LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM--(Marketwired - Sep 16, 2015) - A survey by Arkadin reveals that while (67%) of companies have begun their UC journey, challenges persist which cloud their ability to achieve the full transformative benefits of the technology. Respondents said employee resistance to giving up established ways of working (50%) and resistance to relinquishing their existing technology tools (41%) were the biggest barriers to successful UC launches. The findings underscore the importance of a user-driven focus around UC to ensure employees experience the empowering productivity advantages of having all collaboration and communication applications, such as voice, video, presence and web conferencing, in one simple-to-use interface.
Increased Productivity is Key UC Driver
While challenges complicate adoption, the majority of companies (70%) agree on the benefits and importance of implementing UC, with the top benefits related to increased productivity (81%), improved support for mobile workers (47%) and improved customer service (43%). A sizable number of businesses expect to secure these perks quickly, with (40%) anticipating a positive ROI in the first year, and (70%) within two years.
"It's gratifying that the large majority of organizations understands the productivity benefits associated with UC, however, unless they put the user at center stage and quickly and decisively communicate the benefits they won't reap these advantages," says Hugues Treguier, Arkadin Director of UC. "A distressingly low (12%) of companies are doing this today which suggests the need for a radical change in how the industry approaches UC."
Other key findings:
- A sizable minority of businesses (26%) are stuck at the starting grid, with the majority confused about the immediate value of UC to their businesses.
- (65%) of respondents said the lack of a single UC solution for all employees is a major obstacle for successful roll-outs.
- (70%) of respondents reported cost as a major factor for implementing UC.
"While progress is clearly being made, it's imperative for the industry to overcome the challenges to UC adoption so that more businesses can benefit from it," continued Mr. Treguier. "This is especially critical in a global and connected workplace where access to information anytime, anywhere and from any device is critical. Fortunately cloud-based UC helps to eliminate many of the barriers to adoption, by making implementations more cost efficient, simple and scalable, compared to the traditional on premises solutions."
About the survey: Arkadin, an NTT Communications company and one of the largest providers of Unified Communications as a Service in the world, conducted the survey to determine where organizations are in the "Race to UC" and if there was a clear consensus on the business case and deployment challenges. Over 200 businesses were interviewed through an online survey. For more information: Arkadin Unified Communications Report: The Missing 'U' in UC
About Arkadin
Arkadin is one of the largest and fastest growing Collaboration Service Providers in the world. Our collection of market-leading audio/web/video conferencing and Unified Communications solutions enables enjoyable collaboration experiences that are essential to success in a digitally connected global workplace. As an NTT Communications company, our services are delivered in the cloud and backed by a cutting-edge infrastructure for premium service quality. Over 37,000 customers spanning the largest global enterprises to small businesses are supported locally in 19 languages through our network of 56 operations centers in 33 countries. For more information: http://www.arkadin.com.
About NTT Communications Corporation
NTT Communications provides consultancy, architecture, security and cloud services to optimize the information and communications technology (ICT) environments of enterprises. These offerings are backed by the company's worldwide infrastructure, including leading global tier-1 IP network, Arcstar Universal One™ VPN network reaching 196 countries/regions, and over 150 secure data centers. NTT Communications' solutions leverage the global resources of NTT Group companies including Dimension Data, NTT DOCOMO and NTT DATA.
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