4 Easy Ways to Create a Better Work/Life-at-Home Balance

For many professionals, the opportunity to work from home full-time was always a remote (yes, pun intended) and unlikely possibility. Then, when the pandemic struck and offices were immediately closed across the country, it suddenly became our reality.

For some, working from home has created a lot of stress, and they find themselves wearing thin. Meanwhile, many others have come to prefer working from home and will likely view it as a preference or even a condition of employment moving forward.

Some degree of working from home is here for the long run, which is why we need the home to be as productive, effective and balanced a workplace as possible. So, what affects work life balance? Many factors, but here are 4 easy steps that will help your work-from-home employees thrive.

1.    Clearly Carve Your Time into Chunks

Whether you live alone, with a partner and/or have kids, our homes are often filled with our favorite entertainments, hobbies and loved ones. However, during work hours these can easily become productivity-sapping distractions.

Time chunking (or “blocking,” if you prefer) is the key to keeping these distractions from taking over your day. Quite simply, time chunking involves dividing your workday into designated blocks during which you concentrate on a specific task or project.

How to be productive working from home

• Create a to-do list for the day and block your time according to those priorities

• Try to silence your phone, messaging apps, Twitter, etc. during specific blocks

• Schedule breaks between blocks of time, because knowing you have an upcoming break for coffee, folding laundry or some other stress-relieving activity will help you stay focused throughout your blocks

2.    Schedule Your Day According to the Current Reality

Just because it worked well for you to do certain tasks at certain times in the office doesn’t mean that same schedule is ideal when working from home. The office and the traditional workday were designed for the majority of people whom scientists call “morning larks,” because their natural circadian rhythm allows them to focus best during the morning rather than the afternoon and evening hours.

Chances are you’re a morning lark. Nevertheless, if your kids require more attention in the morning, you might find it necessary for your productivity (and your sanity) to schedule your lighter tasks for the morning and tackle the more concentration-heavy projects in the afternoon.

If you’re a night owl by nature, working from home might offer your best opportunity to shine. You might keep yourself available for calls and urgent needs during the day, and then dig in for your most productive work during the evening and night hours.

3.    Get Comfortable with Video Conferencing and Use It Often

For many extroverts, human-to-human interaction is essential to survival, happiness and productivity. Moreover, 65% of the population are visual learners, which means we absorb and retain information better when we can hear and see.

Even for diehard introverts who learn best by hearing or doing, routine visual connection is essential to building rapport, maintaining relationships and collaborating effectively with colleagues.

That’s why scheduling video conferences is vital to work-from-home productivity. In fact, a recent study found that video participants learned 200% more on average than audio-only callers. So, schedule video calls often and routinely. Better still: consider a unified communications system that integrates secure video conferencing and collaboration tools for your employees.

4.    Get a Unified Communications Solution and Maximize It

Now that you have achieved the points above:

1.    Rearranged your schedule for working from home

2.    Divided your time into productive blocks

3.    Embraced video conferencing to stay in touch

You’ve satisfied your employees’ basic needs to work independently productively.

However, in order to productively work collectively as a team, they need the tools that enable remote collaboration. That’s why deploying a cloud-based unified communications platform will take your business to the next level.

At Gregg Communications, our techs – experts in all the top platforms – help our clients pick the right solution and get the maximum benefit from it now and later. Some of the features we recommend for dispersed teams include:

• Outbound call routing to make and receive calls for multiple devices

• Integration of voice, chat, video and screen sharing for productive work meetings

• Remote access so that managers can provide supervision remotely

These 4 easy steps won’t just improve your employees work-from-home productivity, they will also improve output and morale back in the office.

Unlike other communications resellers, Gregg never hands you off to the vendor once the sale is complete. We guide and support you throughout the onboarding and training process so your expectations are met and exceeded.

So, help your employees embrace the first 3 work-from-home steps we outlined above. Then, give us a call (630-706-8222), email or reach out for more information and we’ll guide you through the 4th. Work-from-home is here to stay, so let’s equip your business to survive and thrive through whatever comes your way.

The Right Technology Transforms Your Employees into a Harmonious Team

Have you seen this amazing 50-year anniversary rendition of the classic rock anthem “The Weight,” which features musicians performing virtually together across five continents? It’s truly an example of harmonious collaboration at its finest.

On the other hand, the Global Citizen One World: #TogetherAtHome virtual concert last month, in which the artists and presenters collaborated from their homes to create the benefit concert, was a little more discordant. If you tuned in, it was obvious which virtual acts collaborated seamlessly and which struggled. Since these were all top-notch performers, the difference between success and disharmony in this case was in the technology.

This echoes what a lot of businesses are finding right now: as hard as it is to work together in person, it’s a lot more difficult to collaborate virtually, especially if you don’t have the right technology for the job.

Remote Work Now and in the Future

Over the past several years, remote work opportunities started appearing in a variety of industries. Then, when COVID-19 struck, businesses, nonprofits and government agencies all transitioned to remote-work arrangements at the same time, almost overnight. For many organizations, the transition was achieved through a patchwork of free apps, trial licenses and repurposing existing systems.

It got the job done but, for most businesses, it was neither easy nor painless. Now, as many states and localities are reopening, surveys indicate that many workers overall – and more than 85% of millennials in particular – prefer to work from home. Moreover, some of the most skilled and desirable workers will even seek new employment if their current employer doesn’t offer a remote work opportunity post-COVID-19. This means that work from home (WFH) and the technology that enables it has changed the way we do business forever.

Essential Collaboration Tools

As the Global Citizen virtual concert demonstrated on national television, having the right technology and plenty of bandwidth is the key to successful collaboration. So, how can you use collaboration tools to improve team communication? Microsoft Outlook is a great example.

Not only does Outlook sync email, calendar appointments and tasks across all your employees’ devices, but, as part of Microsoft 365, it also eases collaboration between team members within Word, Excel, PowerPoint and other core Microsoft apps. Teams can share documents, make edits, schedule appointments and connect those documents and communications to the meetings they are associated with.

Unified Communications Turns the Tools into a Suite

A unified communications system is the key to creating effective remote collaboration. It integrates solid individual productivity tools like Outlook, Salesforce and Constant Contact into a seamless collaboration suite.

As a reliable, neutral partner, Gregg Communications works with all the best communications platforms to help our clients select the one that’s right for their needs. One of those is Mitel. We partner with them to bring you an excellent team collaboration solution.

Mitel is a top-tier communications technology developer with more than 4.7 million business phone solution users. Their platform offerings are especially noteworthy for integrating popular third-party applications into one simple, user-friendly interface.

For example, with a Mitel collaboration solution, your employees can simply click the “Conference” button to access a variety of communications tools within one uncomplicated platform. The employee can transform a calendar appointment into a collaborative work session that involves teleconferencing, screen sharing and live document editing. Additionally, your external participants, including vendors and clients, won’t need to download other apps or plugins in order to collaborate.

Build a Symphonic Collaboration Suite

Much like small and medium businesses that responded to the COVID-19 shutdown, the Global Citizen virtual concert admirably pulled together a diverse team of collaborators quickly with the technology on hand. The results were good, but far from brilliant.

With the right technology, expert guidance from a trusted communications partner and a little strategic planning, collaboration across your virtually dispersed employees can become seamless and more productive than ever before.

The days of talking over each other and long pregnant pauses on patchwork teleconferencing calls are in the past. Give us a call (630-706-8222) or send an email and we’ll set you up with technology that will have your team communicating harmoniously.

Security in the Cloud: Now and Later

As the coronavirus pandemic swept across the country and state governments responded by issuing shelter-in-place orders, many business owners found themselves hurriedly cobbling together remote work setups for their employees. A quick response was necessary and appropriate in the early days of the unprecedented coronavirus crisis.

However, hackers have swiftly adapted to and exploited the many gaps these new, unsecure, remote work setups created. This means as the pandemic persists and merges into a ‘new normal,’ the costs of waiting to establish secure, reliable business communications have never been higher.

The Trouble with Zoom

In the initial days of shelter-in-place orders across the country, the teleconferencing platform Zoom experienced an explosion in usership. Businesses used Zoom to get themselves organized and reconnect with clients while individuals used it to stay connected with friends and family during social distancing.

Unfortunately, the exponential increase in traffic made Zoom the victim of recurring service outages and the target of hackers. Early on, trolls joined unsecured meetings where they disrupted proceedings and abused participants. More recently, hackers have attacked services like Zoom to obtain personal and business data and login credentials. Although Zoom initially advertised that its service features end-to-end encryption, it later emerged that this is not exactly accurate, and vulnerabilities persist.

There are Options in the Cloud

Now that many businesses have managed to reestablish core functions remotely, it’s time to replace these fragile setups with secure, reliable arrangements that will carry operations efficiently into our new normal. Transitioning to a cloud-based business phone solution is the best way to achieve this for a minimal expenditure of time and money. Moreover, there are numerous high-quality unified communications platforms and Gregg Communications works with all of them.

To explore the wide-ranging benefits of moving to the cloud during this challenging moment, we’ll highlight Mitel and RingCentral as two examples.

Mitel’s MiCloud Solution

Mitel is a leading Unified Communications provider with more than 4.7 million cloud users. Their newly launched MiCloud is an enterprise-level platform that offers larger businesses unparalleled scalability, integration and remote work flexibility. Mitel chose to host their solution on the Google Cloud for all the right reasons:

·         It’s a highly reliable platform that features multiple redundant backups.

·         It has the highest obtainable speed and availability offering with minimal latency.

·         It offers multi-layered security architecture that’s compliant with all major regulations.

The topic of security compliance is essential for businesses in certain industries. For example, a client of ours that processes academic transcripts for universities is under constant third-party audit. The cloud enables us to ensure they have the appropriate level of security and transparency even under a remote work setup.

RingCentral’s best-in-breed approach

RingCentral has topped the leaderboard of Gartner’s Magic Quadrant in Unified Communications for the past five years. Their family of business communications solutions are secure and reliable with an additional benefit: wide integration with a variety of productivity tools such as Microsoft, Google, Salesforce and more. One outstanding feature of going to the cloud with RingCentral is they adopt a best-in-breed approach in which they have partnered with leaders in a variety of spaces such as contact centers and video teleconferencing. This is how RingCentral enables secure, user-friendly integration with some of the leading business productivity tools.

The Future is Now

Businesses that had transitioned their unified communications to the cloud before the pandemic faced a less jarring adjustment to full-time remote work. Similarly, business that make the transition now will future-proof themselves for the new normal that follows. Whether it’s renewed waves of infection, various other disasters (natural or man-made), or the need for remote work options, a robust cloud communications system is a solid investment.

At Gregg Communications our definition of customer service includes choice, which means we help you select the top-quality platform that’s best for your needs and price point, not in preference to the vendor that gives us the best kickback. Moreover, unlike other communications providers, we don’t desert you once the sale is closed. As part of our White Glove service, we guide, support and train you throughout the deployment process.

If you’re ready to establish secure, reliable business communications to get you through this crisis and whatever comes next, give us a call (630-706-8222) or send us an email.

Dispelling Remote Work Misconceptions and Setting up for Success

For many industries, discussions among executives when considering remote work and work-from-home arrangements for employees invariably conjure up outdated tropes and misconceptions like these:

• Remote work is only for tattoo-covered creative types who play around on Photoshop while sipping

  macchiatos at the local hipster coffeeshop.

• ·Working from home is a rite of passage for Silicon Valley coders who can’t afford office space while they

  develop the next killer app.

• · Employees who don’t work from the office squander their time, are difficult to supervise and can’t

  communicate effectively with customers or collaborate within teams.

The telecommuting evolution in modern business began long before the coronavirus pandemic forced stores, studios and offices to shutter their doors and send their employees home. While some workers simply cannot do their jobs from home – dog walkers, airline pilots and ER doctors are three groups that immediately come to mind – many other businesses can migrate to mostly or entirely remote work arrangements without sacrificing productivity or results.

In fact, many businesses have achieved lower costs and greater employee satisfaction and retention through work-from-home arrangements. The key to unleashing telecommuting’s potential is a good communications platform.

Benefits to Employees

Numerous recent surveys support one clear conclusion: Most employees prefer to telecommute. In fact, 85% of millennials are willing to work remotely and one-quarter of respondents surveyed by Global Workforce Analytics were willing to accept a lower salary in exchange for a work-from-home arrangement.

Likewise, recent surveys of telecommuting professionals find that four in five feel less stress and report better morale. Reasons for this include:

• ·   Less time and money spent on commuting, eating out and dry cleaning.

• ·   Better work/leisure balance, producing a healthier lifestyle.

• ·   Fewer distractions and greater flexibility to work when most productive.

In short, most remote employees are happier, healthier, and more productive.

Benefits to Businesses

Happier employees stay with their employer longer: 50% lower turnover according to one study.

Healthier employees miss fewer workdays: 70% of remote workers missed fewer workdays compared to in-office personnel in a recent study.

More productive employees create greater output for your business: 70% of remote worker respondents in a recent poll reported greater productivity after switching to a work-from-home model.

The general formula that emerges is straightforward: Happier, healthier, more productive employees reduce a business’s costs and improve outcomes. In even more immediate and concrete terms, employers that transition some or all of their employees to remote work arrangements save significant sums on rent, office furnishings, electricity, stationary and other consumables.

How Phone Systems Help

The coronavirus pandemic has created an unprecedented urgency, forcing nearly all office-based businesses to quickly retool for telecommuting in order to survive. Moreover, as difficult as it can be to appreciate silver linings while standing under the rainstorm of COVID-19, even the most traditional office-based businesses will benefit in the long run by equipping themselves to offer full or partial remote work opportunities to their employees after this storm blows over.

The key to unleashing your employees’ fullest potential through a work-from-home arrangement is an effective unified communications solution that enables the essential tools that businesses and remote-based employees need:

• ·    Outbound call routing to make business calls from their personal phone wherever they are

• ·   Documentation of customer interactions so that information is available to all members of the project

  team

• ·    Integration of voice, chat, video and screen-sharing functionality to enable seamless collaboration

• ·    Remote access features so that managers and supervisors can enter employee’s virtual workspaces

  and monitor interactions with customers

In this moment of confusion and urgency in particular, a cloud-based phone system is the best way to quickly deploy these essential features across your newly dispersed remote workforce while also ensuring top shelf cybersecurity.

Importantly, because cloud providers operate on a monthly or annual subscription model you won’t be locked in forever and you won’t need to make substantial upfront investments at this moment when you need to conserve capital. Moreover, many cloud platforms are offering free extended licenses or at substantially reduced prices during the coronavirus response period.

The Support You Need to Choose Wisely and Deploy Quickly

Gregg Communications is a long experienced and entirely neutral communications provider that works across all major unified communications platforms and contact center vendors to:

1.    Choose the best solution for your specific needs

2.    Onboard quickly and tailor the tech to your business processes

3.    Train your staff to get the full measure of communications performance

We achieve these three essential goals by doing two fundamental business practices better than anyone else:

Firstly, by delivering unrivaled customer service, which we describe as Gregg’s e3: experience excellence from experts on every interaction.

Secondly, by guiding and supporting our clients throughout the entire project lifecycle and beyond with our White Glove service rather than disappearing once the sale is closed.

Most businesses didn’t enter the coronavirus pandemic with the communications tools necessary to survive it, but some businesses will adapt and, consequently, be in a far greater position to thrive in the business ecosystem that emerges after the crisis.

Give us a call (630-706-8222) or email us and let’s get your business set up for remote work right away.

Gregg Grows with You – It’s All About the Fundamentals

For some of our team members, spring means the start of baseball season. That triggered a watercooler conversation about how communications technology has advanced the game during the 53 years that Gregg Communications has been serving our clients: radio, TV, live streaming and, soon, immersive 3D simulations, perhaps.

Despite the extraordinary advances in technology, the old saying about baseball remains just as true about doing good business: “It’s all about fundamentals.”

At Gregg Communications, we call the fundamentals e3. It means our clients experience excellence from experts on every interaction.

The Fundamentals of Good Business

When it comes to equipping our clients with the communications technology they need to collaborate effectively, serve customers and avoid problems, we believe the fundamentals are these:

1.    Develop unrivaled expertise across all facets of the technology.

2.    Learn your inner workings to determine the most cost-effective solutions for your specific needs.

3.    Customize each solution so you achieve maximum performance and lifespan.

4.    Maintain a pulse on industry changes to provide you with well-timed recommendations.

These are the guiding principles and actionable steps we practice at each and every interaction with our clients.

Expertise Across All Facets of Communication Technology

The technology that fuels today’s leading communications platforms can be divided into 3 categories: on-premise, cloud and hybrid. Knowing the benefits and challenges of each is the first step to selecting the most cost-effective solution for your business.

On-premise business communications

As the name suggests, on-premise solutions reside within the business’ physical location. You acquire an annual or lifetime software license, and you purchase the servers and other hardware that run it. “On-prem” was really the only option until about ten years ago, but it remains an effective approach for medium or larger businesses with one office. Moreover, on-premise solutions allow for the substantial personalization some businesses with unique workflows require.

Unified communications through the cloud

Cloud-based platforms have grown tremendously in recent years and are a strong option for any size business. It works a lot like a rental agreement where you pay a monthly fee for a specific range of services over a specified contract period. The benefits are numerous:

·         Avoid purchasing expensive hardware that can quickly become obsolete.

·         Easily scale types of services and number of users as your business grows.

·         Readily facilitate business travel and flexible workplace arrangements.

The cloud is often the most cost-effective approach for highly seasonal businesses like, for example, a Christmas supply wholesaler that might need to scale up contact centers and expand functionality during the later months of the year.

Create a hybrid to satisfy specific needs

Just like the Toyota Prius, hybrid communications systems use 2 models; on-premise and cloud, to deliver the best of each. Imagine, for example, a Chicago-based manufacturer that has developed a robust on-premise solution and now wants to hire field reps in other locations without investing in new office spaces and hardware. Likewise, you might have a Los Angeles-based staff that has the on-premise solution to do business in Wisconsin, but they find that Wisconsinite prospects are more receptive to a local cloud-based representative.

Experience Excellence from Experts

Whether it means purchasing on-premise hardware or signing a cloud-based service contract, we understand that selecting the right communications solution is intimidating. It helps to have the support and guidance of expert technologists. But that’s not enough to feel confident in your choice. You also need a partner like Gregg Communications that knows your business processes, workflow, staffing and future plans.

With deep knowledge of your company, we help you match the best solution to your specific needs. It’s the only way to feel confident you’re getting the right solution. It also lets us add enormous value by:

·         Developing personalized training so specific staff and departments effectively leverage key functionality as quickly as possible

·         Customizing the solution to your specific needs so you take advantage of every drop of performance for your money.

Whether you’re leaning toward on-prem, cloud or hybrid for your unified communications system, experience excellence from the experts at Gregg Communications. You get the very best technology delivered with all the right fundamentals.

Give us a call (630-706-8222) or email us and let’s get started.

What It Means to Be "Better" - Not Different

Remember Apple’s famous Think Different marketing campaign? Even before that it was a cliché that almost every business claimed to be “different” from the rest. Despite the irony of everyone making the same claim of being different, during our 53 years, we’ve learned that what you want from your communications provider is not something different, exotic or unique.

What you want is something better.

Better Means Giving You Everything You Need

At Gregg Communications we’ve been in the business of solving clients’ phone and unified communications problems since 1967 and, in that time, we’ve seen several “different” companies make a lot of noise and then disappear just as quickly. Even with our love for the latest whizbang communications technology, we know the way to be better is through delivering service and results to our clients.

We get to know your business

We assign you a single point of contact to lead you through the learning process. Then, we listen and ask questions to discover the goals, opportunities and challenges that make your business unique and trigger your need for specific communications functionalities.

We leverage broad, unbiased expertise

With our understanding of your business’s needs, we balance the functionality, cost, usability and scalability of each of the major platform providers like Mitel, 8x8 and RingCentral, among 15 others, each of which we have expertise in and an unbiased relationship with.

We select the best fit for you

Offering you a broad choice might be different from other providers, but it’s also better because we provide unbiased guidance during the selection process. As your matchmaker, we win by helping you make a successful choice that fulfills your needs, rather than by ushering you onto the platform that provides us the best kickback.

No disappearing acts after the deal closes

For other communications providers, their work ends once the deal closes: they hand you off to an account rep from the manufacturer and wish you well. The better you get from us is that our work only begins once the deal closes and it’s time to deploy your solution.

One size never fits all

Hardware and software rarely work seamlessly together right out of the box. Moreover, the settings menu in even the simplest app has more toggle switches than an airplane cockpit. Our knowledge of your systems and workflow, combined with our expertise in your chosen platform, enables us to configure it for you rather than you adjusting to it.

Hands-on-the-wheel training

Whereas most vendors and manufacturers hand you off to a generic webinar for training, we keep our hands on the wheel until you’re ready. We’re right there with you, making sure you receive the best, customized training for your specific needs. Your employees also learn more quickly and are happier when they aren’t on their own during those first intimidating test drives on the new platform.

‘Better’ Means Giving You All the Tools You Need

Gregg Communications has unmatched credentials, including an unrivaled 53 years of industry experience, an average 25 years of management team experience and successful installation of more than 800 call centers throughout the country. Nevertheless, rather than presume that you should trust our judgment blindly, we leverage our experience and expertise to guide and educate your team to make good decisions for your communications and customer service needs.

Consider moving to the cloud

As your on-premise communications system ages or your business is expanding to new offices or territories, it’s the ideal time to consider moving to the cloud. Cloud systems tend to offer easier and more economical scalability, and they accommodate a variety of travel and remote work setups. Meanwhile, they require fewer internal IT requirements for maintenance and upgrades.

Why staying on-premise might be best

Some applications still function better on-premise than in the cloud. Moreover, some businesses have tailored their network or applications to achieve specific purposes or outcomes. For example, some use Salesforce to dial out to customers, log call recordings and integrate typed notes. In this case, it might make sense to stay on-prem. We’ve still got your back with our Voice Managed Services and three levels of “break and fix” maintenance offerings.

Choosing between on-premise vs. the cloud is just one of the many tough, but important, decisions that will lead you to a next-level unified communications solution. Either way, Gregg is right there with you, white gloves on, helping improve internal collaboration and the quality of your interactions with prospects and customers.

Forget different. Give us a call (630-706-8222) or email us and we’ll give you better.

Solution Series: 8x8's Flexible, Multi-Tiered Cloud-Based Platform

Gregg Communications is a unified communications provider that works with all the leading platforms and manufacturers to deliver our clients the solution best suited to their unique needs and opportunities. As a neutral provider whose only objective is to deliver the best functionality at lowest cost to our clients, we explore each of the leading platforms in depth and without bias to help you home in on the best solution for your business needs.

In our last Solution Series article, we detailed the cloud-leading offerings from Ring Central. In this article, we explore the flexible, multi-tiered offerings from 8x8 Cloud Systems.

The Five-by-Five on 8x8

An advantage of an 8x8 solution is that their applications are developed or owned by themselves. This makes support and updates faster and easier because they are entirely in-house, without using third parties.

8x8, Inc. is a pioneer in the hosted IP telephony and unified communications center industry, providing secure, reliable, cloud-based communications to more than 45,000 businesses spanning over 100 countries. The company scored as a Leader in Gartner’s annual Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service report.

8x8 also earned firm Frost & Sullivan’s coveted 2018 Competitive Strategy Innovation and Leadership Award, noting that “8x8 practices an end-to-end, single-vendor approach that is matched by few, if any, of its competitors.”

X Series

Developed by industry leading experts, the X Series is 8x8’s workhorse platform, which is a top-shelf solution that brings together several dimensions of functionality.

Voice and Telephony

8x8 enables international local calling through a cloud-based virtual system that improves voice quality and clarity, which shortens call times and increases customer satisfaction.

Contact Center

The X Series platform combines voice, chat, email, and social channels to enable onsite or remote representatives to resolve customer inquiries quickly and according to the customer’s preferred contact method.

Team Messaging

Individuals, teams, and departments can move between chat, voice, and video meetings with just single mouse clicks to enable a seamless and constructive flow of information through just one app available on all their devices.

Analytics

8x8 excels in empowering their customers to turn interactions into data from which they can glean productivity-enhancing insights. The platform’s analytics features include speech-to-text transcriptions, call record summaries, and detailed agent performance metrics.

Security and Compliance

8x8’s infrastructure and data centers meet or exceed all the major security requirements in the United States and in other major industrialized nations, including those associated with the Defense Department, HIPAA/HITECH, the United Kingdom, and the European Union.

A Flexible, Multi-tiered Communications Platform

8x8 bills their X Series platform as a flexible, ready-out-of-the-box solution that accommodates businesses of various sizes and organizational structures. The X Series platform is available in four tiers, each of which includes the features of the pervious tier while enabling additional functionality for the user.

At the introductory level, the X2 Knowledge Worker Plan integrates voice, messaging, and meetings into one app that is available on all your devices.

The X4 Supervisor / Administrator Plan incorporates analytics and monitoring features such as Barge-Monitor-Whisper, which allows the supervisor to act as a copilot or flight instructor to the contact center rep during the cal

The X6 Voice-Focused Contact Center Associate Plan integrates the communication tools of X4 with most major customer relationship management (CRM) platforms to enable efficient, effective management of customer interactions.

The X8 Multichannel Contact Center Associate Plan enables advanced analytics and integration with multiple communications channels such as through social media, Skype, GSuite, etc. This Cadillac offering guarantees top quality round-the-clock and round-the-global functionality through one single vendor.

As Close As Possible to Ready-Out-of-the-Box

8x8’s X Series platform is as close to ‘ready-out-of-the-box’ as any unified communications solution on the market. Nevertheless, you simply cannot get a perfectly tailored suit without going for a fitting.

Through our White Glove service Gregg Communications is your guide, guru, and advocate throughout the deployment, onboarding, and work-in phase. With our experience, expertise, and training to your staff we ensure you get every ounce of functionality out of your communication solution. We don’t leave the scene after the sale closes; instead that’s when we don our work gloves and hard hats and jump into the trenches alongside you.

There are a lot of reasons to move your communications to a cloud-based SaaS solution and do away with the headache of maintaining your own platform and infrastructure. Whether it’s 8x8 that’s caught your eye or one of their competitors, give us a call (630-706-8222) or email us and we’ll help you get started today.

Solution Series: Why RingCentral Is a Bona Fide Leader in Unified Communications

Here at Gregg Communications, we work with many best-in-breed phone solution manufacturers, but we are beholden to none.

Instead, our first and only loyalty is to you, our client. We help you select the best communications solution for your business, whether it’s cloud phones, unified communications or premise-based. Then we configure that product so you can squeeze every ounce of value and productivity from it.

Our new solution series will explore the different vendors we work with to help you narrow the field and determine which will best satisfy your business needs.

In our first article we explored the benefits of Mitel’s MiCollab phone solution. In this article, we take a deep dive into how RingCentral provides a complete, global cloud communications and collaboration solution and how Gregg Communications fits in as a RingCentral dealer.

What the Experts Have to Say About RingCentral

The analysis of experts counts for a lot in evaluating technology solutions. This is the first indication of RingCentral’s status as a market leader.

According to market analysts Frost & Sullivan, RingCentral is the top-ranked hosted IP telephony manufacturer on the Frost Radar. Its glowing review of RingCentral highlights:

·         Flexible, economical and market-leading products

·         A proprietary platform that features rapid innovation and cost-effective scalability

·         Particular focus on the needs of decentralized workspaces and mobile workers

·         Extensive and constantly expanding set of features

·         Strong track record of reliability and multiple, geographically dispersed data centers

IT consulting firm Gartner also recognizes RingCentral as a top leader in the industry for its ability to execute competitive product offerings and its unrivaled completeness of vision. RingCentral has reigned as a Gartner UCaaS Magic Quadrant leader for the last five years and beats out top contenders in the communications space.

RingCentral’s Top Features

It’s tempting to make a decision based purely on the praise and accolades of experts, but first let’s consider some of RingCentral’s standout features.

Integrations through an open platform

RingCentral’s open platform allows for integration with many of the leading business productivity applications such as Salesforce, Google, Microsoft Office 365, Zendesk and others. This means that employees can accomplish more of their communications tasks directly within the platform rather than jumping between multiple windows strewn across several monitors.

Single, user-friendly interface

Not only does RingCentral integrate with leading productivity applications, it brings together your collaboration tools in one user-friendly interface where you can:

·         Message groups and individuals

·         Manage calendars and tasks

·         Host online meets

·         Share files

·         Perform voice and video conferencing

RingCentral deploys best-of-breed technology

Most vendors can’t avoid the temptation to lock you into their proprietary services and applications. Alternatively, RingCentral has the self-confidence to source best-of-breed technology wherever it resides. For example, its video conferencing solution leverages Zoom, which is a Magic Quadrant leader in the Meeting Solutions space. RingCentral also engages contact center services from inContact, also a Magic Quadrant leader in that market.

This means RingCentral clients receive best-in-class technology through one platform and vendor. But, because RingCentral handles all the vendor relationships and interactions, the end user has only one point of contact and accountability.

International scope and scale

While RingCentral is a preferred vendor for North America-focused businesses, it also has a Global Office solution that caters excellently to multinational firms. This means it’s ready to work overseas with you, off the bat, or to expand cost-effectively alongside you.

RingCentral Made Easier with Gregg Communications’ White Glove Treatment

Whether RingCentral or another competitive platform is the best choice for your unified business communications needs, you might feel some reluctance to take the plunge. That’s because migrating phone systems, like changing health insurance providers, has traditionally been a burdensome, aggravating and time-consuming process.

That’s where Gregg Communications’ customer service is qualitatively different from all the rest. Rather than hand you off to your RingCentral representative with a wave and a smile, we put on our work gloves and guide you through the entire onboarding process with our White Glove service, which includes live, on-site training, Day 1 cutover support, project consultation and vendor management.

Give us a call (630-706-8222) or email us to explore RingCentral and the other competitive platforms. We’ll help you choose – and deploy – the right one for your business.

Solution Series: Mitel Is a Leader in Cloud-Based Communications

Here at Gregg Communications, we work with many best-in-breed phone solution manufacturers, but we are beholden to none.

Instead, our first and only loyalty is to you – our client. We help you select the best communications solution for your business, whether it’s cloud phones, premise-based or hybrid. Then, we configure that product so you can squeeze every ounce of value and productivity from it.

Our new solution series will explore the different vendors we work with to help you narrow the field and determine which will best satisfy your business needs.

In this article, we take a deep dive into the capabilities and benefits of Mitel’s MiVoice Connect phone solution.

Get to Know Mitel

Mitel is a leading manufacturer in the business communications industry with more than 70 million business users across 100 countries. In 2017, Mitel acquired leading telecommunications innovator ShoreTel to become one of the undisputed heavyweights in the unified communications (UC) industry.

While Mitel offers both cloud and on-premise voice over IP (VoIP) solutions, their focus and impressive growth in recent years has centered on cloud and UC solutions. In fact, Mitel scored highest on the growth index of the Frost Radar, which analyzes hundreds of businesses in the industry and compares them across ten criteria. Mitel’s impressive growth places it as an industry leader in cloud users with upwards of 4.7 million users, the highest market share.

Business and Enterprise Solutions for Collaboration

With a variety of innovative platforms, it’s nearly impossible not to find a Mitel solution that fits your business. One of the ones we at Gregg Communications like best is the MiVoice Connect platform because it brings all the communications tools under one roof to improve the ease of workflow and business collaboration.

With MiVoice Connect, the key value proposition is there’s no longer a need to flip between multiple apps to call, message, share screens and edit documents. Unlike some other platforms that purport to offer a collaboration suite, MiVoice Connect provides a consistent look and feel; works across multiple devices, operating systems and locations; and enables device handover.

Device handover is a particularly innovate and useful feature that allows for the seamless transfer of a call from one device to another. Here’s a common scenario in which device handover facilitates workflow and productivity:

1.    Sally initiates a call on her smartphone during her commute to work.

2.    Arriving at the office, Sally transfers the call to her desktop in order to access documents and share her screen.

3.    Nearing the end of the hour, Sally transfers the call back to her smartphone so that she can continue the call while driving to a sales meeting across town.

Some Assembly is Always Required – We Can Help

Like most manufacturers, Mitel’s platforms are scalable and flexible to suit businesses of various sizes, geographies and needs. Nevertheless, “ready to use out of the box” is not generally how you’d describe any UC platform. There’s always “some assembly required,” to say the least but, unlike with Ikea furniture, you never have all the little screws, foot pads and Allen wrenches you’re going to need.

That’s where Gregg Communications’ White Glove Service makes all the difference throughout the process of identifying the best phone solution for your business and implementation, training and supporting the new system. Most phone vendors leave the scene after the sale closes. Gregg Communications serves as your guide, advocate and worker to ensure you get everything you’ve paid for and it works the way it was advertised. Our clients like to call it a white glove service, but our techs think of it more like putting on our work gloves and jumping into the trenches alongside you

Size, experience and innovative features are a few of the good reasons to consider Mitel for your phone system needs. Whether Mitel’s the right office phone solution for you – or you’d like to consider alternative platforms – give us a call (630-706-8222) or email us. We’ll help you identify the phone system that works best for your specific needs.

8 Big Benefits of a Cloud Phone System for Your Business

A simple Google search about business phone systems will bombard you with articles stating unequivocally that “the cloud” is the best phone system for your business. The trend is certainly moving in this direction, with an estimated 80% of IT budgets now being committed to the cloud, but that doesn’t mean it’s right for your specific needs.

The fact is that moving your phone system to the cloud can offer substantial benefits over traditional on-premise configurations; a fact that many vendors and resellers will stress in an effort to push you into it. Nevertheless, IT decisions as weighty as your phone solution should be evidence-based and grounded in what’s best for your individual business. Believe it or not, there are a number of reasons businesses aren’t better suited to the cloud, and several reasons why they are. The best place to start is with understanding the full benefits of the cloud.

The Benefits of Cloud-Based Phone Systems

As a reseller that partners with most major cloud and on-premise vendors, Gregg Communications is in a unique position to lay out the unvarnished facts about the biggest benefits to businesses from moving their phones to a cloud model (or hybrid). Here are the top 8:

1. Capital expense vs. operating expense

One of the top selling points for small businesses, or those operating without a lot of capital, is the financial model of the cloud. For on-premise models, the system hardware, handsets and software can amount to a large capital expense that companies look to spend one time every five to ten years. As additional seats are needed, handsets and support equipment need to be purchased. Conversely, the cloud is a pay-as-you-go model that is billed as a monthly operating cost. As new seats are needed, the monthly cost simply increases incrementally.

2. Quick setup time

In most cases, the onboarding time with a cloud phone solution is much shorter than an on-premise implementation. This is because the platform is already live and configured to host business. While it’s not quite “plug and play”, it is considerably less time consuming than building an on-premise system, where you have to purchase equipment, lay groundwork, configure each unit and install the software.

3. It’s scalable

Expanding your communications capacity quickly and affordably, to accommodate rapid growth and seize unexpected opportunities, is a dream for most small and mid-sized businesses. Other businesses like the ability to contract their phone solution as needed. For instance, accounting firms love the ability to add phone seats around tax deadlines and remove them when the temporary workers are no longer needed.

4. Better support of remote users

In a very real sense, your whole business is a remote user when you’re on the cloud. This makes it much easier to enable access for offsite and remote staff. You can also establish security and access settings to ensure this access is obtained without unnecessary risks. There are on-premise systems that can support remote workers, but these often require additional equipment and configuration.

5. Cables, circuits and switches, oh my!

Most business locations in Chicago are equipped to handle high data transfer speeds, but not all of the buildings can accommodate the bandwidth you might need to host your own phone system onsite. Many businesses are reluctant to assume the expense of laying new phone cables in rented spaces, making a cloud system a more desirable solution. It’s likely your internet cabling is more up-to-date than your phone wiring. We would be remiss to not point out, however, that in this situation you’ll need to make sure your internet bandwidth is adequate to support the phone.

6. Upkeep and maintenance

The decision point here is: do you want to employ technicians and outlay cash when upgrades and repairs are needed? Maintenance and upgrading are included when you opt for just about any cloud phone system. We should note that for Gregg Communications’ on-premise clients, support is available with any phone system.

7. Security and compliance

While compliance is a headache for certain industries, security is a concern for all businesses these days. Most cloud providers are uncompromising about security since they know a single breach can shut their doors permanently. For example, Mitel has integrated their system into Google data centers to establish a level of security that satisfies HIPAA and PCI requirements. On-premise phone security is not as readily available. It depends on the reseller and vendor to strategize the best security options for you and implement them. It’s often costly and less effective than a cloud system.

8. Access to new innovations

Cloud phone providers are always adding new functionality and features to their solutions. Because the software is hosted in the cloud, these new features are available to you as soon as they hit the market – without requiring you to purchase new versions. While some features come at an additional cost, they are much more accessible and the cost is often nominal, if there is one at all.

The Best Phone Solution for Your Business

The benefits of cloud-based phone systems are evident. However, moving to the cloud is a choice that depends on the needs and opportunities of your unique business.

The efficiency, functionality and cost savings of the cloud are generally going to be more apparent for larger business with multiple locations, especially where satellite locations are smaller and more dependent on the main office.

Moreover, an important question to consider is how much you want to engage in the back-end operations of your business. It’s a little like the question of an automatic vs. manual transmission. Some like the control of clutching and shifting, while others want to focus more on reaching the destination.

Making the Best Decision for Your Business

Gregg Communications supplies cloud and premise-based phone systems. We work with all the leading manufacturers to offer our clients the best phone solutions on the market. As a neutral third party, our primary goal is to connect our clients with the platform that best meets their needs and minimizes their costs, while offering expert guidance and care during purchase and implementation.

Consider the benefits of moving to the cloud, but then be sure to get an unbiased assessment of what will work best for your business. Reach out to us at (630-706-8222) or by email to talk to us about what phone solution would suit you best.