Effectively managing your communications in your company means you are matching your business needs with the services you require. Because companies are never static, and they are constantly changing, your communications services need to change accordingly, says Deon Munn, CEO of TelesaComms.
Your annual budgets and strategic business plans are an early indicator of the planned business changes. This highlights what changes are needed in your communication infrastructure, which should be sized in line with those changes. But, as this is not always easy, what should you be considering when managing your company's communications services?
The process starts with getting visibility of your communication usage and trends to get insights of which services have the biggest financial and performance impact on your business. Understanding the details of your usage is important; what Web sites/telephone numbers are users accessing; is this for business or private usage; who are your staff calling, how must time is spent on these events and how often? Understanding the usage patterns for your different business units provides managers with information on their staff productivity, client interfacing, supplier interfacing, executive demands, etc.
As productivity has a direct impact on your bottom line as it impacts your salary bill as well as your communications bill, it is vital to understand this. There is a trend with millennials in the workplace, where they regard access to social media as part of their package in the workplace. This is acceptable as long as it doesn't impact their business performance and as long as you understand the impact.
Having a view of the services offered by service providers and the real impact of the costs is important to ensure you can support the change in staff behaviour.
As this human behaviour is becoming a reality, it is important to have a single view of your overall communication services to manage this behaviour's effect on business. This is further complicated by the effect different roles in your company have on business, and it is therefore important to measure the different metrics.
By having detailed knowledge about your communications needs and current usage, you will be able to ensure your staff have the necessary access and you have the tools to understand the impact on business and the ability to manage it through cost-effective technology or policies to enforce the right behaviour.
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