through the previous points can you develop the technology plan around deployment. This encompasses the current state of your LAN and WAN environment, survivability, etc.
8. Deployment options - will UC be deployed by region, site, organization?
9. What’s the retirement plan for things you take out of production (such as a legacy PBX, voice mail, etc.

Before jumping into a unified communications implementation, companies must carefully evaluate their goals and properly plan for the deployment. The benefits of UC can be vast – but only if deployed and implemented properly.