Over the last two years, we have become increasingly aware of how technology can benefit children’s hybrid learning experience. Technology was already part of the traditional classroom because it’s an integral learning tool, but virtual and hybrid learning was not the norm. Therefore, many school systems had to move quickly to update their infrastructure to accommodate continued learning at every education level—even daycare.

Research shows that helping preschool-aged children get familiar with digital devices builds foundational skills for life and later school years, which can be especially important for confidence and comfort in a hybrid learning environment. Fostering these critical skills is exactly what Kleine Strolche, a non-profit, parent-owned daycare center in Selm, Germany, aimed to do in partnership with Poly.

The center prides itself on its next generation approach to child development, where technology is already considered essential to learning. When collaborating with Poly, it was important to the Kleine Strolche’s team that all smart devices have a plug-and-play functionality that deliver the familiar, seamless Microsoft Teams experience they expect. Ease-of-use was another key criterion. Kleine Strolche, like most educational institutions of its size, does not have an IT department, so their new tech needed to be very intuitive.

Together, Poly and Kleine Strolche implemented new tech and processes throughout the daycare center to keep admin and parents connected all while empowering children with digital tools to learn and explore.

Innovative Technology

Kleine Strolche selected the Poly Studio USB video bar, Poly Studio P5 personal webcam, Poly Sync 40 speakerphone and the Poly Voyager Focus 2 ANC Bluetooth headset to update their center’s technology. The intelligent, plug-and-play devices ensure that the daycare’s management team, the parents’ council, and the parents themselves remain in touch. Implementing this technology allowed everyone to maintain those connections and smoothly run the day-to-day operations during the COVID-19 pandemic and after.

“Thanks to Poly’s solutions, we can now maintain operational continuity at all times. Our headsets’ noise-cancelling function allows us to make phone calls even when it’s noisy in the nursery. We regularly use the Poly Sync 40 as a speakerphone for the children and, when necessary, video conferencing technology to broadcast childrens’ events,” said, Mandy Sieradzki, Manager of Kleine Strolche Selm e.V.

It’s Child’s Play

When technology is intuitive, even children can learn to use it quickly. Children at the Kleine Strolche daycare center listened to their favorite audio books via the Poly Sync 40 and got acquainted with the device’s how-to during storytime. When children were separated from each other due to COVID-19 restrictions, the Poly Studio P5 webcam was used to connect children and their teachers for conferences and creative engagement, including live events and puppet shows to continue children’s learning, even from miles away.

What did this extraordinary project teach us? Digital education and new media literacy are not rocket science if you have the right equipment, which is easy to implement and use. Make the technology as easy as a child’s play, and see creativity abound in everyday life.

Read more about this excellent initiative here.

Grant Thornton is a large accounting firm with over a hundred meeting rooms across Australia. Like many firms, they used the timing of the COVID-19 pandemic to upgrade and modernize their rooms.  They knew they needed to undertake a digital transformation journey to modernize, simplify and standardize their user experiences across many locations, while at the same time upgrading from Skype for Business to a native Microsoft Teams Solution.

They wanted their employees to collaborate as equals – whether they were working from home, on the go or in the office.  Their search was for a solution that would simply and easily replace their existing room systems without having to reinvent the wheel.

After researching the space in detail, Grant Thornton selected a suite of Poly systems to meet their needs.  The Poly Studio X30s they selected were more cost effective than the MTR options they reviewed, and they were so simple to install that they could manage the deployment internally – which also resulted in significant cost savings for the project.

Supplementing those, Poly Studio X50s and G7500s handled the larger and more complex rooms in the project.  Because all of these systems had the same user interface and firmware, Grant Thornton could standardize their user experience across all locations.  And, because they were all Android based appliances, they were able to easily slide into rooms to replace previously existing devices with only minor tweaks needed to existing automation and control systems.

“The complexity of our larger rooms with significant automation” provided an additional challenge, according to Carlo De-Fazio, Technology Officer at Grant Thornton.  “These rooms can sit between 20 and 250 people in any given video conference, and each individual room refit would have required significant investment to make it Microsoft Teams compatible.”

He explained that their research and comparisons quickly showed the Poly solutions to be the best option on the market.  “Not only was the cost of the [Poly] units less expensive than the Windows-based devices, but the installation was far simpler. Cabling locations, including various parts to the unit, were fewer, and the overall footprint was lighter,” said Carlo. “This meant we could do the installation ourselves, which not only saved money on the devices but the installation cost as well,” he added.

Over a series of months Grant Thornton started retrofitting the rooms themselves (with light touch support from their local vendors NQAV and Generation-e.)  “It became obvious how easy the device setup was, and the user experience was solid. Each month new features were added to the devices, and they quickly surpassed the Windows devices for feature parity” Carlo explained.  “The new rooms performed brilliantly. They look so professional, and our people have picked up the new interface very swiftly,” he highlighted.

“We saved millions of dollars and still had a premium finish” he explained.  However, he pointed out that in reality, “the saving was not as significant [to us] compared to how nice the new equipment is. The rooms look brilliant, and the devices were easy to setup. Overall, we could not be happier with our approach and outcome.”

Click above to hear Carlo explain in his own words.

When Grant Thornton looked for a solution that would allow their over fourteen-thousand employees to make hybrid working a seamless experience – no matter where they were working from – Poly systems were clearly the right answer.  To find out more about how Poly solutions can be the right answer for your organizations, and to learn about Poly’s unique, next-generation innovations like Poly Director AI and NoiseBlock AI, reach out to your local Poly representative.

SECURE A ONE-TIME DISCOUNT ON YOUR FIRST POLY MICROSOFT TEAMS ROOM

Poly is delighted to offer a unique, one-time discount on your first Microsoft Teams Room. This offer applies to both the Poly Studio Focus and Small/Medium Room Kits for Microsoft Teams Rooms.

For more information about Poly’s solutions for Microsoft Teams, contact a Poly representative or head to Poly.com!

Over the past eighteen months, Poly Experience Centers (PECs) around the world have been refreshed and reopened in cities like Shanghai, Beijing and London. This week we were proud to officially open the doors of our newest PEC in New York City! Over the course of two days, we welcomed industry press, analysts, customers and partners to join us for an official ribbon-cutting ceremony and a chance to experience the difference that Poly’s solutions can make to enable today’s modern hybrid workforce. 

What is a Poly Experience Center? 

Poly’s experience centers are special because we take a holistic approach to demonstrating how our products integrate into workspaces. For many other companies, briefing centers are designed as showrooms to display and demonstrate solutions in a simulated environment. At Poly, our experience centers are actual workspaces! This allows our visitors to experience collaborative solutions in action in a way that can be easily reproduced by customers in their own office locations. 

In our PECs, you can meet face to face with our solution experts as they walk you through Poly solutions that are tailored to your business’s specific needs. You can see demonstrations of Poly’s products and experience the tools designed to empower and connect workforce – whether they are in an office, working from home or someplace in between. 

The decision to refresh our PECs allowed us to rethink the design of our centers and update them to reflect the most pressing business needs today. Our former centers built almost 10 years ago were great for a “present to” style of briefing program; however, they needed to be updated to accommodate our current “experience” methodology.  

The Experience 

The goal of the Poly Experience Program is to create tailored briefing experiences for our customers to showcase how Poly’s professional-grade voice and video gear can solve their organization’s specific collaboration needs. So, we start by getting to know our guests, their business and what they are going through. We want to have a firm grasp on the day-to-day reality of their employees. Where are they working and how? Are they set up to be productive given their work style and workplace? Is the layout of the office welcoming and conducive to employee productivity? Then we begin to tailor our presentation for the exact needs of each business and employee persona.  

Matching Solutions with Workstyles 

At Poly we advocate for physical spaces that are designed to accommodate different workstyles as well as the importance of outfitting every employee with the right tools for their job function and locations. Over the past decade, we’ve done extensive persona research to understand the various workstyles that make up the typical organization from office collaborators to on-the-go executives. This user-driven approach to technology decisions is more critical than ever as so many of our customers are planning for a future of work that is increasingly hybrid and flexible. Our PEC staff can walk you through how to match the correct technology for the various personas in your workforce to keep them productive and connected throughout the day. 

We look forward to sharing the Poly experience with our visitors in NYC. To learn more about our Poly Experience Program or to schedule your experience, contact your Poly account representative! 

Jennifer Adams leads Global Sales Experience and Enablement Programs at Poly. 

For years, the Monterey Bay Aquarium struggled with their communication products and platforms. The inconsistencies across the business, system complexities and dropped calls were downright maddening. Collaboration was an absolute headache and it needed to change. When the Aquarium team needed to provide their diverse workforce with reliable technology, supported by a unified platform, they turned to Poly.

We spoke with John Abrahamson, Vice President of Sales, and Rob Mann, Vice President of Technology, to discuss how Poly’s technology is empowering their team to communicate and collaborate. From conception through execution, our teams worked side-by-side to equip the Monterey Bay Aquarium team with the right technology for the job.

Professional Grade Technology and Design

In our partnership, we learned that flexibility, simplicity and interoperability were priorities for the Aquarium team. They needed products that were compatible with Zoom, their preferred internal platform, in addition to other common platforms that outside clients might use to connect with the Aquarium staff. Platform interoperability has been a genuine pain point for their team. With this information, it was clear our CCX400 and CCX500 desk phones offered a natural, simple solution.

Our CCX 400 is the super-accessible model in our “next-generation” CCX family of phones. It’s easy to use and blocks out background noise, making conversations as clear and efficient as they should be ─ even if there are penguins and otters splashing nearby. The phone offers a five-inch color touchscreen, legendary Poly sound quality and Android nine-powered performance. Not to be outdone, our Poly CCX 500 features a five-inch color touchscreen, glorious Bluetooth® connectivity and Android nine-powered performance.

The Monterey Bay Aquarium team agreed that Poly’s Zoom certified products were the right choice and quickly went to work outfitting their building and staff, integrating Poly’s solutions.

Rob Mann, VP of Technology at Monterey Bay Aquarium, said, “I definitely appreciate the mounting system for the phones. Someone at Poly had the design brilliance to make a flip-flop bracket under the phone. As it turns out, it can be used multiple ways. It saved us a ton on plastic and time installation. My thanks to whoever thought of that.”

Not only were we able to help the Monterey Bay Aquarium team overcome a long-term pain point, but we were also able to wow them with design, interoperable products, reliable tech and a steadfast partnership.

Pro-Grade Products Meets Best-in-Class Partnership

With their previous set up, over 536 calls were dropped the first day Aquarium reopening tickets became available. On the new system, the Aquarium had fewer than 50 calls dropped, with greater call volume in the same period of time. With our products and partnership, they successfully diversified their calls via a phone tree system and ensured their customer service is outstanding.

John Abrahamson, said, “I’m in charge of Sales and I was blown away by the relationship Poly created with the Aquarium. I could not have been more pleased with the direct line of communication throughout the process. The representative listened to our needs and reacted to those needs specifically ─ not an agenda. That’s really the backbone of building a relationship between clients and organizations. It was incredibly refreshing and offered a learning experience for my own Sales team.”

Rob added, “Poly has been a great listener and responsive partner, which is invaluable to me. We haven’t had to compromise on anything with these endpoint devices. I wouldn’t have expected that at all, and we’ve been able to find the best equipment.”

Simply powerful communications ─ our solutions made it easy. The Monterey Bay Aquarium was never forced to choose between their priorities or even be limited to a single platform. Poly worked with the team to find the right solution, creating a consistent way of working across their business that supports their priorities, resolved pain points and offered best-in-class support. From kickass products to five-star listening, being an outstanding partner is always a priority.

Looking Ahead

We are already helping the Monterey Bay Aquarium team plan for their future. Should they ever need to transition platforms or to the cloud, they are well-equipped to do so. Our partnership will continue to evolve with return-to-office work on the horizon and as the Aquarium team charts their next steps. “Knowing what I know now about Poly, phone endpoints and room capabilities,” said Rob, “I’m going to continue looking to Poly as a service provider.”

We look forward to that shared future.

To learn more about Poly’s solutions, connect with a product specialist.

If the last two years have taught IT professionals, the public sector and business leaders anything, it’s that organizations must be prepared with a voice and video infrastructure capable of providing continuity in the face of rapid, and often, disruptive change. The global pandemic has been a catalyst for digital acceleration across all industries, as companies have been forced to rapidly deploy new technologies to keep their teams connected and performing at their best, no matter where they are getting their work done.

Whether it is health-related, like the current Omicron surge, or a natural disaster, no one knows what the next major disruption will be or when it may show up, but the recent past has taught us all how important it is to have readiness and flexibility built into an organization’s communication infrastructure.

Here are a few examples of Poly customers from different verticals who were ahead of the curve in terms of having the right collaboration tools in place to set their organizations up for success as they navigated the challenges of quickly pivoting to support remote and hybrid teams:

EDUCATION

The pandemic turned the education landscape upside down seemingly overnight, challenging learning institutions of all types to implement distance learning and remote administration in record time. Deciding what gear to roll-out, which features to deploy and how to ensure network readiness were major challenges for administrators and IT departments to navigate.

Issues such as their phone systems not allowing for off-prem use, needing to provide reliable professional quality headsets and roll out VaaS platforms like Zoom and Microsoft Teams left many schools struggling and scrambling in the transition to remote education.

When Chapman University needed a flexible solution that facilitated reliable communication and collaboration between staff and students, they turned to Poly as their trusted partner. Chapman moved quickly in the early days of the pandemic to support its nearly 10,000 students and staff with Poly gear, preparing them with the necessary tools to tackle remote learning and administration. The use of video cameras with features like speaker tracking, headsets that block out distracting background noise and speakerphones with acoustic fence technology made a huge difference for teachers working from home or in remote classrooms. The transition to support remote learning helped the university create a safe environment, support diverse needs and better prepare for whatever the future may hold.

Pennsylvania Public Schools is another success story. The Poly technology the Lancaster-Lebanon Intermediate Unit 13 (IU 13) implemented years before to connect the 22 schools in their district made their pandemic-induced transition to distance learning far more seamless. Roy Hoover, IU 13’s Network and Telecommunications Coordinator, pointed out that the decision to move from traditional desk phones to softphones and Poly headsets in the years prior to the pandemic made for a relatively seamless transition when staff were forced to work from home. Roy’s experience demonstrates how equipping a workforce with flexible, agile technology makes it possible to transition between traditional and remote working environments with relative ease.

GOVERNMENT

State and Federal governments faced massive challenges when transitioning to supporting a virtual workforce due to the scale of operations, privacy/security concerns and need to integrate with outdated, complex legacy infrastructure.

Because the Virginia State Supreme Court had a Poly-powered voice and video network in place, the pandemic did not incite the chaos it might have otherwise. Bob Kelley, Sr. Video Applications Engineer for the Supreme Court of Virginia, recommends that if states haven’t already begun, they should start planning their video infrastructure immediately so that they can launch something that will work for them in the long run – the next five to seven years.

HEALTHCARE

The medical field has been ahead of the game relative to many other industries. Healthcare institutions have been taking strides toward improving telemedicine for years to make quality care more accessible. There was an increasing demand for telehealth options, even before the pandemic, and now that increase has accelerated significantly. Administrators and IT professionals in the medical field have been leading the charge and taking on this challenge bravely, and Poly has been happy to be an ally.

Avera eCARE has supported patients and clinicians with their team of medical experts for more than 25 years. As true pioneers in telehealth, they use Poly solutions across their network to provide remote emergency care to rural emergency rooms, behavioral health clinics, critical access needs, correctional health needs and senior care.

On an average month, Avera eCARE supports 1,400 emergency video consults calls and 1,000 specialist consults, receiving patients from their 380+ Poly Group Series 500 units deployed to emergency rooms, state correction facilities and long-term care facilities. In addition to video, nearly 90 percent of Avera’s clinical administration and clinical staff use a Poly headset at their desk every day.  In the early days of the lockdown, they were well-equipped to send staff home with the gear they needed to continue providing exceptional service to patients.

The Road to Readiness

At this point, we know change is inevitable. It’s something the workforce is going to navigate day-by-day, and we know the back and forth is exhausting for everyone. However, ensuring your business has readiness and flexibility built in ahead of time can make a huge difference. Those who suffered fewer obstacles and less stress were those who already had flexible, reliable voice and video technology in place.

Poly is here to assist with a variety of consulting services that help you plan ahead and future-proof your organization, including the Poly Grant Assistance Program, which is a free resource focused on aligning available funding with your organization’s communication needs.

The road to readiness is paved with professional-grade voice and video solutions capable of adapting quickly as collaboration dynamics evolve. Being prepared is the key to business continuity – and, when it comes to keeping your teams connected, Poly’s got you covered.

The pandemic turned the education landscape upside down seemingly overnight, challenging every university to adapt to distance learning in record time. Deciding what gear to roll-out, which features to deploy and how to ensure network readiness were major challenges for administrators and IT departments to navigate. When Chapman University needed a reliable, flexible solution that facilitated reliable communication and collaboration between staff and students, they turned to Poly as their trusted partner.

Chapman moved quickly in the early days of the pandemic to support its nearly 10,000 students and staff with Poly gear, preparing them with the necessary tools to tackle remote learning and administration. The transition to remote learning helped the university create a safe environment, support diverse needs and better prepare for the future. Poly products and services made that possible.

Innovative Features

Poly’s professional-grade video gear, including the Poly Studio lineup of video bars, were selected thanks to innovative features like Presenter Tracking that allowed teachers to move freely around the classroom while instructing instead of being locked in front of their laptops. Advanced audio features like Acoustic Fence and NoiseBlockAI are available on the Poly Trio 8300 and helped ensure remote students on the far end could hear every word from their instructors and classmates.

Multi-Platform

Chapman also had to confront another key challenge: multi-platform support. Poly equipped Chapman University with devices that are fully certified for use on Microsoft Teams and Zoom, including native app experiences for both, which provided the flexibility to move seamlessly between UCaas service providers.

The Chapman team explained that,
“…as time goes on, we, as a university, are always going to reevaluate what the best provider is given current needs. And so, it’s fantastic to see that Poly products can be converted between different platforms without additional investments.”  Hear exactly what their Assistant Vice President of Infrastructure, Phillip Lyle, had to say in his own words in this video.

Ease of Deployment & Management

The Chapman team also appreciated that Poly products are easy to deploy and set up. Getting a new deployment of collaboration devices up and running in a cloud-based management system can be a painstaking process. With Poly Lens software, the unboxing and device on-boarding process is greatly simplified. The Chapman IT team could scan a QR code on the boxes as they were setting up the units and quickly register the devices within the Poly Lens client, streamlining this provisioning process to a nearly out-of-box experience.

Poly Lens software also enabled device management along with powerful, actionable insights about how Poly collaboration endpoints and the workspaces that house them were being utilized across the Chapman network. This potent combination of professional-grade devices with a powerful software backend provides for an adaptable, flexible collaboration toolset capable of evolving as the ever-changing pandemic landscape forces universities to pivot and make quick decisions.

Moving Forward

According to BestColleges.com’s 2021 Online Education Trends Report, which collected data from 1,800 college students and 366 school administrators in the fall of 2020, nearly half of all students surveyed said they were likely to engage in online (49%) or remote (48%) learning even after colleges resume normal operations.

Chapman’s students are no exception. Phillip Lyle, Assistant Vice President of Infrastructure, suggested that, in the future, it’s likely that nearly every class would feature at least one remote user as students and staff decide what learning environment is most appropriate for their safety.

Providing an Equal Seat at the Table

Important considerations must also be made for hybrid teaching models, where students will be split between in-classroom and remote attendance. This scenario often presents more challenges than a 100% remote model, as teachers strive to accommodate the needs of in-class and remote students.

Hybrid education may present challenges, but the Chapman team will be well prepared to meet them. With Poly gear, in the classroom, conference rooms and home offices, Chapman ensures that any student or staff member who needs to participate remotely, now or in the future, can do so easily and have an equitable seat at the table.

These products also help universities meet the needs of students and staff who previously had trouble attending traditional classrooms due to a physical, mental, emotional or cognitive disability. Chapman’s built-in hybrid education solutions create more opportunities, ensuring those affected have appropriate accommodations. When best-in-class collaboration tools are ready at the click of a button, students and staff can worry less about technology and more about a best-in-class education.

For more information about Poly’s solutions for education, contact a Poly representative.

Head to Poly.com to learn more!

The next time you’re in a hotel and order a meal from their restaurant or room service, it may not actually be coming from the hotel.  A new firm called Butler Hospitality is helping hotels meet their guests’ dining needs in four US cities so far – and they’re growing.

Serving more than forty-thousand hotel rooms In New York, Chicago, Miami and Washington D.C. – and soon to be serving over two-hundred thousand rooms in US cities coast-to coast – Butler’s ability to communicate with their staff, investors, customers and potential customers has never been more important.  They wanted to find a videoconferencing solution that would be reliable and provide them with a sense of pride as they collaborated with others in their industry.

The first system they installed was not from Poly.  It was a multi-component endpoint with a robotic camera, controller, and processor.  It seemed to work OK for them during initial tests, but they soon found that it locked them into only one video platform provider.  Aaron Cohen, Butler’s Chief Revenue Officer, explained that “If we’re courting a new investor, and that investor uses Zoom, we don’t ask that investor ‘do you mind using our platform instead?’  You’ve got to be able to join that Zoom call.”  Having made a big investment in video equipment that turned out to be incompatible with other video platforms was a big headache for the Butler team.

In an attempt to find a solution, Butler purchased one of the many Poly endpoints that is platform agnostic and put it in one of their other conference rooms.  (It was actually less expensive than their initial investment.)  Aaron explained that the results were very impressive.  The Poly video bar was able to follow the action in the room and always perfectly frame the shot without any distracting camera motors or other moving parts buzzing around.  Poly’s innovations in noise elimination and low-light camera pick-up created experiences that were, in his words, “as good or better than” the more expensive system in every aspect.

Poly has video solutions that are certified for use on multiple platforms, so whether you chose a USB device to connect to a PC (like the Poly Studio for medium rooms or the Poly Studio P15 for individual use) or instead choose an all-in-one device (like the Poly Studio X30 or Studio X50) you can always rest assured that you will be able to use that device’s superior features natively on multiple platforms (such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams and many more.)

Aaron Cohen, Butler Hospitality’s Chief Revenue Officer

In Aaron’s words, he would “absolutely recommend the Poly systems to anyone who wants a high-quality system that doesn’t want to get locked-in to just one video platform provider.”  In his mind, his current usage of video platforms involves “a little mix of everything.” He has “no idea” what the prevailing video platform will be next year, as he says, “it may not even have been invented yet.”  Aaron is very confident however that the Poly systems are his best choice to ensure the value of his firm’s investment into the future.

To find out more about the many Poly systems that can give your team the same confidence to just crush your meetings, visit our website, or reach out to your Poly representative and tell them you want the less expensive, better quality, video platform agnostic endpoints that are helping Butler grow their business every day.

As the world only just begins to see light at the end of the tunnel of the most horrific pandemic in a century, it is important that we pause to appreciate the few silver linings that came out of the experience.  Surely, the ability to develop the vaccine technology that’s been implemented needs to be amongst our brightest spots, but there is another one – perhaps a bit more subtle – that needs to be highlighted as well, and that is how communication technology has finally come to be recognized as an equalizing force that enables a more inclusive workplace.

When everyone was forced into lockdown and had no choice but to work remotely, like the rest of us, Gary LaSasso and the team at Amicus Therapeutics shifted to a collaboration technology-supported remote working model.  Gary’s team quickly discovered that remote collaboration had become the great equalizer. As a biotech firm that searches for potential treatments for rare and devastating diseases, Amicus had always advocated for and implemented an inclusive workforce – including employees with disabilities of all types.  When the world switched to remote working, suddenly all employees were connecting and collaborating as equals.  For Gary, it meant the barriers to employment – be they geographical or physical – had been removed.  Clearly, another pandemic silver lining.

TECH THAT LEVELS THE PLAYING FIELD

Anthony DeVergillo, Gary’s colleague, manages Amicus’ internal communications.  He has done so from his home for the past four years as the rare neuromuscular disorder he lives with, Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy weakens his muscles to the point that he needs to use a wheelchair and requires a noninvasive ventilator to assist his breathing.

When all of Amicus’ employees were forced to connect remotely during the pandemic – and discovered the tremendous value in having high-quality collaboration tools – suddenly the experience of collaborating with Anthony was no different than collaborating with any other Amicus employee.  The pandemic leveled the playing field.

However, there was still one work issue that Anthony said raised his anxieties.  He was always self-conscious about the noises his ventilator made during calls.  It is loud, produces a high-pitched squeal, and makes a significant noise every time he takes a breath.  Of course, none of his colleagues minded the noise while seeking out his thoughtful perspective and vast expertise with brand architecture, but he knew that people would – at least subconsciously – find it distracting at best.

POLY’S ENGINEERING TEAM STEPPED-IN TO HELP

While Poly’s engineers designed NoiseBlock AI with more mundane distractions in mind (a vacuum cleaner, a rustling bag of food, etc.), it was conceivable that this powerful algorithm would be able to detect that Anthony’s ventilator noise was not speech – and without any additional tweaking.  It was certainly an experiment worth trying.  We shipped one of our new Poly Studio P15 personal collaboration bars to Anthony as a demo, and the results were remarkable.  Nearly all of the extraneous sound that had been passing through his old setup was blocked by the microphone array and processor built-in to the unit.  Have a listen to our recent Microsoft Teams video conversation for yourself – and be sure to note the difference in the audio when I ask Anthony to switch to the Poly microphone system:

As Gary points out, Poly has been on the cutting-edge of innovation and continues to be the industry leader with the quality of the video and the audio together in the one Studio P15.

Poly engineers strive to pioneer industry innovations that help make collaboration and communication more natural and easier to use for everyone.  This doesn’t only include NoiseBlock AI, but also production rules that allow our cameras to automatically track and adjust with TV-director-skill as people draw on a whiteboard, stand up and walk around, or simply shift into a different position in their chair.  The Studio P15 also has many other great features that you can read about here.  But clearly, helping Anthony feel more confident communicating and allowing him to get his ideas across without distraction, and therefore feel more a part of the Amicus team is one of our proudest moments.

If you’d like to find out more about the Poly Studio P Series and other Poly innovations that enable your team’s message to come through but leaves the distractions behind, visit our website or reach out to your Poly representative to get more information.

Pete Kolak, who manages the collaboration systems for a large financial services company in California, was pulling his hair out deploying conference room systems. “Our firm was a very heavy user of videoconferencing technologies – even before the pandemic,” he explained. “It would take us two to three days to install a medium-sized video conference room.”

No matter which conference or huddle room products Pete selected, it was always a challenge to wrestle with the multiple cables and/or cable harnesses all around the room connecting various components. He and his team had to closely monitor installation firms to ensure they complied with his organization’s aesthetic requirements. Sometimes this involved ordering custom-made shorter cables. However, even then, they often needed to bunch up the excess behind displays in an attempt to make the equipment look as professional as possible. The excess hidden wires often made troubleshooting the systems very difficult. Pete and his team looked around for newer, less-expensive room solutions, but they were often disappointed because many options were not designed for use in a conference room.

When Pete evaluated the Poly Studio X Family of collaboration systems, the improvement – in his words – was “dramatic.”

STREAMLINE YOUR SETUP WITH POLY STUDIO X

By putting all of the needed components (cameras, speakers, microphones, codecs, processors, and a ton of very intelligent production skills) into a single bar, his room installation projects went down from two to three days to two to three hours. And that mess of cables – gone. Not only were the Poly Studio X systems easier to install, but their embedded intelligence – such as NoiseBlock AI and automatic camera framing and tracking – meant they also performed better and faster than prior available systems.

POLY’S COMMITMENT TO INNOVATION

At the end of the day, the reason Pete continues to install these Poly Studio X systems at his company because of Poly’s commitment to innovation. He appreciates that Poly came to market much more rapidly than many competitors and that we continue to incorporate better and more rapid features than any other device out there.

Pete and his team know that Poly’s EPTZ (electronic pan-tilt-zoom) technology captures conference participants beautifully – without motors or distraction. and best of all, the software and hardware will only continue to improve with every update to Poly OS. Now, they can’t imagine installing a system with a mechanical camera motor that would surely distract the participants with its movements and disrupt the room’s environment.

If you’d like to hear all this in Pete’s own words, watch the video below.

Pete knows that Poly builds tools, not toys and that pro-grade gear for meeting rooms doesn’t have to be complicated. Poly gives Pete and his team the confidence, flexibility, and edge they need to make sure that their whole organization can command every meeting.

If you’d like to find out more about the Poly Studio X Family and other Poly innovations that can enable your team to crush their meetings, visit our website, or reach out to your Poly representative to get more information.

Image courtesy of Avera eCARE

Based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Avera eCARE has established a fine-tuned network of remote care providers to bring advanced medical resources to communities in 32 states around the country. For 25 years, Avera eCARE has supported patients and clinicians with their team of medical experts through their robust communication and video infrastructure.

PATIENT CARE 24/7/365

Avera eCARE conducts specialty consults out of their Sioux Falls Hub, primarily servicing rural health care facilities. In 2004, Avera evolved to begin providing 24/7 on-demand services. While this service initially began with intensive care unit (ICU) services, they were one of the earliest adopters of telemedicine to support rural clinicians and began to see how those hospitals were using the services in unique ways. The ICU and rural hospital use cases helped to inform Avera about new ways to think about telemedicine and have since evolved to provide remote emergency care to rural emergency rooms, behavioral health clinics, critical access needs, correctional health needs, senior care, and many others.

In rural communities, oftentimes there are only a handful of clinicians who are not only in charge of general hospital services, but also emergency services, senior care, and all other health needs for the community – at times overwhelming clinicians. In these overstretched medical environments, eCARE is extremely beneficial to on-site clinicians who are then able to bring in specialty healthcare providers through Poly video endpoints.

Poly recently had the opportunity to speak with Mandy Bell, Innovation Officer at Avera eCARE to learn about how their advanced remote medical network uses Poly.

WHY CHOOSE POLY?

ROBUST VIDEO THAT IS EASY TO USE FOR ALL

When choosing a provider to power their network, the primary emphasis was placed on sourcing solutions that deliver consistent audio and video to facilitate virtual consultations with ease in place of on-site services. This is because in emergency scenarios it is crucial that minimal training is required for any of the technology. It has to be easy to use and it needs to work every time. “Poly has been highly reliable; it’s there when we need it most. The Poly technology is seamless to use across our network and we know that it’s easy and intuitive to use right from the start,” said Bell.

Additionally, the technology needed to provide lifelike video to allow clinicians and patients to feel as if they are in the room together and facilitate proper evaluation of patients. In essence, the key to the success of telehealth is that the technology must be seamless for all to use and bring high-quality professional care to anyone, anywhere via a Poly device. When it comes to how these attributes come together to create an experience that is similar to being in-person, Bell explained, “We’ve relied on Poly technology to make sure that we can zoom in and evaluate patients, support emergency airway intubations, and communicate effectively with the bedside team. All of this is set up using any reliable, hi-def technologies so that the end-user doesn’t have to lift a finger when they are taking care of the patient in front of them.”

So, what happens when technology is easy to use and provides high-definition video and audio? You forget it’s there.

“One of the best things about working with Poly technologies is that the technology works so well, it actually fades into the background, we no longer had to have conversations about what technology to use, but more about how to deliver the care. It works so well we almost take it for granted that the tech will just work so we can do our jobs,” explained Bell.

Image courtesy of Avera eCARE

INVESTING IN QUALITY

In addition to ease of use, Bell noted that another important variable is durability. “We chose Poly (then Polycom) as our standard primary vendor in 2005 and we feel amazingly fortunate. The units we bought nearly 16 years ago are still in service – which is amazing if you think about it. That’s a really good run for any kind of technology that’s deployed and used that heavily. We’re big fans and we’re currently installing the next generation [of endpoints] across hospitals and in our corporate headquarters,” said Bell.

ABILITY TO MANAGE REMOTELY

With technology at the core of how Avera eCARE operates, the ability to remotely manage their vast deployment becomes crucial to ensuring endpoints are running on the latest updates and device issues flagged. Avera’s infrastructure relies on Poly RealPresence Resource Manager, a collaboration device management platform that provides advance provisioning and management of Avera’s entire deployment. 

HOW AVERA USES POLY

Avera’s eHelm is set up for all services offered, each service station with its own video unit and computer documenting systems so that doctors and nurses can huddle up and take calls together. Rather impressively, care providers can have up to ten calls simultaneously across the network of 200+ facilities.

Image courtesy of Avera eCARE

On an average month, Avera eCARE supports 1,400 emergency video consults calls and 1,000 specialist consults, receiving patients from their 380+ Poly Group Series 500 units deployed to emergency rooms, state correction facilities, and long-term care facilities and have over 900 Poly Group Series codecs deployed. In addition to video, nearly 90 percent of Avera’s clinical and clinical staff use Poly headset at their desk every day.

At the end-user sites in the ER, Avera has Poly video devices hung on the hospital room wall so that the patients can easily be seen by the practitioners, and boom mics are hung over the hospital beds to pick up conversations with patients. In one case, Avera worked closely with Poly engineers to design devices to assist in video laryngoscope needs – most often used for intubations which can be a scary, lifesaving procedure, that most practitioners do not do very often. Using Poly video, doctors and clinicians can see the airway very clearly and help guide the bedside clinician through the procedure.

POLY TECHNOLOGY IN THE NICU

In the NICU (newborn intensive care unit), Avera uses the Poly Group Series 500 connected to a GoPro camera mounted to a flexible arm on the NICU warmer. After the baby is born, the GoPro is mounted above the infant to be monitored by a remote physician. The doctor communicates with on-site physicians and nurses to advise proper care. The dual-camera system allows the remote NICU team to collaborate and communicate effectively with bedside caregivers during the intense period of care just after delivery.

RADIATION AND ONCOLOGY

Avera’s eRadiation and Oncology programs are brought to rural locations using the Poly Group Series 700, allowing physicians to provide quality accessible care. Poly engineers came into the hospital to test mount cameras in oncology lead-lined vaults to ensure cameras, control rooms, and supporting technology could provide this level of remote expertise. The multi-camera setup allows the remote specialist to get multiple views of the patient and linear accelerator as well as the staff and systems in the control room.

TELEMEDICINE AS THE NORM AMID A CRISES 

During the first month of the COVID-19 pandemic, Avera deployed 500 endpoints via the Poly RealPresence Desktop solution to respond to the high-demand for telehealth visits. Remote diagnosis and monitoring have been hugely beneficial in relieving on-site nurses from being required to go into every room and potentially risk contracting the virus. Additionally, this saves nurses time – allowing them to treat more patients. This rapid deployment of Poly solutions ensured that operations continued to run smoothly and helped Avera feel as if they were prepared ahead of time because of the strong technology backbone they already had in place.

Poly also worked with Avera to increase the number of live sessions, allowing them to have an additional 600 video sessions per day to allow staff to remotely check on COVID-19 positive patients – this limited the need to use precious PPE (personal protective equipment), and expedited care for patients. The increase in live sessions also allowed Avera eCARE to ramp up other telehealth services to hospitals in need through a quick install via the RealPresence Desktop App.

In some cases, clinicians who were exposed to COVID-19 were outfitted with the RealPresence Desktop App on their laptops or iPads and they were able to work from home while still seeing patients in the hospital. 

A WATERSHED MOMENT FOR TELEHEALTH

During the pandemic, the vast majority of routine and non-urgent medical visits have been relying on telemed to safeguard patients and healthcare workers from illness. This mode of care is something Bell predicts will have staying power long after the pandemic, explaining, “This is that watershed moment for telehealth. We’re just at the tip of it. But now that more people have been exposed to telehealth, it’s going to be difficult to go back to pre-COVID times. Patients are going to demand it – why would you want to go to the hospital when you can stay in the comfort of your home or office?”

We are living through a time with so much at stake when it comes to health and the ways in which technology has enabled so much of our lives to turn virtual is astounding. And as time goes on, it’s only becoming more difficult to imagine things going back to the way they were before COVID-19. As Mandy Bell said, this is truly a pivotal moment for telemedicine. Healthcare systems such as Avera eCARE that have been embracing technology and driving innovation to provide quality care remotely have been at the forefront of reshaping the medical space.

For more information about Poly’s solutions for healthcare, contact a Poly representative.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Brochure: Poly Healthcare Solutions

A look at the solutions that help drive success in healthcare. Download brochure.

Solution Brief: Poly Telehealth Application

Smooth integration of video into Epic EHR. Download solution brief.

Quick Start Guide: Poly Grant Assistance Programs (PGAP)

We know that finding and getting a grant can be time-consuming and overwhelming. That’s why Poly provides assistance in every aspect of proposal preparation, funding selection, and submission of grant applications. Let us help you find funding to implement voice, video, and data communications solutions. Our team of grant and industry experts will help you create a funding solution package to meet your specific and unique needs and achieve your project outcomes. Download quick start guide.