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Strong Storms Are Rolling In… How Business Continuity Planning with TCI Helps Protect Your Business

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TCI’s cutting-edge Disaster Recovery solutions are tailored to help protect your entire technology environment – from data and applications to office computers, mobile devices, networks, and phone systems.

Will your business continue to operate when disaster strikes?

Here are just some of the ways TCI’s comprehensive approach helps you safeguard what counts:

  • Determine appropriate risk reduction strategies, remedies, and alternatives for critical systems and networks, including affordable ways to address voice and data protection measures like off-grid power sourcing and secure off-site storage.
  • Enable a remote work program that can keep your business open when your office is shut down during an emergency.
  • Avoid critical data loss or recovery delays dealing with missing databases, disrupted systems, networks, and more.

If you’re considering moving to the cloud, remember you don’t have to do it all at once.

Create a plan… Identify what should stay in-house and what should go to the cloud. Focus on what you’d need to operate if a major interruption or disaster occurred. Determine the connectivity your employees need to do their jobs remotely. Also, work toward consistent and seamless end-to-end communications. TCI can help you build a hybrid or full cloud solution that meets the needs you’ve identified.

The cloud gives your company the agility it needs to respond to any disruption, be it a natural disaster, pandemic, a security breach, or a failure of your network or hardware.

Schedule your Business Continuity Planning meeting. Contact TCI today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

TCI’s Wi-Fi Service Offers High Speed In-Building Broadband Connections

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TCI’s Managed Wi-Fi Service… Simplify and speed up your day-to-day operations. Our Managed Wi-Fi puts intuitive yet powerful tools in the hands of your network administrators:

  • Add wireless capacity in minutes with fully automatic provisioning
  • Manage complex, dynamic environments using Auto RF
  • Throttle bandwidth and block unauthorized applications
  • Streamline device onboarding with built-in Mobile Device Management

Wi-Fi 6 Support… TCI supports enterprise-class Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) access points to solve density and throughput challenges. With up to 8 transmit and 8 receive antennas, your applications will always operate at peak performance. In addition to 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz radios, many APs offer a dedicated security radio that:

  • Continuously scans and protects against security threats
  • Senses the RF environment and adapts to interference
  • Automatically configures RF settings to maximize performance

Wireless Made Easy… From growing offices to large corporate enterprises, TCI designs, implements and maintains the wireless networks that keep local businesses connected and running strong. Our expertise includes:

  • Wireless site surveys
  • Wireless coverage testing
  • Access point cabling
  • Wireless security
  • Wireless network management

Whatever your environment and business goals, TCI can design, deploy, and support a cloud-managed wireless solution for you.

Our certified infrastructure experts will ensure your mobile workforce has access to the connections they need to stay productive… Contact TCI today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

Why More CFOs Are Shifting IT Investment From CAPEX to OPEX

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Traditionally for technology investments, CFOs most often preferred capital expenditures over operating expenses because they could take advantage of the amortization and depreciation of those investments over an extended period. There’s a growing argument, however, that operating expenditures (OpEx) have distinct advantages over capital expenditures (CapEx).

Operating expenses are used for the day-to-day costs of running a business and can be more stable. But technology developments are occurring faster than companies can digest and are the reason many CFOs are shifting from capital expenditures to operational spending.

The cloud is a perfect example of how to apply OpEx for technology expenditures. As an operating expense, the cloud allows a company to:

  • Pay only for the capacity it needs now and scale as requirements change
  • Ease and speed up the budgeting process because short-term spending requirements are lower
  • Make multiple investments across the business since capital isn’t tied up in large upfront expenditures
  • Fund expenses faster through operations rather than needing to borrow money or divert money from other projects to pay for large, upfront technology costs
  • Smooth out cash flows over time instead of requiring lumpy outlays

Cloud Offers a Path to the Future

If you’re looking to reduce communications costs, the cloud can save you money:

  • No costly, upfront investments in servers, switches, and PBXs
  • No budget “surprises” – consistent, predictable calling plans
  • No costly, across‐the‐board software upgrades as new features and versions are released – you get the latest versions immediately, automatically
  • No wasted money on over-provisioned trunks or underutilized hardware
  • No high energy and cooling costs to run a roomful of equipment, and rent to house it all

The cloud offers a better path for growth. It not only saves you money through economy of scale, but also scales cost‐effectively as you grow. You never have to worry about adding more servers and switches as you add more employees. You simply add more seats in the cloud at a fixed monthly cost and have the assurance that new employees are connected to all your business communications from day one.

Ready to talk about your path to the Cloud? Contact us today: (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

The 9 Most Important Call Center Trends of 2022

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We’ve seen a lot of changes to the call center and customer experience landscape over the years, from cloud communications and virtual agents to more strategic thinking around analytics, more flexible social media interactions, and innovative ways to involve artificial intelligence. And when the pandemic pushed businesses to modernize their business communications overnight, we’ve seen even more shifts in how businesses meet the evolving needs of both customers and their employees.

Here are nine technology trends that are helping companies deliver the best quality customer experience. See how far your business has come in building customer relationships that last — or which of these trends may need to be on this year’s to-do list.

1. Artificial Intelligence

As early adopters continue honing AI applications for call routing, we expect to see more connections forged between various media channels and streamlined call center response.

2. Digital Transformation

A forward-looking digital transformation strategy is going to be essential for business competitiveness. And it’s not just about using the right channels to interact with customers where they are; the smartest businesses are integrating technologies to provide full customer context with each interaction and leveraging system data to provide proactive service.

3. Better Contact Center Analytics

Gone are the days of relying on supervisor skills and know-how to get the most out of contact center agents. Now, even smaller businesses are taking advantage of sophisticated analytics to turn data – like call and screen recordings, chats, SMS messages, and more – into useful feedback for their agents. We expect more advancements in analytics as companies continue to implement more unified communications platforms and strategies.

4. Omnichannel Communications

More businesses are recognizing that while a customer journey may begin on one channel, valuable insight and feedback from the customer can be gained on a completely different channel. Responsive businesses are using this trend to create a superb customer experience by unifying communications across channels into one stream. This helps their customers by connecting them with an agent who knows their purchase and service history and provides valuable context. Most importantly, the two-way conversation is public on a social media platform, so other customers can see how the business solved the problem.

5. Cloud Communications

Many businesses have already adopted cloud communications as part of their communications strategies, but cloud communications have become particularly important for contact centers. The steady increase in remote call agents has made cloud communications a necessity for businesses who want to take advantage of seamless team communications and collaboration. With cloud communications, traditional office-based contact centers can take on new locations, and grow and contract workforces as market needs demand.

6. Employee Engagement

Just as customer expectations have evolved in the last few years, so have the expectations of the employees that make quality customer experience possible. And dissatisfaction in the work environment and culture has led to high agent attrition in the contact center space and beyond. Businesses that want to remain competitive will provide their employees with the culture and technology that empowers an efficient, productive, and flexible workforce.

7. Flexible Working Options

Lower overhead, time zone flexibility, and variable working hours have made remote contact center workers a stable trend in 2022. With constantly improving unified communications, remote workers have become a permanent and beneficial part of the contact center environment. By using collaboration tools, contact center agents can be mobile, with access to real-time analytics and customer context.

8. AI-Powered Self-Service Tools

The high priority on process improvement and self-service since the pandemic has addressed the issue of increasing workload for contact center agents, as well as the difficulties around achieving the desired service levels or Average Speed of Answer (ASA). Giving customers information quickly helps reduce call volumes, and easy-to-navigate FAQs help narrow down calls to those with sufficiently complex issues. Quick access to self-serve solutions also provides an emotional benefit to customers (that DIY-fix high!) and reduces overall call times.

9. SMB’s Leveraging All Employees to Support Customers

SMBs are extending traditional contact center agent desktop features to employees that work outside of the contact center to supplement customer-facing employees. Blended UC/CC solutions that bring customer and employee experiences together into a single user experience tear down the silos between traditional contact center agents and the rest of the organization.

If you need more help determining how to apply these trends to your call center, TCI’s local experts are here to help. Contact us today: (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

Surviving on Good-Enough Communications? A Guide to Upgrading Your Business Technology

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Business leaders have been running in emergency mode trying to adapt to workplace limitations imposed by COVID and the mandates intended to limit its spread. Often, businesses made do with a mix of communications solutions from different vendors – with varying results.

Now is the time to re-assess and refine:

Integrate Communications

Many businesses are working with an unwieldy patchwork of solutions from different vendors, each implemented separately at different times. This Frankenstein-type framework is okay for just getting by. But compatibility and efficiency issues can hamper your capacity to grow and thrive. An integrated platform ensures a seamless experience for management, employees, and ultimately customers.

Adapt Processes to Make the Most of Communication Technology

If you find yourself spending more time on communications tools after a partial or complete migration, you may not be making the best use of them. Define optimal ways of working before you implement the tools. Will you recreate your current processes with your new cloud solutions? If so, go back to the whiteboard. Set up measurement tools before you deploy. You can’t improve what you don’t measure.

Develop Flexibility and Security

Whether your employees are remote, hybrid, or in-person, they’re likely to use personal devices for work purposes. With the right solutions, you can support secure work and promote collaboration regardless of which devices your employees use.

Offer Robust Tools to Avoid “Shadow IT”

Keeping employees from using unauthorized IT isn’t easy. You’ll need to offer modern and agile tools and establish an IT infrastructure that works for everyone. One central, lean IT infrastructure with well-documented interfaces will always scale better – and be more secure – than a hodge-podge of departmental apps and databases.

Invest in Omnichannel Customer Communication

Customer experience is an essential part of any communications upgrade. Customers want flexibility when they reach out. They may start on social media, switch to email, and then give you a call. An omnichannel communications solution removes friction and helps you meet customers where they are.

Prepare for Takeoff

The pandemic accelerated many businesses’ digital transformation, but many were forced to choose between speed and strategy. If your business has been getting by with emergency quick fixes, it’s time to redefine your communications strategy and upgrade.

TCI experts are here to help. Contact us today: (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

Migrating to the Cloud… The Easiest Way to Simplify Your Business Communications

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Your business has its own needs and distinct workflows, and the path you take to the cloud will be just as unique. Our new e-book will help you discover which path to the cloud is best for you, and how the cloud’s benefits – reliability, agility, and simplicity – and affordable monthly pricing can work for your business.

Learn why migrating with Mitel and our new UCaaS partner RingCentral is your easiest and most effortless way to connect with the cloud.

eBook: You Can Get There from Here, Profiles of a Cloud Migration Candidate

Connect Your Workforce

Migrating to the cloud gives you the best foundation for supporting the growing shift to hybrid work models and driving engagement with both employees and customers. Give your employees the tools to do their work, their way, supported by the best solution out there.

Support Your Customers

Enhancing employee experiences with your technology is a small change that has a big impact on your ability to meet your customers where they are and help set your business apart.

Migration Made Easy

Your TCI, Mitel, and RingCentral teams will work closely to ensure a seamless migration experience so you and your team will be up and running in no time. You will get access to world-class features and functionality with industry-leading 99.999% uptime.

Ready to talk about your path to the Cloud?
Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

We Make HIPAA Compliant Communications Easy for Healthcare Providers

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TCI offers healthcare communications solutions that enable more proactive and efficient care to increase patient engagement and satisfaction. We specialize in enabling more proactive and collaborative communications in hospitals, medical centers, and physician practices.

Reliable communications between healthcare facilities – such as between a doctor’s office and hospital – are essential to delivering patients the best care in a timely and efficient manner. Protecting your patients’ right to communications privacy should not be difficult or expensive. TCI and Mitel take the worry out of protecting patient privacy by offering HIPAA-compliant communication solutions.

The need for information to remain secure extends past physical human interactions. The transfer of patient information also needs to be done through secure and regulation-compliant communications methods. TCI’s
Mitel-powered solutions protect your communications on-site or in the cloud.

Connecting healthcare providers…

  • Hosted Cloud Voice Services for Small Healthcare Organizations – Reliable, easy to use, manage, and set up. Get the HIPAA-compliant communications service your healthcare business needs for an affordable monthly price.
  • On-site & Private Cloud for Larger Healthcare Organizations – Truly seamless communications and collaboration lets care providers focus on patients instead of processes. On-site communications solutions and cloud phone systems can make all the difference.

More Efficient Workflow Operations

Our healthcare communications solutions keep on-site nurses, dispersed physicians, and non-clinical staff connected with each other and with patients. When communications solutions are securely integrated into your workflows, you can reduce the chance of bottlenecks and ensure patients get the right information at the right time.

Better Outcomes. Satisfied Patients.

Better patient care means higher satisfaction rates and higher reimbursement rates. Build your business and attract new patients with communications solutions that help you deliver better care to more people.

Let’s talk about how TCI connects the DC region’s healthcare providers and how these solutions can benefit your facility.

Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

3 Good Technology Decisions that will Fuel Business Growth in 2022

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Many businesses are finding they are weighed down by technology choices they had to make quickly during the pandemic.

With little time to assess communication platform pros and cons, they made quick purchase decisions that may have been awkward for employees to navigate, saddled businesses with unanticipated costs, and introduced performance problems that frustrated staff and customers.

The beginning of the new year is an ideal time to ensure you have a communications platform that’s designed — from the ground up — to deliver the reliability, agility, and efficiency you need to optimize productivity today and respond quickly to unanticipated changes tomorrow.

To take advantage of that opportunity, you’ll want to make 3 smart choices:

1 – Choose the Cloud to Streamline and Strengthen Your Technology

The cloud is the easiest way to simplify and supercharge your communications technology. By consolidating disjointed communications tools into an all-in-one, cloud-based solution that offers team and video collaboration, mobility, and voice capabilities, you can unleash greater productivity and performance, while eliminating the cost and resource burdens of managing your current systems.

2 – Choose a Proven UCaaS to Meet Your Needs Today and Tomorrow

Customer and employee expectations have permanently changed. Businesses have gained new confidence in their staffs’ ability to work from anywhere. Employees value the balance that hybrid working environments provide. And customers just want great service — and don’t care where the employee supporting them is working from. That’s why TCI is partnered with Mitel and RingCentral to empower our clients with the world’s leading UCaaS technology.

3 – Choose a Trusted, Local Partner to Customize Your Migration Path

Your business has already made investments in its communications platform. You’ll want a migration plan that takes that into consideration. Look for the guidance of a local partner with extensive expertise in the full range of VoIP deployments — including on-premises, private cloud, and public cloud systems. TCI has been serving the DC region’s businesses and public sector for 40+ years. That’s why you can trust our experts to ensure your transition to the cloud will be based on a customized migration plan and timeline.

Choose the Freedom to Focus on the Future

If the communications platform you put in place during the pandemic isn’t providing you with all the functionality you need to grow and meet new challenges ahead, now is an ideal time to press the reset button.

Contact TCI to help you make the right choices for your business. Call us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 

Need Wi-Fi Support Help? Simplify Management & Secure Your Office Network from the Cloud

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Wireless connections are a critical element of today’s network infrastructure and one that consumes a growing share of IT resources to secure and manage. To support your wireless connections, TCI offers cloud-managed Wi-Fi solutions that enable you to streamline switching, routing, and security tasks via the web.

Protecting your Wi-Fi networks

You can arrange to dynamically grant or restrict network access to a device based on its security status, location, installed software and OS version, and more. And when a user fails to comply with a set security measure – such as disabling the antivirus program, jail-breaking a device, removing a passcode, or leaving a given territory – that person’s access to your Wi-Fi networks will be automatically revoked.

Need Wi-Fi support help?

TCI’s certified network experts can optimize and manage the hosting of your entire Wi-Fi infrastructure by offering:

  • Immediate implementation and expansion of Wi-Fi, switching, and security to new sites.
  • Upgrades, patches, and maintenance.
  • Support to allow mobile and remote workers to become as productive on the road as in the office.
  • Tiered services to suit the needs of any sized organization.

TCI’s cloud experts are ready to help you secure and manage your Wi-Fi network. Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.

 


Migrating to the Cloud in Five Simple Steps

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A future with more features, better reliability and less maintenance awaits you with Cloud Voice services. This simple guide outlines the five steps to activating your new communications system.

Step 1 – Needs Assessment

  • Discuss your unique needs with us so we both understand all requirements you may have or critical systems that need special attention.
  • Review and document any differences between your new cloud service and your current system including updating business processes or workflows that leverage your existing system.

Step 2 – Demonstration

  • Schedule a time with TCI for a Cloud Voice demonstration so you can see the service in action and ask questions.

Step 3 – Migration

  • Review technical requirements and system design that fit the unique needs of your business as determined in the needs assessment.
  • Confirm compatibility with third-party applications and validate integrations.
  • Export user data and configurations from your legacy system.
  • Configure network and firewalls in accordance with best practices.

Step 4 – Number Porting

  • Sign LOA to port DIDs and Toll-Free numbers to your new service.
  • Set up new phones with temporary DIDs for UAT in preparation for cut-over data.

Step 5 – Cut-Over

  • Activate system using ported DIDs.
  • Download and install client communications and collaboration software.

At every step of the way, we’ll be working with you to answer any questions you have and ensure a smooth transition.

Now that you know the five simple steps to migrate to the cloud with TCI, let’s begin the process. Contact us today at (703) 321-3030 or info@tcicomm.com.