Networked technologies have made work and learning increasingly mobile and highly flexible. So much so that employees are now choosing work-location flexibility over a higher salary and employers are providing workers with the tools to facilitate this. Cisco IBSG calls this “Smart Work.” Of course, the ability to make flexible working a viable option depends on a number of factors, including availability of good broadband connectivity, employer trust, the nature of the work in which an employee is engaged, and suitable social software and video technologies that enable the employee to remain in a connected (albeit virtual) work environment.

Employees, too, have to develop a new form of self-discipline that involves maintaining a good work-life balance; rather than working longer hours, this entails spending much of their extra time with family, in the community, or furthering their own personal and professional development. Read More »

Tags: Big Data, Cisco, cloud services, device proliferation, future of work, IBSG, infrastructure, network, S+CC, security, smart applications, Smart+Connected Communities, urban services, urban sustainability, work-life

Productivity and flexibility are key words that we hear many times in the work place.

What do they mean to IT administrators in relationship to telepresence meeting room scheduling? In the past this was a complicated process that meant that Microsoft Exchange server had to be taken off line to do this type of upgrade. Now with a new feature capability from Cisco TelePresence TMSXE, IT administrators can install TMSXE quickly and easily with step by step instructions without impacting Microsoft Exchange during the upgrade. This means there is no impact to end-user’s productivity because the upgrade is seamless and transparent to them. TMSXE continues to empower end users by giving them more control and flexibility to schedule telepresence meeting rooms when and where they need without needing IT support to do so. TMSXE frees up IT resources to focus on more pressing issues vs. having to be the telepresence meeting room scheduler for an organization. Read More »

Tags: Cisco TelePresence, infrastructure, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Outlook, TelePresence, TelePresence Management Suite, TMSXE

Co-written by Bryan Mobley, Director, IBSG Service Provider

The business world’s rise to the cloud has been dramatic and increasingly rapid. From an initial attitude of vague interest mixed with trepidation, organizations have begun to embrace the transition in a big way. Some are already realizing the expansive benefits in costs, efficiency, and innovation that come with this game-changing technology.

To keep with the pulse of cloud migration, Cisco initiated a series of roundtable discussions two years ago. The philosophy of each meeting was to bring together 10 to 20 decision makers from a variety of enterprises, midsized businesses, and government agencies. So far, we’ve held 15 of these discussions across North America. In addition to providing a unique opportunity to share our thought leadership, these sessions provide an ideal forum for hearing our customers’ thoughts on cloud: the benefits, the inhibitors, and even a few war stories. In the end, however, it is the advantages of cloud that spark the most contagious conversations.

Here are some of the key trends that have emerged from two years of discussions:

Read More »

Tags: Cisco, cloud, Computing, enterprises, IBSG, infrastructure, migration, private cloud, Public Cloud, SaaS, Service Provider, services, SMBs, software as a service, vdi, virtual desktop, WebEX

Cisco’s overarching objective is to create a unified user experience across our entire collaboration portfolio from IM to web conferencing to immersive TelePresence.  We want to deliver the highest quality and most consistent experience to all users.

Cisco’s portfolio of collaboration infrastructure includes call control, conferencing, enterprise edge and management; and we are consistently delivering advancements across all of these key areas.

Today I’d like to talk specifically about Cisco Unified Conferencing, a big step towards delivering a unified collaboration architecture.   Unified Conferencing brings together transcoding, switching and web-enabled conferencing under the orchestration of Cisco TelePresence Conductor.

Read More »

Tags: Cisco, collaboration, infrastructure, Jacob Nordan, TelePresence, telepresence conductor, unified conferencing

Changes in the way we work are creating new challenges in business communications and collaboration. With the growing trend of a more dispersed workforce, organizations are looking to video technologies such as telepresence as the new standard for effective collaboration. To be productive, employees need to have access to the same communication services on any type of device, but organizations are finding it is not easy to deploy video for mobile workers.

Cisco’s call control solution brings together Cisco Unified Communications Manager (Cisco UCM) and Cisco Video Communications Server (Cisco VCS) to offer the same suite of feature-rich communication services regardless of device and location. With Cisco UCM and Cisco VCS, customers can easily collaborate using different devices, from anywhere, and with users within and outside of their organization.  The unified communications experience accelerates productivity across the mix of mobile and office and home-based workers.

Read More »

Tags: call control, Cisco, collaboration, CUCM, infrastructure, TelePresence, Thomas Wyatt, UCM, Unified Communications Manager, vcs