TELEPHONY/CTI

Often ballyhooed strictly as an alternative to business travel, conferencing is, quite simply, convenient collaboration among people. Through conference calls, forums, instant messages, newsgroups, bulletin boards, e-mail, notes, videoconferences and any number of other appellations for sharing information, students and teachers, researchers and scientists, and global businesses stay connected. The level at which these diversified users wish to collaborate, however, demands varying degrees of complexity and of quality.

Introduced within the past five years, for example, on-demand teleconferencing software means ports no longer need to be reserved. The improved reservationless model furnishes flexibility–and soon, true instant conferencing, using new IP architecture, will incorporate PSTN, IP or wireless devices. Analyst Andrew Davis, managing partner at Wainhouse Research, notes, “We expect the market for such services to grow from $2.8 billion in the year 2000 to almost $10 billion by 2006.”

The Web-conferencing niche generated revenues of $266 million last year–and projected to surge to more than $2 billion in the next six, according to Frost & Sullivan.

Those “ivy-covered walls” are being re-landscaped via the Web. Distance learning encourages students everywhere to carry a laptop with their lunchbox. Virtual classrooms expose students to to collaboration among their distant peers. Distance teaching re-styled the concept of tenure into virtual tutelage, with fewer numbers of professors, each able to teach expanding numbers of students at once.

For organizations small, midsize and large, conferencing technology prompts many questions–among them, what benefits derive from such an investment? Global 2000 companies discovered they work better, resulting in faster business decisions, shorter selling cycles, enhanced communication and reduced costs.

CONFERENCING: A DIRTY WORD?

According to Marty Hollander, vice president of marketing for Latitude Communications in Santa Clara, CA, “Business people want to train, manage projects, obtain staff updates, hold sales calls and conduct virtual meetings that are just as effective as in-person ones.

“People need to pass notes, see who is speaking, view and edit documents, get a ‘show of hands,’ step out for private talks, and other natural components of meetings,” he observes. “Meetings must be simple to schedule, reschedule and attend, without the need for multiple reservation numbers, passwords and ID numbers.”

Latitude’s MeetingPlace supplies a single, fully integrated voice and Web conferencing environment to other organizations. When Century 21 real estate recently overhauled its policies, Kathy O’Shauhnessy needed to train 4,000 franchisees nationwide. To travel to each would have taken years. She completed the training in six months with the technology she already used for staff meetings, project management and investor calls, saving Century 21 more than $2 million to date.

Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad requires lightening-fast communication, and uses the solution’s IP telephony capabilities for safe, efficient scheduling of tracks. An open meeting is always on in case of emergencies requiring trains to be rerouted or canceled. Railroad teams can gather for immediate meetings to handle crises, with other team members able to be conferenced in even on their cell phones or personal digital assistants.

In Alaska, legislative sessions must be open and accessible to the public, but realistically, how can the scattered residents of the vast state travel across ice fields, around glaciers and through snow banks to attend? With conferencing technology, residents call one of 22 remote legislative information offices for immediate entry to visit sessions, and the state records and archives sessions for later review.

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BRIDGE TRAINING DISTANCES

“Web conferencing offers a wide-range of services that fit any meeting’s demands,” says Ted Schrafft, president of Premiere Conferencing in Lenexa, KS, which produces five conferencing solutions, including VisionCast, ReadyCast and SoundCast. “Training content can be delivered and demonstrated interactively, allowing participants to ask questions over the telephone, or through electronic question-and-answer or chat features. Presenters can poll the audience to gauge interest in the content, and collaboratively share documents to explain points more thoroughly. Participating employees’ simple requirements are access to a PC, the Internet and/or a phone line.”

“Before Web conferencing, our in-person training sessions were difficult because our employees are located around the world in different time zones,” says Jeff Klein, IT manager for Sorrento Networks, a metro optical networking company located in San Diego. “Web conferences allow us to regularly conduct training sessions without the extensive time-consuming coordination and travel. Premiere’s collaborative features allow our employees to function as if they are located in the same room.”

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WEB-CONFERENCING DARWINISM

“Web-conferencing solutions need to be all encompassing, offering the best in security, scalability, ease of use and long-term ROI,” adds Robert DeKoning, president and CEO of Pixion in Pleasanton, CA. Its adoption has been constrained by problems in those specific areas, but with its multimedia capabilities, Web conferencing is emerging as the preferred means for business conferencing, training, customer support and distance education.

In 1995, the client/server model with the T.120 standard made implementation expensive and arduous. By 1997, business models included subscription-based services and peer-to-peer solutions developed to minimize implementation requirements, with little or no upfront capital expenditures. As these solutions gained popularity, costs rose dramatically. Users learned that peer-to-peer technology was not secure, and that larger meetings often produce unsatisfactory experiences.

Active users are shifting to a third wave—server-driven enterprise communications—that utilizes a standards-based, cross-platform system with enhanced security, enabling bandwidth-independent Web meetings with internal administration. The server exists behind the enterprise firewall for greater control and security.

For large users, initial investment is low and recurring costs are minimal. For smaller users, implementation on a hosted basis provides the security and scalability required without the upfront investment. Although Pixion hosts Web conferencing at approximately $14,400 annually for 10 seats, Marketing Director Charles Orlando claims Pixion offers a transition to an installed system behind the firewall, with technical support and a “seat-usage” monitor for cost control, at around $23,000.

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ANYWHERE ANYTIME VALUE

“Any organization about to implement a distance-learning initiative should involve the highest levels of its IT group,” suggests Paul Sparta, chairman and CEO of Plateau Systems in Arlington, VA. “Find out first what the entire organization’s learning needs are, then research the technology needed to execute it.”

He cites Alcon, a $2.8-billion international pharmaceutical company with 12,000 employees and offices in 75 countries, which needed to train its national sales force on a new enterprise application. A division armed with distance- learning software delivered self-paced training courses straight to the Web browser of each sales representative. Time away from the field was greatly reduced, training costs slashed, productivity enhanced, and perhaps the greatest commodity in today’s corporate world—knowledge—was dispersed where and when it was needed. 
“The benefits of e-learning in time and money saved alone are compelling,” Sparta concurs, “but planned wisely, such a system can create strategic value far beyond hard cost savings, from increased productivity to enhanced employee retention.”

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E-LEARNING'S PAYOFF

“In the knowledge economy,” submits Ara Ohanian, CEO of Vuepoint Corp. in Roslyn Heights, NY, “companies can generally expect to knock up to 60% off training costs by using e-learning applications.” Unlike instructor-led classes, however, Ohanian says, the cost of e-learning is reduced as the number of students increase. Not to be ignored are savings in time spent on training and the cost of printed materials.

Certainly, significant start-up costs exist–a typical 1,000-user setup without major integration points would cost approximately $100,000 yearly, Ohanian projects–including the expense of hardware and software for course delivery and for content authoring and management. Further cost effectiveness occurs when a firm sets up a shared repository of knowledge around a particular subject, available to all employees who need it, no matter their location or when they need to use the information.

Take the case of Toyota when a new vehicle is being introduced. Regional dealers, mechanics, technicians and sales staff need information on features, servicing and technical specifications. Each of those areas can start building a knowledge module, or learning object, around the product, spending a certain amount to do it.

By looking at knowledge assets in a global way, 80% of the entire knowledge requirement around a particular product launch is usually the same; 20% may be local, based on region or based on vertical. In dollars and cents, that translates to potentially big savings. Ohanian points out that such a system could be universal to the product launch in all offices or regions, so that the cost of the launch in each region would cover the majority of knowledge and training needed for all regions. Then, 20% of that cost would apply to expenses tailored for the local areas.

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SPEAK WITHOUT RESERVATION

A new teleconferencing model–reservationless or on-demand conferencing–accounts today for nearly one in five conference calls, with expectations of nearly four out of five by 2007. The implications for enterprises include lower costs, time savings and enhanced collaboration because of automation.

Reservationless conferencing uses traditional bridge hardware and digital signal processing resources, but, explains Jeremy DuPont, VoIP product manager for Voyant Technologies in Westminster, CO, “No reservations are needed because the system is able to intelligently anticipate usage and distribute ports accordingly,” As the probability of new participants joining a call declines, ports are gradually allocated back to the open pool.

Most commonly, implementation of on-demand conferencing is contracted through a teleconferencing service provider, since installing the infrastructure requires thousands of subscribers to perform most efficiently and, thus, is limited to large organizations.

“Emerging IP systems will move beyond reservationless to true ‘instant’ conferencing,” DuPont predicts, “so that additional participants on traditional PSTN, IP or wireless devices can join any two-way call with the press of a button. Neither reservations nor conferencing subscriptions will be needed because the IP architecture will simplify call routing.”

As new capabilities and ease-of-use advantages spur more frequent use of phone conferencing, costs will fall because of reductions in development, transport and maintenance expenses.

The Bombay Company Inc. found teleconferencing an easy and efficient way to facilitate and enhance internal communications and investor relations. Bombay, a specialty retailer with North American locations, markets furniture, wall decor and accessories, conducts sales through mail order, via the Internet and through international partnerships.

Its carrier, however, required that Bombay reserve calls ahead of time, and that cancellations be made at least two hours prior to the reserved time to avoid a $35 penalty. This became costly. Each time Bombay made a reservation, a different dial-up number and passcode were assigned, so that all involved parties had to be sure they were using the newest phone number.

After several inflexible situations with that carrier, Bombay decided to use Genesys Conferencing’s Meeting Center, a collaboration platform that integrates audio and Web conferencing. Bombay did not need to buy or install any new hardware, as it only required a phone line and a connection to the Internet. This reservationless solution proved to be more flexible, employees always use the same dial-in number and passcode, and cancellation penalties do not exist.

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For more information from Genesys Conferencing:
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THE FUTURE IS NOW

Conferencing products/services are thriving in knowledge-fertile global territory. As the industry meanders around obstacles like voice delays, interoperability or encryption (see www.att.com/virtualmeetings/excutivevideoemo.html), the quality of conferencing steadily improves. As more organizations are exposed to the steady flow of these conferencing technologies’ obvious competitive advantages, and with forecasts of market growth from the millions of dollars to the billions in a few short years, to say “the future is now” would be more accurate than ever.

Choose an e-learning system

Every organization’s decision will be unique, but considering these questions will help reap the benefits from the e-learning tool chosen:

• Technology: Does the e-learning solution run on nonproprietary technology? Does it run in a browser window? Does it require the purchase of additional hardware and software (and are these included in the cost)? What kind of security does the product offer? What is the technology impact on an IT department? (Are there any hidden costs here?) Can the technology allow the sharing of high-intensity graphics files? Can it handle both mutlicast video and audio? Is it scalable to meet current and future needs? Will it integrate with common tools instructors and students use, such as Microsoft’s Outlook?
• Reliability: What does the vendor promise as uptime? Does the vendor have 24x7 availability? What does the vendor offer in terms of training and technical support? Are both live and online support offered, or just one or the other? What’s the backup policy for files? What is the vendor’s failover strategy? Disaster recovery strategy?
• Ease of use: Is the product easy to install and maintain? Is it easy for students and teachers to use on a daily basis? Does it run over the Internet? Does it use moderate bandwidth (256K)? Is it available via a browser? Does it offer real-time conferencing and messaging? Is the workspace flexible, and is it configurable by instructors to meet the needs of humanities, as well as science courses?
• Relationship building: Does the product have features that help build the same rapport between teachers and students and among students as the physical classroom does? Does the system allow students to see one another, and to form workgroups for class projects? Does it improve the immediacy of interactions between teachers and students? Does the tool aid the instructor in facilitating online classes and sessions? Can it be customized to give every class its own look and feel?

This article was contributed by Robert Ebert, CEO of Virtualdesign.net, Portland, OR.

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