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By Info-Tech Research Group
IP telephony (IPT) has come a long way in recent years, yet many IT leaders are still struggling to effectively make the case to upgrade. Making this more difficult is the fact that some of the key savings opportunities realized by early adopters have since been minimized. For example, given current low domestic long distance rates, toll bypass savings hold much less weight in most IPT business cases today.
Info-Tech has found that IT leaders are most successful in justifying an IPT upgrade when there is an opportunity to move away from outdated or unsupported systems. Regardless, the majority of IT leaders understand that IPT is the direction of the future. Begin planning now for the inevitable upgrade by identifying the key benefits and costs associated with the change.
Key Considerations
Pinpointing the Benefits of IP Telephony
The benefits of IPT are generally categorized into two areas: productivity improvements and operational efficiencies.
Key opportunities to drive productivity improvements with IPT include:
- Collaboration. Beyond common IP phone features such as central directory access and call control customization, related desktop features (e.g. unified messaging, presence, and conferencing) can enhance collaboration and drive user efficiency gains. These types of capabilities are commonly perceived to boost team productivity and help address common business communications bottlenecks (e.g. phone tag).
- Customer service. Organizations can make use of advanced IPT features to boost the quality and effectiveness customer service operations, particularly with respect to the efficiency of contact center agents. A common example of this would be click-to-call CRM integration, which can typically be deployed with IPT at much lower cost and complexity than traditional CTI (Computer Telephony Integration).
- Mobility. IPT offers greater flexibility for mobile workers, as VPN-based handsets or PC-based softphones are much easier to relocate, allowing roaming users to remain available. Advanced features such as multiple ring services can also improve the accessibility of remote users, encouraging a more accessible and collaborative mobile workforce.
Key opportunities to realize operational efficiencies with IPT include:
- Administration. Daily IT operations benefit from the efficiency gains of IPT. One of the largest areas of improvement is time to complete typical Move/Add/Change (MAC) requests. These activities, which may have previously required a telecom specialist and an hour to complete in the past, can be simplified to a task that takes mere minutes for internal staff to perform. This typically also results in direct cost savings. For example, if it takes one hour for a telephone technician who is paid $50 per hour to perform a MAC and an IPT solution would require 15 minutes of a $20 per hour help desk worker's time, the cost savings per MAC is $45. If one assumes that each employee requires one MAC per year in a 200 person enterprise, the annual savings would be $9,000.
- Consolidation. Converging voice and data to the LAN/WAN infrastructure represents an opportunity to consolidate multiple disparate PBX systems and centralize services (e.g. call control, messaging). In addition, branch PSTN connection costs can be significantly reduced by routing calls over the enterprise WAN and terminating through aggregated PSTN connectivity at a main site. Notably, with current low domestic long distance rates, few implementers realize substantive overall toll savings.
- Maintenance. Retiring legacy PBX systems will eliminate associated maintenance contracts while simultaneously consolidating hardware, administration, and support. Although implementing a new IPT solution will be accompanied by new vendor maintenance and support costs, the difference compared to the high cost of servicing an older, proprietary system may be considerable.
- Staffing. Consolidation and centralization of hardware and services also provides an opportunity to revisit the enterprise's telephony support model. Most organizations begin converging telecom teams with network operations as a precursor to deployment. Specific activities may be transferred to existing teams to realize efficiency gains. For example, management of PSTN connectivity is commonly transferred to the group responsible for managing WAN and Internet connectivity. Potential savings due to staffing reductions are also possible; consider the following:
- Changing telecom roles and responsiblities may mean that some staff is laid off, while other resources are allocated elsewhere in the organization.
- There may be some non-IT staff that is no longer required, such as administrative positions that were previously responsible for reception.
- Telephony contractors or outside administrators may no longer be needed due to the increased efficiency of some tasks (such as MAC requests).
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