IBM Connect BP302 Social Communications: A Roadmap for Connecting Sametime with Everything
Social Business, Mobile or Social Communications: what path should you take? Does Connections need Sametime or does it stand alone?
What are the most critical decisions an organizations makes to unify existing audio conferencing, video conferencing, and phone systems? In this session we will offer a roadmap to Unified Communications that marks the critical “forks in the road” on the journey to UC and illustrate experiences from actual implementations. We’ll cover UC platforms (Sametime, Lync, Jabber), video (Cisco, Polycom, Avaya), telephony (Cisco, Avaya, ShoreTel or legacy), firewalls, mobility, and call control/dial plans. The session will wrap-up with a live demo featuring full integration of Sametime, Connections, and Polycom video.
3. Abstract
Social Business, Mobile or Social Communications: what path should you
take? Does Connections need Sametime or does it stand alone?
What are the most critical decisions an organizations makes to unify
existing audio conferencing, video conferencing, and phone systems? In
this session we will offer a roadmap to Unified Communications that marks
the critical “forks in the road” on the journey to UC and illustrate
experiences from actual implementations. We’ll cover UC platforms
(Sametime, Lync, Jabber), video (Cisco, Polycom, Avaya), telephony
(Cisco, Avaya, ShoreTel or legacy), firewalls, mobility, and call control/dial
plans. The session will wrap-up with a live demo featuring full integration of
Sametime, Connections, and Polycom video.
3
4. Your speakers
James Burnham .is a Social Business Solution Architect with Meridian IT.
James’ current focus is helping companies realize improved results by extending
social and collaborative platforms deeply into existing business processes. James
draws on twenty years of experience in a variety of roles including internal IT for a
global manufacturer, sales engineering and strategic alliance management with a
global systems integrator, and sales engineering and partner management with
software OEMs in analytics and marketing automation. James began working
IBM ICS space with Notes R3 and deployed one of the first global scale Domino
collaboration. His current engagements with clients include business analysis for
social business deployments, and social business architecture, and unified
communications.
4
5. Your speakers
Peter Lurie - My specialty is focusing medium to large organizations on the key
things they need to improve communication and collaboration. This includes not
just unifying their collaboration, but also the plans, policies and procedures to
make it effective. I focus on ease of use, driving adoption, and showing
measurable business results. I've been working almost exclusively with IBM, IBM's
partners and IBM's customers for the last 5 years, and have 12+ years
collaborating around the globe with customers, partners and prospects.
Currently I'm the manager of the Global UC Architect team at Polycom.
Previously, I was an IT professional at a large financial services firm.
5
6. Your speakers
David Price has been working with ICS products since release 3.3. As an
employee of an international bank, he built a 93,000 Notes and Domino enterprise
and at one point had the largest Domino deployment on IBM Power I outside of
IBM itself. A speaker at IBM and non-IBM conferences as well as Red Book
author, he helps companies select and deploy collaboration solutions. His focus is
to deliver Social Communications integrated with voice and video. Working with
products from Avaya, Cisco, Polycom, Tandberg and ShoreTel. He advises
companies to understand what their Social Communications environment can be
and which capabilities should come from ICS and which from voice and video
providers.
David is also an IBM ICS Champion for 2013.
6
7. Meridian IT at a glance
Meridian IT Inc.
– International System Integration with focus on hardware,
networking and IBM software
– Experience and expertise with multiple systems (Cisco,
Avaya, Nortel and ShoreTel) along with telephony
infrastructure (dial plans, SIP trunking, routing, etc.) and
video (Tandberg, Polycom and Radvision)
– Authorized to sell and implement IBM Sametime Unified
Telephony® as well as all versions of IBM Sametime®.
– Public and private cloud offerings including platform as a
service (PAAS).
– IBM Flex System™ certified as part of our broad IBM
hardware experience.
– IBM PureApp™ certification in process
Meridian Group companies hold Cisco Gold, Avaya
Platinum, Tandberg, Polycom and Shoretel certifications
7
8. Polycom at a Glance
Financial $1.5B Revenue, 23% Y/Y Growth, 2011
Strength 58Qs Positive Cash Flow
$615M in cash and investments
Strategic 7000 Partners
Partnerships
Strategic Alliances with
Customer 415,000+ customers
Momentum
100% of the Fortune 100
95% of the Fortune 500
93% of the Fortune Global 100
Industry Polycom Named #1 Video Conferencing
Momentum Leader in new Forrester Wave Report
based upon “Strategy” and “Offerings”
Gained 8% market share in 1H 2012
8
9. Disclaimer to the disclaimer
As always, IBM Lotusphere® /IBM Connect2013® has a number of
announcements
This year there are many in the Social Communications space
This deck is (will be?) available before the start of the conference
We created the presentation with public information
– Information from other sessions should only make the topics and themes more relevant.
– Where we know or expect announcements, there will be a note on the slide and we will
speak to what was announced as of Wednesday
9
10. House Keeping
Please fill out the evaluations
Put phones on silent or vibrate
Don't block the aisles with power cord
10
11. Agenda
What does connecting Sametime to Everything Mean?
Social Communications Roadmap
Forks in the Social Communications roadmap
IBM Sametime® and IBM Connections® and Polycom Real Presence ® Social
Communications demo
Questions and hopefully Answers
Other key sessions from IBM Connect2013
11
12. Connecting Sametime to everything
Connecting any person
on any device, in any
Scope: presence, chat,
application, on any web conferencing, voice,
webpage, to another
and video
person, anywhere, on
any device.
Voice: enabling Video: connecting
Sametime with VOIP, Sametime with bridges,
PSTN; dial plans for room based, desktop,
reaching people or tele-presence, and
devices mobile
Applications*: enabling
Sametime with-in
applications, webpages,
portals, mobile devices
12
13. Any person, any device, anywhere
Add Chat, Presence, Telephony Awareness to
Applications & Devices
Connect to Voice & Video Networks,
Audio & Video Conferencing
13
14. Understanding Click to Call/Click to Conference
Sametime Standard in a VoIP installation
• Presence/telephony awareness ONLY. In this scenario, Sametime Standard does NOT function
as a the soft phone*
• Sametime Connect instructs the telephony system to call my registered device (VoIP softphone,
mobile phone, desk phone) and then call the other parties.
• For laptop users, the registered device will either be a telephony UC client on the laptop or a cell
phone
This can result in:
• Multiple UC clients on the desktop
• Additional client if video client is different
• Redundant address books that do not synchronize
• Redundant presence indicators
• Potentially confusion for the end user
• Potential for redundant licensing and maintenance
* This is the key factor for many customers in choosing between
SUT/Sametime SIP and Sametime Standard
14
15. Integrate vs. interoperate
• Telephony or video controls are part of Sametime.
TCSPI = • When possible, find vendors with TCSPI adapters
integration • Find third party firms who have written their TCSPI adapter
Interoperate • Integration only (typically).
= SUT Lite • Many solutions call for SUT Lite with TCSPI
• Challenge with Sametime to date has been lack
PSTN • Review announcements from this week
• iLink provides both Tandberg TCSPI as well as PSTN
integration integration into Sametime Standard.
(http://ilink.de/en/products/index.html)
15
16. External chat
communities
via TCSPI Gateway
Server via SUT Lite
Meeting
Server
Community
Server
Media
Manager 3rd party SIP
infrastructure
TCSPI
Dual Adapter(s)
PSTN
Voice Video
Bridge Bridge
HTTP IP PBX TDM PBX
VP (Virtual Places)
SIP
Partner Controlled
Sametime Component
Partner Component
16
17. Making Social Business Visual
IBM Social Business Solution Polycom RealPresence Solution
Polycom
RealPresence
Media Utility for CMA RealPresence
IBM Sametime Device Management Immersive
5 Video Publishing
(Polycom App)
IBM Domino Server PRMM
Scheduling Integration Recording and playback RealPresence
4
(Polycom API) Room
IBM Sametime 3
Audio/Video Integration
Calendar Integration Resource Manager
Lotus Notes (IBM Integration) RealPresence
Calendar Integration Desktop
IBM Sametime Server
IBM Connections 2 SIP Trunk via SUT Lite
Integration (IBM option)
RealPresence
1 Mobile
Video Integration DMA 7000
(Polycom Add-in)
Polycom Conferencing
Add-In for IBM Sametime Audio device
(cellphone,
RMX Conference Platform conference
phone, etc.)
H.323, SIP, PSTN, ISDN
SIP audio and video audio and video
SIP audio and video
18. Sametime TCSPI options
TCSPI
• Avaya – Radvision*
• Avaya telephony
• iLink**
• Polycom
• Shoretel
SUT Lite
• Avaya –Radvision*
• Cisco – Tandberg***
• Polycom
• Logitech - LifeSize ****
•* Radvision functionality prior to acquisition.
• ** Developed TCSPI for Tandberg
• *** Interoperability via Cisco VCS gateway.
• **** No interoperability testing completed. SIP is a standard but not as mature as TCP/IP or
SMTP
18
19. Agenda
What does connecting Sametime to Everything Mean?
Social Communications Roadmap
Forks in the Social Communications roadmap
IBM Sametime® and IBM Connections® and Polycom Real Presence ® Social
Communications demo
Questions and hopefully Answers
Other key sessions from IBM Connect2013
19
20. Social Communications Roadmap: A Way to Navigate
Convergence of Content & Communications
20
?
Social Business + Communication Connections and Sametime Are
Tools: “Social Business – Connected” Getting Closer
• Five years ago the focus was on web • Today: two development teams, Two product
conferencing and IM. managers, etc.
• Convergence of communications (Sametime) • Separate purchases, standalone deployments
& content (Connections) • But integration points exist and are becoming
stronger
21. Social Communications enablers
Mobile Device Network Social Generation
Cloud Delivery
Proliferation Readiness Connectedness Raised on Video
64M 3G $41B 800M 3B
Tablets Today Today Users on Videos
4G Facebook viewed daily
320M $241B 140M
on YouTube
Tablets By 2020
by 2015 WiFi On video 66%
chat by 2015 Mobile
Traffic 2015
21
22. Social Business and Social Communications changes the
internal IT landscape
Knocking • Individual tools don’t work
Down • Video conferencing with a non-integrated audio bridge creates latency
between audio and video, very distracting for viewers
Silos
Be • Wrong turns can lead to multiple:
• clients (chat, presence, telephony, video)
careful of • dial plans
forks in • collaboration platforms
the road • audio channels and audio bridges
Voice &
• Want to own Social Business road map
Video • As we discuss later, make sure you are evaluating the right features
Vendors
22
23. Social Communications Roadmap Best Practices
You’re on a journey: social business and communications is
inevitable and unavoidable.
• Social Communications is a business project to make social networks more
effective – so focus on the people and the business goal.
Strong executive sponsorship
• You're wrestling with gorillas. Breaking down silos engages lots of stakeholders-
every employee, customer, vendor; your voice, video, network, collaboration
teams.
Align executive sponsorship to a compelling vision
• Why are we doing this? What will it look like when we're finished? How (who!) will
we use it? What will we do differently?
Successful journeys start with the End in Mind!
23
24. Social Communications Roadmap Best Practices
Should you trust your telephone or
mobile device vendors Social
Communications roadmap?
• Phone != Social communications
Conference room video units !=
Social Communications
• Video MCUs, video borders and other
infrastructure do need to play a part in
Social Communications evaluations.
That thinking is as logical as
‘I own a Volvo therefore I must
marry a Swede’.
(Not that there’s anything wrong
with Swedes…or Volvos).
24
25. Process to evaluate and deploy a Social Communications
Solution
Use Cases
Architecture Products Implementation
(requirements)
Process is not new, unique or terribly original but you will hear us repeat
it over and over again
May times customers or IBMers will call us because they jumped right to
products and want assistance in comparing features.
25
26. Building Your Roadmap
Know your
Terrain &
Geography
Know where
you want to go
(vision)
Know where
you are
(assessment)
26
27. Terrain: Pervasive, Continuous, Fluid
BYOD is new reality.
• Extremely rapid discard rates
• Very fast adoption especially with mobility
• Your Success (survival, relevance) demands solutions that anticipate changes
Business will not wait for IT
• IT must embrace the speed of business
• Fail Fast, Succeed Fast
27
28. Vision: Know Where you Want to Go
Improving collaboration will
– Make our sales persons 1% more
effective resulting in $x increase in
revenue
– Reduce process time by x days
resulting in reduced cash to close with
a value of $.
Improving collaboration will
– Support the expansion of our sales
offices.
– Allow us to recruit the best talent
regardless of geography.
– Tie together our US and European
operations under a new management
structure.
28
29. Assessment: Where are you today?
Telephony infrastructure: VoIP or
legacy TDM?
We are an organization that is built
around our ERP system. Majority of
employees are not mobile and mobility
Enterprise applications that would is less critical.
benefit from Social Communications?
CRM, ERP, customer extranet, chat We are an organization organized
on public web site for pre-sales around the sales process. Our
questions. employees are highly mobile and
need their mobile devices to function
as an extension of the desk phones.
These two companies have very
different assessments and different
needs.
Legacy systems will often require
SIP/TDM gateways.
29
30. Agenda
What does connecting Sametime to Everything Mean?
Social Communications Roadmap
Forks in the Social Communications roadmap
IBM Sametime® and IBM Connections® and Polycom Real Presence ® Social
Communications demo
Questions and hopefully Answers
Other key sessions from IBM Connect2013
30
31. Roadmap to Social Business
There are clear “forks in the road” on the journey to Social Communications. Pick
the wrong path and it will take time and money to change
Fork A - Social Business focused
Fork B – Device focused
Fork C – Application focused
Fork D – Let’s describe it when we get there.
Yes you can end up with a Runcible spoon solution; a Runcible spoon is more
commonly known as a spork.
31
32. In this process we are often asked about non-IBM solutions
Microsoft Lync ®
• We go back to: Use cases → Architecture → Products →
and/or Microsoft Implementation
Yammer®, Cisco • We have found Microsoft Outlook customers where Sametime
Jabber™ and Connections are the best solutions. It all depends on use
cases.
or IBM products
• Often when multiple legacy TDM systems are involved, SUT is
Sametime + the best option; or
• Spork: Sametime integrated with telephony vendor’s TCSPI
telephony vs. SUT plus Connections; or
Lite vs. SUT. • No telephony integration until TDM PBX is replaced with SIP
PBX
32
33. Company A Chose Social Business Fork
Healthcare, Microsoft email and productivity tools.
Background
1,500 employees.
Collaborate across geographically separate groups;
Driver
find experts quickly. Organization is fairly flat and lean.
Strong need to align project teams; flat & lean
Assessment
organization; mix of IBM, Oracle, Microsoft.
Full IBM Social Business+Social Communications;
Decision replaced OCS and SharePoint; extending Social
Business outside the firewall.
Use cases and following the analysis made the
Lesson
decision possible.
33
34. Company B Chose Device Fork
Transportation firm. IBM Notes® and IBM
Background Domino® deployed enterprise wide. 3,000
users, large call center operation
External meeting costs, improved collaboration,
Driver telephony UC.
Collaboration without Unified Telephony.
Decision Deployed telephony UC solution understanding
the overlapping tools on the desktop.
The organization focused more on device, less
Lesson on the application.
34
35. Company C Chose Application Fork
Manufacturing. IBM Notes/Domino deployed
Background enterprise wide. Approximately 1,500 users.
Technology refresh of multiple outdated telephony
Driver installations. Spent over a year comparing
telephony/UC/Social Business vendors.
In the end, decided the business need was
Decision application focused, not device focused.
(1) Start with business goals in mind, engage the
business; (2) device based use cases favor Avaya or
Lessons Cisco; (3) application centric use cases favor IBM
Social Communications
35
36. Company D
Chose, actually I’m not sure what the heck they did
Big Box retailer with many locations including
international. Deployed IBM Websphere Portal Server
Background and associated portal products. Tens of thousands of
users. IBM Notes/Domino deployed enterprise wide.
Integrate the stores with each other and corporate.
Driver Critical factor was surfacing UC in their portal as well
as Notes.
Selected vendor whose products a) don’t integrate
Decision with Websphere Portal Server or b) IBM Notes
Some people will believe the line, ‘that feature is in
Lesson the next release’ more then they will their eyes.
36
37. Critical Question: Connections--Standalone or with Sametime?
• Presence in Connection
Today, good • Connection features in ST Business Card
integration • Add chat to community or activity
Announcements • drive even better integration.
• Ability to take artifacts from a Sametime Meeting and save into
I expect this Connections.
week • Extend Sametime Connect integration into Connections
• not only should Sametime and Connections be integrated but why aren’t
The answer is you doing so today.
Personal • is that in the future, a new Social Business product will include additional
viewpoint services including ECM and what we consider UC today.
37
38. Agenda
What does connecting Sametime to Everything Mean?
Social Communications Roadmap
Forks in the Social Communications roadmap
IBM Sametime® and IBM Connections® and Polycom Real Presence ® Social
Communications demo
Questions and hopefully Answers
Other key sessions from IBM Connect2013
38
39. Live demo – Connections 4.0 and Sametime 8.5.2 IFR1
What you will see
• Typical Connections Interface
• Sametime tags
• See what tags connect to
• See what tags do
• Sametime client / HTTP session
• See us converse and share
• See us find and bring in expert
• See us go to voice call
• See us escalate to video call
• Create a meeting w/voice & video
39
41. Lotus User Group Webinars sponsored by Meridian and
Plantronics
LUG -> SocialBiz User Group
http://www.socialbizug.org/communities/service/html/communityview?communityU
uid=21781f72-8a28-438e-ac4d-f2a44f7aaa5e
Social Business @ IBM Connect 2013 — Preview what's around the corner for
Sametime Video and Mobility
Seeing is Believing — Video Options for Sametime
IBM Sametime Unified Telephony Lite: Communicating with Devices
Your Social Business advantage: using IBM Sametime to integrate telephony,
audio and video; tying people and customers together in powerful ways
Don't Get Stopped By a Wall, A Firewall That Is — Using the Sametime 8.5.2
TURN Server
It's Video-riffic: What's Coming next for Sametime
41
42. Sametime Enhancement from Plantronics
Successfully voice or video projects require endpoints.
Best Practice is to partner with people who know what they are doing.
– Meridian partners with Plantronics for this reason
UC Adoption toolkit – guides, configuration video and bag full of tips to ease the
deployment of endpoints
Productivity - status updated when you are using your headset on a Sametime /
Mobile / Desk phone call via Spokes software for Sametime.
Mobility - Spokes gives you the ability to roam around the office with your headset
and still remain connected to the Sametime call control and toggle between calls.
350 feet if DECT SAVI headset and 33 Feet if Bluetooth away from desktop .
Spokes software for Sametime - Can be deployed by IT and updated the same
way.
42
43. Agenda
What does connecting Sametime to Everything Mean?
Social Communications Roadmap
Forks in the Social Communications roadmap
IBM Sametime® and IBM Connections® and Polycom Real Presence ® Social
Communications demo
Questions and hopefully Answers
Other key sessions from IBM Connect2013
43
44. Q&A
James Burnham (jburnham@meridianitinc.com)
David Price (dprice@meridianitinc.com)
Peter Lurie (Peter.Lurie@polycom.com)
Find us on Greenhouse on Sametime via our email addresses
If you are not on Greenhouse, register via this link:
https://greenhouse.lotus.com/gh_next/lotusgreenhouserequests.nsf/Mai
nDocumentSelf?openForm
Don’t miss Ask the Product Managers
and GURUpalooza on Thursday!
44
45. Agenda
What does connecting Sametime to Everything Mean?
Social Communications Roadmap
Forks in the Social Communications roadmap
IBM Sametime® and IBM Connections® and Polycom Real Presence ® Social
Communications demo
Questions and hopefully Answers
Other key sessions from IBM Connect2013
45
46. Other key Sessions
Sunday
• JMP201 IBM Connections 4.0 Administration Introduction Jumpstart F Yasin, L Chaney
• SHOW 401 - Demystifying Your IBM Sametime Deployment with the Configuration
Validator J Miller
• JMP204 IBM Sametime 8.5.3 Architecture and Deployment Workshop W Morgam
• JMP206 IBM Sametime Unified Telephony QuickStart Deployment C Price
• JMP203 Deep Dive: What's New in IBM Connections 4.0 Administration and
Configuration L Zhang, M Estrada
• JMP205 From Zero to Mobile Hero: IBM Sametime 8.5.2 Mobile Access Server install
F Altenburg, V Juergensen
Monday
• SW102 Social Analytics: Key to a Competitive Social Enterprise M. Heid
• INV103 Social Communications Strategy and the IBM Sametime Roadmap – J. DelPizzo
• BOF101 Using the Power of Video to make Social Business Visual P. Lurie
46
47. Tuesday
• ID401 What's Next in IBM Sametime M Machado
• INV302 - Face It, We Need to Talk! Rich Media in IBM
Sametime - J Reed
• INV104 - IBM Enterprise Mobile Strategy and Platform - D
Marshak, D Del Rosso
• CUST101 Continental: Unleashing a Smarter Workforce
with IBM Sametime for Social - E Jakobi, V Juergensen
• INV204 - "Pardon the Interruption": Social Business Hot
Topics - L Richardson, L Rodriguez, L Benitez
• ID402 IBM Sametime Mobile Instant Messaging and
Meetings S Babin, R Fahey, D Langley
47
48. Wednesday
• Show 400 - If it Fits, it Ships! Getting the Most out of Your IBM Sametime Client
Install N Pittman, C Markos
• ID407 Seeing is Believing: Advanced Video Technology for IBM Sametime P Galvin,
B Srivastava
• SPOT107 Governance, Compliance & eDiscovery for IBM Connections, Sametime
and Facebook C Shields
• ID404 Best Practices for IBM Sametime Meetings Deployment End-to-End B Gold
• ID307 Make Your Microsoft Stack Social with IBM Connections S Foley, B Slavens
• ID306 IBM Connections Mobile Server Administration and Security R Godwin, D
Kennedy
• ID405 Taking IBM Sametime to the Edge: Deploying a Collaborative Extranet T
Payne
• Show 300 - IBM Connections 4 101: Installing and Deploying IBM Connections and
Cognos C Price
• ID403 IBM Sametime System Console: One-Stop Sametime Administration F
Altenburg, V Jeurgensen
48
49. Thursday
• ID406 Best Practices in Voice and Video
Deployment U Segev
• AD109 Using the IBM Sametime Proxy SDK:
Websphere Portal, IBM Connections - and
Beyond W Homes, C Tyler
• GURUpalooza!
• Ask the Product Managers
• CGS - Lotusphere Closing General Session
49
51. For reference only
IBM Solution Diagram-DMA Adapter
TCSPI
VP DMA XML API
VP
PSTN Network
Polycom
IBM Sametime IBM Sametime DMA7000
Community Server Conference Manager
VP SIP
Sametime Media
IBM Sametime Manager
Connect Client or RMX ISDN/PSTN
Meeting Client
XML API
HTTP/S
VP
Polycom RPM
IBM Sametime Meeting IBM Sametime Client
Server Proxy/Registrar
SIP
H.323
Polycom RMX SIP
CMA Client
HTTP/S Series
NRPC
IBM Lotus Domino Server
HDX
Series
IBM Lotus Notes Client with NRPC
IBM Sametime
LDAP
Protocols
NRPC: Notes Remote Procedure Call
Microsoft Active Directory
LDAP: Lightweight Directory Application Protocol IBM Tivoli Directory OTX/RPX
VP: Virtual Places Protocol (IBM Proprietary) Integrator
Polycom Endpoints
Editor's Notes
Includes IM, presence, web conferencing, voice and videoIM and presence includes email, Portals, web pages, Social Business applications, custom application, desktop productivity productsVoice includes – internal Sametime users, PSTN users, dialing between them.Includes dial plans for calling people (Sametime clients) or devices (desk phones, mobiles and external parties)Web conferences including participants on PSTN devicesVideo bridging desktop, room based, tele-presence systems and mobile devices
“Transition from IM to UC to SC not just terminology or marketingshifting the focus from 'reach' to 'relevance‘Reflects evolution and convergence of a) business needs b) technology capabilities and user acceptance/adoptionMajority of our “UC” discussions include video and/or voice along with inserting Sametime into something (Connections, IBM Websphere Portal Server®, Microsoft SharePoint®, public web site for chat support)
Sounds insane but reasonable companies analyzing the wrong features have come to this result.Can you be a Social Business if: You'll need three clients per end point?If the information you need to connect with a person is in three different directories ?If your vendor doesn't have a client for all of your platforms? Video (desktop & mobile) will contribute toward ConvergenceSound and images in separate channels (meeting room, corporate phone, mobile network) are not synchronizedVideo will help drive organizations to consider single channel for voice+videoYou will confront multiple client coexistenceWhen (not if) desktop (and iPad and iPhone and Android) video comes to your organization, you will need to have a coherent answer.Video's technical requirements will contribute toward driving organizations to confront social tool choices
What are you trying to accomplish?Why is this important work?How will you know you are successful?What metrics does your boss’ boss care about?What are business plans? Geographic expansion, expansion of remote working? Go TALK to the business, find out how to help them.ConferencesCompany MeetingSales ClubFamily VacationFraternity / Sorority
Background: Healthcare, Microsoft email and productivity tools. 1,500 employees.Driver: Customer had a number of point solutions including partial deployment of Microsoft OCS® and some SharePoint®. Business drive was to allow geographically separate groups to collaborate. Secondary but important need was to find experts quickly. Organization is fairly flat and lean. There is a significant need to keep teams aligned during projects.Decision: Embraced full IBM Social Business+Social Communications; IBM Websphere Portal Server, IBM Content Management, IBM Connections, IBM Sametime, IBM Quickr for J2EE. Replaced OCS and SharePoint. Provided secured Extranet for customers, extending Social Business outside the firewall.Lesson: Many at the customer, both in IT and the business, were skeptical that an IBM solution was best. Repeatedly going back to use cases and following the analysis through finally made the decision possible.
Background: Transpiration firm. IBM Notes® and IBM Domino® deployed enterprise wide. 3,000 users.Driver: Customer wanted to shift costs from external hosted meetings and wanted to add presence and chat. Was evaluating telephony UC for the enterprise because they felt that that UC was a step needed.Decision: Acquired Sametime Standard, Sametime Extranet and Sametime Unified Telephony to have Social Business. Decision on all products was made by the CIO and the collaboration team without input from telephony manager or engineers.Lesson: Sametime Standard deployment and functionality adopted and used by the organization. During planning for SUT implementation the customer began to truly evaluate IBM and the telephony solution. Eventually the organization concluded they were more device focused then application; deployed telephony UC solution understanding the overlapping tools on the desktop.