Well, last week Microsoft launched Windows 7 to the public and the next wave of marketing battles has begun.  The MAC vs. PC war continues and it appears there is no end in sight.  Regardless of which side you choose, the upgrade question is inevitable.   With each MAC OS X and Windows version upgrade the discussion must be had and a decision will be made; to upgrade or not?

It’s not always as simple as we would like it to be.  Proceeding with an upgrade, should mean that things (process, systems, procedures, etc…) get better, right?   Not always.  The learning curve, possible adverse affect on other technologies, or just the time that it takes to make the conversion, can at times be so painful that the expected improvement is never worth the effort required to implement the upgrade.  How then does one determine if and when to proceed with the change and is there a simple answer?

In order to answer this question for our clients we must familiarize ourselves with and understand the client’s business, their processes, culture and goals.  We then leverage our experience and expertise to determine how a change to their technology, (IT or Telecommunications) will affect them.  We recognize that while something may be new, it may not always be better and at the same time we have discovered that just because something has worked perfectly for you in the past, it does not mean that there is not a better way.  Our answer to the upgrade question is this; Upgrade, as long as it enables you to meet your business goals in a more efficient and cost effective manner.  Appreciate the marketing campaigns and laugh at the commercials, but try not to look to them for answers to your business technology questions.  Look to us, that's our job.

This morning I attended a panel discussion about healthcare and the cloud.  The five member panel was represented by Microsoft, a major Boston hospital, a healthcare researcher, and 2 healthcare technology entrepreneurs.  The panel had excellent knowledge and opened my eyes to the enormous changes and issues happening in the healthcare field and how it will integrate with the cloud.

When it comes to patient information, healthcare systems have what was described as a “roach motel” problem.  The data comes in, but it doesn’t get out.  The creation of an electronic medical record (EMR) and the ability to attach patient information, medical images and other information is the logical wave of the future.  As we all share information on Facebook, Twitter and through online banking, we understand the value of that instant information.  We know how easy it is to get that information out.

In a healthcare system in drastic need of reform, it would seem that technology will be the key to the solution.  But how will that work, how safe is the EMR, who can manage it and what are the rules for sharing it?  How does patient information get across the street?  How is efficiency improved to create a greater level of patient care?  Rest assured, the big boys like Microsoft and Google are hard at work building these platforms in the cloud to make sure that that flow of information can be done safely, efficiently and quickly.

The healthcare reform stimulus is throwing a lot of money at the problem, but according to the experts, that is not  a simple solution.  The healthcare industry is reluctant to change.  They hide within their fortress to avoid innovation.  Forcing innovation is a risky plan.  There also needs to be a set of guidelines so that companies looking to provide solutions to the healthcare challenges create products that can have a standard form of integration and an ability to interface with the mountains of legacy data that already exists.  Hopefully that can all be addressed, but it will take time. 

The cloud is eventually going to emerge as the platform that will give healthcare reform its best chance to succeed.  The road will be long and the benefits will be tremendous.  There are great challenges and opportunities for companies like Unitel that provide the IT infrastructure and support and entrepreneurs who are designing solutions for today’s problems.  I only hope that someday it will be easy enough for my doctor to know more about my health and lifestyle than it already is for CVS today.

At Unitel, we have found that embracing the sticker shock factor can help jump start the right kinds of conversations with our clients.  Since we work in the world of technical solutions, it is vital that we tailor our services to meet the diverse business needs of our clients.  We strive to eliminate the unexpected and bring order to what many clients perceive as a chaotic necessary evil.  After all, our clients business is their business and not the technology that supports it.  Many times they do not have the skill set, time or desire to give technology the attention that it requires, which is why we are there to support them.

When the focus is solution rather than price, you are better able to match the most appropriate long term service, technology or solution to the problem that is affecting your customer’s ability to achieve their business goals (whatever those might be).  At times this approach will elicit a sense of shock and surprise from you customer, the moment the final price tag is revealed.  After all it is not their area of expertise, so for them to assume that the effort or cost necessary to fix their issue is less than what it actually is should be expected.

Open the lines of communication and tackle the concern head on.  Educate the client on what the solution is going to do for their business and how it is going to help improve their bottom line.  This approach may not be the only way to deal with this, but it is the approach we find to be most effective.  If you have taken the time to understand your client’s business and their concerns, then you should be able to assist your customer in shifting their line of thought.  Rather than thinking, “How can I afford this?”  Your client needs to ask themselves, “Can I afford to not do this?”  After all, numbers are just additional pieces of information; they don’t have to be scary.  Business voice and data lines not working, help desk calls going unanswered and critical business servers crashing, now that's scary.

I’m not joking, it really is. That Blackberry or PDA that you’re using is the future of mobile technology. I figured it out the other day – my Blackberry has 8 times the amount of storage than my first PC and talk about performance…..not even close. Imagine that, I can walk anywhere I want with a powerful computing device that connects me to limitless information and applications. With the advent of social networking sites like Facebook and Linked- In the ability to stay connected becomes more important.

The Unified Communications systems we provide for our clients integrate tightly with handheld devices, so much so that you’ll see the business desk telephone fade away in the next few years. It just makes sense. If you’re already carrying a communication device that is fully integrated with your unified communications system why would you need to have another terminal (phone) on your desk?

Another exciting item is the recent release of Android by Google. This operating system for PDA’s and cell phones promises to allow programmers to write all sorts of neat applications that will enhance your experience. Android is an “open source” product which means anyone can write code to work with it. Many cell phone manufacturers have started building phones that use this operating system. Another example of its industry adoption is the recent announcement of a Verizon / Google partnership that will further expand the Android operating systems use.

This is exactly why we added Verizon Wireless to our portfolio. Add in the VoIP Unified Communication Platform, IT Service and Support and it creates an unbeatable combination for maximizing technology.

As I work to spread the gospel of Unitel and encourage businesses to meet with us to discuss supporting their business technology needs, I am finding an interesting challenge.  The networking events around the city of Boston tend to be frequented by sole practitioners, business consultants and coaches, real estate, insurance and IT professionals, web designers, marketers and those seeking new employment opportunities. 

The challenge that I am finding in the networking scene is that the decision makers from the companies that I am targeting do not attend these events.  Unitel’s technology solutions are designed for companies with 25-250 employees that use and appreciate the value of technology.  We partner with these companies to help improve their efficiencies through unified messaging, help desk support, VoIP phone systems, disaster recovery planning and more.  To begin a partnership, let alone get a meeting or introduction with companies of this size is difficult.  

Just imagine being the CEO, CFO or COO at one of these networking events and the feeding frenzy that would happen once everyone realizes who you are.  We are all out to build our businesses and networking is a great way to do it, but when you are targeting a specific customer on a mid-level scale, finding the decision maker is much harder than finding Where’s Waldo!

Technology continues to impact everyday life, both professionally and personally.  The ability to manipulate and share data on a continual basis allows businesses to prosper and friends and family to communicate, share experiences and connect time and time again.  It’s no wonder that we, the human race have come to need and love our technology, so much so that we never truly disconnect.

As a technology solutions firm, we at Unitel work tirelessly to insure that the companies we support have the appropriate information, services and tools in place to get business done.  To that end we are very much aware that when business hours end and weekends or holidays start, the business of technology never stops working.  The term “time off” can not apply to technology.  While we may not be “working”, technology always is.  Our cell phones, Blackberries, laptops, Face book and Twitter accounts are in constant motion.  It’s how we live and what we have come to expect.  The presence of technology in our world has increased and we want it to work –Always.

If you choose to build a business like ours, you must embrace this notion of “Always” and love what you do.  The right technology solutions will strengthen business and empower the individual.  Over time your clients, will come to need you.  It’s not enough to have experience and expertise.  Tools like 24 x7 monitoring and helps desk services or VoIP implementation and carrier services.  Your customers can find that elsewhere.  Finding a partner that values their business and takes pride in the service that they offer is what will cement you as their trusted advisor and vendor of choice.  Our world is changing by leaps and bounds, connections are being made, knowledge is being shared and ideas are becoming reality.  Technology is what enables this to happen.  I love that and I love what we do. 

Hope you enjoyed the day off (if you had it), we’re right here watching your company's technology.  

As a VoIP provider of premise based phone systems we are constantly in “education” mode. There is still a misconception that if you buy a VoIP communication system you don’t need your carrier lines anymore. This is clearly due to the marketing efforts of Vonage and other companies out there providing residential VoIP. Let’s be clear, you still need to have your carrier services to connect to the outside world. Buying and installing a VoIP system does not get rid of those connections. If you have a T-1 or PRI now you’ll need it after you buy the VoIP system too.Will you save money with a VoIP system? Sure enough but not in the way you think. There are NO cost savings on the line side with a VoIP system. The real savings come from productivity and efficiency savings. I’ve had people tell me that those types of savings are just smoke and mirrors. My reply to that is “what are you paying your people for?” You pay for their TIME…..if they save time you save money. Simple but true so when productivity and efficiency  increases so does your bottom line. Back to the VoIP system – by utilizing the new features and tools associated with Unified Communications people save time and thereby….you got it……save money.

Let’s talk about multi-site companies now. If you have more than one location VoIP can really increase your communication. Many people think that they can just purchase the VoIP systems and tie them together over their internet connections. True they could, and it would work, but it wouldn’t work well enough to use it every day. The problem with going over the raw internet is something called quality of service. Basically there’s no guarantee that a call will be routed over the same path on the internet. That creates issues like dropped calls, choppy voice etc. So what do we do? Glad you asked, the most common way of connecting offices today is by using a method called MPLS (multi-protocol labeling system). MPLS is purchased from the Carrier and is basically your own little private network. What’s cool about it is that we can tell the MPLS circuit that if it sees a voice call to ALWAYS let that have priority over all other traffic. This way it’s guaranteed to follow the same path end to end with the result being a crystal clear call. A VoIP system rolled out over an MPLS network will result in a cohesive communications system that will allow four digit dialing between sites, one single voicemail system, transfer of calls and a slew of other really wonderful features. Talk about powerful……

There is a natural convergence between your phones and your computer network.  The technologies are actually piggy backed on top of one another behind the scenes.  I don’t know about you, but my phone sits very comfortably to the left of my keyboard and monitor.  Everything is within reach.  With  improvements in technology and software, there is now a way to dial your phone from your desktop, to have your desktop show you who is calling when the phone rings, with a few clicks of the mouse you can have your office phone forwarded to your cell phone or home phone, the calls can all integrate with your CRM.  There are all kinds of convergences happening here that businesses can use to increase efficiency, organization, sales and productivity.

Unitel’s mission in providing converged support is to partner with businesses to teach them how to take advantage of the convergence between the phone and desktop workstation to become more efficient and save money.  By offering expertise in both telecommunications and information technology under one umbrella, Unitel becomes a unique and important business partner offering Converged Support. 

So what are Unitel’s converged support offerings?  We offer IT support, help desk support, remote monitoring of critical systems, remote  back up, disaster recovery planning, compliance support, virus protection, professional consulting services, virtualization strategy, virtual CIO services, technology strategy and design, phone system sales, phone system support, VOIP solutions, carrier services, unified messaging , Total Care programs and more!  For all of that we offer one phone number, one email and one name. 

The reinvention of Unitel has been a unique experience in organic growth.  In my role as Director of Business Development, I am tasked with taking a business that has grown organically for twenty three years to a whole new level. 

Unitel was built by two brothers (you can learn more here) who had a desire to create a better telecommunications company.  They brought in their friends, their family and their community to build the business.  They began to grow organically.  They swelled to a midsized company during the dot com boom.  They contracted after the dot com bust.  Still they have maintained a steady and stable business.  And now, they are hungry to grow again.

The convergence between telecommunications and information technology has created a new opportunity for Unitel to reinvent itself.  Through careful planning and the addition of an experienced team from the IT world, Unitel is poised to reintroduce itself to its clients and to introduce itself to a business community has never heard of them.  The growth of the new Unitel will be built on a combination of our existing customers and my ability to generate new business with the message of converged support.  Phone calls, emails, networking events, social settings and an awareness of the guy at the coffee shop who answers his phone “help desk” will be the grass roots efforts that I make to continue the organic growth of Unitel, part deux!

We’re proud to announce that Unitel now provides IT Support in addition to our VoIP offering! After 23 years of providing technology solutions we’ve expanded our portfolio to include anything IT. Makes sense right? Convergence has played a large role in our decision to move in this direction. Over the last few years we’ve been involved in many more data driven applications, projects that required that we know both voice and data. So much that we added a group of individuals with long time IT Support experience to provide us with the capability to handle just about any application or project , whether IT or Telephony. Most of our folks have over (10) ten plus years of direct experience in both disciplines and actually, come to think of it, most have over (15) fifteen and closer to (20) twenty years in the field.

In addition to offering full IT and Telephony Support we also now offer Verizon Wireless Services. We are one of four business to business Verizon Wireless Agents in New England. This new program was launched to address the needs of small and medium sized businesses in the New England marketplace. Everything from Blackberry Enterprise Server installations to optimizing rate plans Unitel can handle it.