Being prepared for the unexpected: how to build resilience into your office communications system

The issue of disaster preparedness has recently been thrust onto the front burner for many Canadian companies. While office-based businesses are perhaps best positioned to overcome the challenges of social distancing, many have understandably struggled with the sudden transition to a 100% remote workforce, with disrupted communications being the number one problem.

If your business fits this description, you should perhaps consider inserting a resilience standard for office communications into your disaster recovery plan, similar to how British Columbia added seismic safety standards to its provincial building code. Of course, in the present context, resilience has nothing to do with earthquakes. Rather, it means being able to seamlessly continue regular communications when your office closes for any reason other than physical damage to the equipment.

Compared to what businesses already invest in communications technology, the additional cost of implementing “anywhere” office phones is actually quite small.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology enables phone calls to be routed via the internet to wherever an employee happens to be, not just to their office desk phone. With an IP-based phone system, employees can manage their calls using a range of devices, including desk and portable phones at the office, and smartphones, tablets and PCs at home or in the field.

Panasonic’s NSX line of Unified Communications Systems is designed to integrate with your existing infrastructure and provide enhanced flexibility. It doesn’t matter if your employees are working 100% at the office, 100% remotely or somewhere in between because NSX ensures that the calling experience is always the same for people on the other end of the line.

To get the most value from IP-based communications, you need to have features that will make a difference both in daily workflows and in the event of an unexpected office closure. For enterprises with 100+ users, Panasonic’s Ultimate Activation Key (AK) is the most economical solution because it comes with unlimited licenses for 31 features that include Active Directory integration, Call Centre functionality, Mobility, Redundancy, a Receptionist Console, and Call Recording.

Besides offering the convenience and cost effectiveness of a full-featured solution, the Ultimate AK also makes the most sense from a readiness perspective, explains Nauman Qureshi, Senior IT/IP Telephony Specialist at Panasonic Canada. “With the Ultimate AK, you’ll have a softphone available for every user in your organization. As part of a disaster recovery plan, you could ask users to bring their laptops home or use their own computers with our Softphone app installed. They could work with your IT administrator to register their softphones and, within minutes, start making or receiving phone calls just as if they were sitting at their desk in the office.” Panasonic also offers the Mobile Softphone, a separately licensed app for smartphones and tablets.

“NSX supports up to 2000 users and 32 sites, so growing companies can easily scale up their operations. Installation is a straightforward process. Once an authorized dealer arrives on site, they can gather information and get the system running in a matter of hours.”

Panasonic NSX, coupled with the Ultimate AK, not only offers unmatched flexibility and extensive scalability but also features state-of-the-art 1+1 redundancy. So if voice service is mission-critical to your business, NSX has you covered because it can automatically switch from the primary system to a backup in less than a minute, minimizing the impact of a power outage.

Unexpected events are going to disrupt your office communications from time to time. That’s unavoidable. But with the extra resilience provided by Panasonic NSX and the Ultimate AK, your business will be able to quickly recover from each event and continue operating. That’s being prepared.