Bobby Joseph, country director, India and Middle East, Plantronics, has shared technology and Consumers trends in 2013.
As we move further into the digital age, we are starting to both fear and resent technology. We will pull a higher value on all things that feel essentially human and question (while not entirely resisting) technology’s siren call. With social norms changing fast and a new anything-goes attitude becomes common, people are mashing up cherished traditions with decidedly new ideas, creating their own recipes for what feels right. Businesses are changing, re-thinking their strategies to suit this new consumer.
Here is a quick look at the year gone by and what’s in store for us in 2014
Enterprise Social Networking – is becoming a core tool for the new social workforce. The key insight for organisations succeeding in building value from this technology is social business processes redesign. When organisations rethink processes, enormous co-creative value is unlocked. In 2013, we reached a tipping point in the global workforce, where the majority of workers became comfortable with social networking, and for most businesses, there is a growing expectation that these tools will be used in the business context.
Furthermore, there are now proven models for driving adoption and achieving value through the deployment of enterprise social networks. Companies that succeed in becoming social organisations will achieve tremendous advantages over their competitors, according to Bobby Joseph, country director, India and Middle East, Plantronics.
Online collaboration – Although the technology has existed for years and a large number of enterprises have already put it into play, many CIOs are now exploring ways to bolster capabilities to match today’s digital workplace. The changing nature of worker behaviour and the need for enhanced communications is resulting in the creation of a series of communication tools and devices that are helping the worker to perform their job efficiently on the go.
The increasing internet penetration means that in 2013 there were new populations coming online who looked for newer ways to connect and share amongst themselves. Enterprises also experienced resurgence in connectivity, as employees looked for better ways to create connections and work efficiently with colleagues.
In 2014, Where organizations will see the greatest bang for their buck in UC is communications-enabled business processes (CEBP) – when communication capabilities are embedded in or integrated with enterprise business processes and vertical applications. According to Frost and Sullivan, the Unified Communications market in India is expected to grow at 11.8 percent CAGR from 2010 to 2017.
Bring-Your-Own-Device – 2013 saw mobile devices being increasingly used for business, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) and CYOD (Choose Your Own Device) became important themes for businesses in developing a mobility strategy.
Whilst the device itself is one part of the equation, 2014 will throw greater challenges in terms of managing apps, how to control which apps should be allowed and disallowed from employees’ devices and having the right security measures in place as part of a wider enterprise mobility strategy. Given the sheer volume of devices and applications being used by employees, security is very critical for every organisation and specialist Mobile Device Management (MDM) vendors and security vendors will play crucial roles.
Unified Communications propelling the growth for the headset market – while the corporate world is just about warming up to the concept of ‘Anytime-anywhere-anyhow’ professional life, we are at the brink to witness the boom in the headset category. 2013 was the year of online collaboration and BYOD became important themes for businesses in developing a mobility strategy, 2014 will drive the growth of headsets in the enterprise market due to an increase in adoption of unified communications (UC) solutions.
In addition, the escalating need for multitasking and interest in enterprise mobility are raising the demand for headsets. As they are constantly evolving, UC-enabled headsets provide a host of benefits greater comfort, the use of hands-free headsets facilitates employee productivity more than that by traditional desktop phones.
Companies are discovering that the return on investment (ROI) of deploying an advanced UC client is superior when complemented with advanced headsets. According to Frost & Sullivan, the headset vendors are confronted with a unique opportunity to double their market by 2017 with the growing interest in UC, enterprise mobility, and multitasking enabling technologies.
