Enterprise organizations rely on a robust telecom infrastructure to remain connected across multiple locations and dispersed employees. However, the recent global health crisis has accelerated demand.
The task of quickly shifting every interaction – whether a short face-to-face meeting, boardroom conference or a business-defining sales pitch – to an enterprise communications solution has challenged businesses to adapt in ways unlike ever before.
Whether combating new technology demands for your workforce or navigating the cultural shift, it’s likely your organization has experienced these changes. For example, a recent Gartner study highlights the challenge for management teams who must reassess how to direct their remote workforce using technology. Add to this the frequency demands that fall onto your telecom infrastructure to keep employees connected, and it’s easy to overlook the significant impact that remote working has on the health of your enterprise communications.
In this blog, we’ll explore the overlooked consequences of a remote workforce on your enterprise communications and provide effective methods of managing it for the future. Helping you improve efficiency and reduce the remote-IT burden for your teams.
The Three Ways Remote Working Can Affect Your Telecom Infrastructure
1. Untamed Telecom Costs
After Covid-19, it's estimated that 72% of office workers would like to work remotely at least two days a week. Therefore, remote working is unlikely to be confined to 2020 and businesses will need to reassess the impact that this shift will have on their telecom expenses, long-term. For example, higher frequency and usage of enterprise comms will charge higher costs to your telecom plan. These costs can easily continue to grow untamed if you lack the visibility to truly understand where costs are coming from.
Many businesses struggle to understand their telecom bill. Everything from keeping track of unnecessary features in your plan, hidden variations in costs between regions, to discrepancies in billing – it’s not unusual for these factors to become a headache for internal IT teams who are unequipped to deal with a large-scale influx of remote workers, using devices at higher frequency.
To navigate this long-term, many businesses choose to get support from a telecom expense management provider to regain control of rising and dispersed telecom costs. Telecom expense management (TEM) can optimize your global telecom environment across billing records, contracts, tariffs, inventories, and more, to identify and eliminate inefficiencies.
2. Enterprise Comms Security Threats
TEM support isn’t just about identifying savings. Advice from a team of accredited experts can help you free up internal resources to focus on other priorities. For example, heightened security vulnerabilities from the increased usage of virtual meetings, voice, and other unified comms.
As remote working becomes the norm, you must be vigilant of security gaps. Experts suggest that information leaks, phishing attacks, data loss, and inadequate employee awareness of security issues will become significant risks to the future of remote work. Two-thirds of IT professionals already report a rise in security issues, with 45% of these being non-compliant employee behaviour, and 58% in malicious emails. To overcome these threats, your organizations must do the internal legwork to define stronger security perimeters across their telecom infrastructure.
3. Bring Your Own Device Policy Changes
For many employees, working remotely has led to higher usage of their preferred devices. However, while this method of working has its benefits, it's crucial that that the freedom of device flexibility does not drastically affect costs, which could rise as remote working continues.
For example, higher usage has likely led to your business having to increase reimbursement expenses for personally owned devices, and it's essential to have visibility of this process. A centralized, online portal for mobility reimbursement can help you achieve this, giving you complete visibility of mobility management, in addition to spend, and improving the experience for end-users.
In addition, with the ever-changing flexible working options, it might be time to reassess your telecom contracts to ensure that your providers are providing the best value & terms for your business in these changing times.
Remote Working Is Enabled by Enterprise Comms
With these changes in mind, it's vital to control the costs and security of your enterprise comms across your telecom infrastructure. Luckily, modern technology can easily facilitate the demands of remote working – however it's essential to ensure that your contracts, policies, and security are equally up to date.
