Collaboration? Is that a working methodology that delivers projects for clients faster and more accurately?

Sponsored

If you type the word collaboration into Google’s search engine, you get some 521 million results.

And while we hear the word constantly, and self-help and business guides talk about collaboration at length, in an IT sense it’s relatively under deployed.

In the context of IT, when I talk about collaboration I’m referring to a new working methodology that can deliver projects for our clients faster and more accurately.

Traditionally, an IT project would be delivered in steps, with one tech doing their bit, then passing it on the next person in the chain. Repeat and pass on, repeat and pass on, until project completion.

But that way of working is less than optimal for several reasons. Clearly it’s bad for productivity – and by global standards New Zealand has plenty to do to improve productivity.

The OECD’s two-yearly review of the New Zealand economy, issued in mid-2017, was identified as a key challenge for New Zealand. "Improving productivity growth is a major long-term challenge for improving inclusiveness and living standards," said the Paris-based organisation.

Telesmart now embraces real-time collaboration when delivering client projects. Put simply, this means different participants input collectively in real-time – some on site and others working remotely.

Apart from being great for productivity (which benefits us and our clients’ bottom lines), collaboration delivers:

• Rapid turnaround from start to project delivery
• Errors can be immediately addressed
• Pertinent input is available at any point
• Remote consultation and remote presentations mean people don’t have to be gathered around a boardroom table

The ability to bring in remote workers is a key advantage for us because we can attract the best staff wherever they may live. Personally, I can’t understand why anyone wouldn’t want to live and work in the coolest little capital in the world . . . but as an employer it’s no longer an issue.

Real-time document applications – initially Google Docs but now there are many options available – mean project briefs, reports and planning can be revised and update by several people at once. Gone are the days of our specialists twiddling their thumbs waiting for a colleague to update their section of a report before it’s their turn.

Crucially for clients, when things go wrong – as occasionally they do – we’re able to respond much more effectively to put things right. We can have any number of engineers respond in real time, remotely, from different platforms. It may be a cliché, but time is money so this ability to respond in a multi-faceted way means our clients can expect their projects to be sorted more quickly than was previously possible.

But perhaps the most important tool we now use ubiquitously is a suite of high-end video collaboration tools.

Our video collaboration software has no capacity limit, optimizes to the end-points screen resolution, including UHD (4K) to ultra-high definition, and utilizes a patented Codec making it extremely bandwidth tolerant. It’s device agnostic too – meaning it connects to anything, anywhere – whether that’s an Apple, Android, Windows, IOs, Google platform, or traditional static video conferencing solutions such as Lifesize, Cisco and Polycom.

New Zealand public affairs, consumer marketing and digital communications agency Acumen Republic is benefiting hugely from our integrated Vidyo solution across its Auckland and Wellington offices. CFO Mandy Hancock says video connectivity is a key part of their daily operations.

“The Vidyo system is basically on all day. We work incredibly closely across our two offices because our teams cross over, just as our clients do. In fact, we have hardly any clients without a presence in both cities.

“We have a team of about 35 staff across the two offices and every hour or so one of the video conference suites is on. We have two in each office, which for so few staff tells you how often they are used. We share content with clients, conduct internal meetings - work-in-progress sessions, planning . . . even the Board meeting is across the Vidyo system.

“Our chairman and our Chief Executive are often elsewhere, and they join meetings on their laptops. So wherever they are, they can video conference with us. We can play video across the video conference as well – something that cannot be done with other platforms that I’ve seen. That’s crucial because we’re a marketing company and video features a lot in what we do.

Mandy says the decision to use video technology was made a few years ago when the company made a conscious effort to reduce the amount it spent on flights.

“Sure, in some cases we need to be face-to-face – for a client pitch, for example. But a flight can take half a day when you factor in travel to the airport, waiting, flying then travel to the office once you’ve landed. So, the cost benefit is in time saved.

And the technology just keeps getting better, she says.

“There is no comparison to first generation video conferencing. It’s now fast, easy to use, clear and can be used from any device. Sometimes job candidates suggest an interview is by Skype but our experience is that platform is too unstable. We simply send them a link to Vidyo and they can be interviewed wherever they are – often overseas.”

Acumen Republic’s ELT has been behind the adoption of technology improvements across the company.

“We believe it is a point of difference that our modern offices are seamlessly connected, laptops are new, files easily shared and worked on. We do a lot of collaboration. It’s definitely been worth the investment.”

For more information please contact Telesmart on 09-912-3180 Auckland or 04-801-4642 Wellington.