Microsoft's UC solution, Office Communications Server (OCS), continues to get serious consideration from enterprises around the world. The solution offers a strong return based on many hard and soft factors. OCS is not simply a phone system replacement, it's more accurately a phone system alternative made possible by many emerging technologies. New technologies. New technologies come with requirements for planning, training, adoption, and appropriate usage guidelines. Organizational and human shifts are required for OCS success. As a result, enterprise planning needs to include not only the technical activities and considerations, but also (the tougher) non-technical aspects.

OCS implementations can be compared to ERP implementations in that the challenge lies in the re-examination of communication flows and assumptions. Potentially the biggest assumption challenged by OCS is the god-given right to a telephone on every desktop. As with ERP, it is frequently common to see outside consultants brought into OCS implementations to assist with matching the organization's needs to the new capabilities. Outside professionals bring experience with the product, the known key questions to ask, and proven discovery techniques. Re-engineering organizational processes can be a ruthless job, a little experience and objectivity can go a long way toward reaching a consensus. (Not to mention consultants are expendable in the case of re-engineering casualties).
 
There are several reasons why professional assistance with OCS implementations makes a lot of sense. OCS has lots of moving parts, parts that don't necessarily follow organization charts. Within the technical groups, OCS requires strong Microsoft server skills and strong telecom skills - these skills combined are rarely spotted in the wild. The telecom folks don't get Active Directory or domain controllers and the server folks don't get call centers and dialing plans. But all that is secondary to the impact that UC brings to the line of business groups. These groups have the most to benefit from OCS, but also have the highest walls (around departments, functions, and geographic locations) to overcome.

It is easy to understand why so many users and consultants focus on the technical aspects of an OCS implementation. For one, it isn't trivial. For most organizations it is their first true significant project of convergence. Major infrastructure changes are usually required, and new technologies need to be learned and implemented. For many consultants, this is the low hanging fruit - easily replicated, easily sold, easy value demonstration. But to truly benefit from OCS, the design needs to be considered from a business perspective.

To get a better idea of the consultant process involved with OCS, I spoke with Kevin Schwartz from Aspect's Global Professional Services division. Aspect is in a fairly unique position. It was an early adopter of OCS, and uses its own international implementation (and savings) as a marquee reference. Aspect has a strong voice system heritage, and a very tight relationship with Microsoft.

Kevin suggested that Aspect's key value is in overall project design combined with their experience in mission critical voice applications. This design includes a road map, buy-in from staff with the design, a proof of concept, the business case, and the actual implementation. The business case surprised me, but without direct experience it is hard for an organization to quantify how OCS can or will make an impact. Kevin placed less emphasis on the technical portion of the project. For Aspect, the technical component of the implementation is surprisingly consistent among projects despite wide variances in scope and size. Rather, the customization is in the total design.

Kevin said that it is common to underestimate the human factors related to a project like implementing UC and OCS. It isn't about just changing a phone to a headset, it is changing integral communication flows involving business objectives, presence, conferencing, web collaboration, mobility, and teleworking; or simply stated UC. OCS means new tools and capabilities that require instruction and new ground rules. Even the notion of dial tone is different (it's gone); it involves changing ingrained behaviors and assumptions. And if you don't do all this you will likely miss the full benefit of your UC investment, and perhaps even be better off with your old phone system.

Aspect utilizes workshops with customers to identify improvement opportunities and create executive, IT, business, and end-user buy-in which is critical for project success. For example, one common benefit of OCS is improved team collaboration. But OCS simply provides the tools that can enable collaboration. Users must understand how, when, and where to use these tools to make effective use of them. Kevin also stated that the objectives of the project need to be "sold" as well. For example, a specific goal of a UC project may be to reduce travel costs by increasing video conferencing and online meetings. It is important to communicate to the staff that online collaboration is an alternative that facilitates the goal. Conversely, without that communication, staff may deduce management believes online tools are equal to travel and rebel against the false conclusion.

It is important to keep an eye on the goals. Moving to UC and an OCS implementation can be high risk. The vast majority of users likely don't consider their current (traditional) system broken, and factor in the general resistance to change, high expectations around voice systems, or even zero tolerance for voice system mishaps. But the financial and productivity gains (hard and soft) can be significant with proper buy-in and execution. Potential UC benefits include improved team collaboration, reduced travel, reduced carbon footprint, increased mobility and teleworking, reduced lead times, and reduced infrastructure costs (to name the big ones). But some of these improvements, quite candidly, involve compromises. It is very hard to get buy-in after users are frustrated from poorly planned implementations. Proper project design works to prevent that.

OCS is young. The current release referred to as "R2" is effectively the first version as a PBX alternative. Wave 14 is coming soon with much richer PBX functionality. Microsoft is presently focused on initial market penetration and larger deployments. Soon, the market will shift to a broader focus on applications. New technology sees major upgrades. These are reasons to ensure that OCS is implemented properly as envisioned by Microsoft, or risk upgrades breaking unconventional uses. Experience and familiarity is always useful, but critical in a project as encompassing as OCS.