Last December, we introduced a native Dialpad Meetings app experience for our Poly Studio X series—the latest step in the growing partnership between Dialpad and Poly. Together, we’ve continued to develop and enhance our offerings, and we’re excited about what’s coming next.

Let’s take a look at how far Dialpad and Poly have come with Dialpad Meetings for Rooms and what’s in store for the days ahead.

The Road so far for Hybrid Meetings

We’ve made solid progress since Dialpad Meetings for Rooms launched. Not only has there been plenty of demand and early adoption—especially with existing Dialpad Meetings customers—but customers have also chosen to upgrade their old devices. Their new Poly devices help them easily and fully leverage the solution for their web conferencing needs.

As Dialpad customers transition their workforces back to the office (or adopt a hybrid work environment), they’ve begun deploying room hardware. In fact, the rise of hybrid work has made room hardware more important than ever, as it helps connect in-office and remote employees in a way that makes it feel like everyone’s in the same room.

And it’s no wonder why customers are choosing Dialpad Meetings for Rooms! After all, it can be set up and launched in minutes, and joining meetings just takes a click. Dialpad Meetings is designed for efficient hybrid collaboration, so you can start or join meetings instantly from any device.

From there, you can enjoy Poly’s immersive audio and video capabilities, making it feel as if all participants are in the same room. It comes complete with next-gen beamforming microphones and Poly’s NoiseBlockAI to help you clearly hear everyone in the room without distractions.

All the while, Dialpad AI provides real-time transcriptions, so every note you need is available in an instant. You can even use the Miro integration to set up a digital whiteboard for everyone to collaborate on, regardless of your location.

What’s next?

We have plans for future capabilities that will help make meetings better, easier and more equitable for both participants in the room and those joining remotely. These include:

• New mobile controller options, so it’s even easier to join meetings from personal devices.
• Additional controls for the TC8, designed to make the in-room experience smoother and more efficient.
• New AI upgrades to streamline workflows.
• New devices to expand the hardware portfolio, including the upcoming Poly Trio C60.

Whether you’re communicating between office locations or joining from the comfort of your home, Dialpad and Poly will be there to create the greatest meeting experience possible. To learn more about Dialpad Meetings for Rooms, visit Dialpad.com

As workers return to the office, collaboration spaces are getting a makeover. Poly understands that designing the room environment and deciding the layout for video equipment can be challenging, especially with the new considerations for supporting hybrid teams. Even though our Poly G7500 and Poly Studio Family products were designed with ease of deployment and setup in mind, there are other important considerations when prepping your video collaboration spaces, such as how to deal with windows, where to place the furniture, and where microphone placement will work best in your space. 

The new Room Preparation Guide offers pre-installation strategies and recommendations for room planning to help you optimize your collaboration environment. These helpful tips can prevent oversights that can counteract a productive and enjoyable video conferencing experience. 

Maximizing the Room Environment 

The basic elements of your collaboration environment – walls, windows, HVAC, colors, lighting, acoustics – are important to creating a workable space. Fine-tuning the room environment before installing your video conferencing equipment is crucial to your collaboration experience. 

The guidelines in the Room Prep Guide help establish a good foundation for collaboration rooms by answering questions such as the following: 

• Do window treatments really matter? Yes. Use curtains or draperies (never blinds) that are heavy enough to dampen sound from inside and outside the room. 

• How bright should the lighting be? Bright light increases the range of in-focus objects, especially people’s faces. Make sure the light is diffused and never shining directly at the camera.

• Which floor materials are acceptable? Choosing the right flooring makes a big difference in the room’s acoustics. Stick with carpet if you can or pay special attention to sound dampening in other parts of the room (like walls and ceilings). 

• What color should I paint the walls? Neutral colors with hints of blue work best. Grays, silvers, and champagne work well for acoustic panels. Avoid saturated colors if possible (and stay away from green!) 

• How can I minimize background noise? Most of the options to minimize background noise are integrated as acoustic materials built into the walls and ceilings. If you can’t alter or update the construction of your room, consider enabling Poly Acoustic Fence or Poly Acoustic Fence with Beam Shaping Technology (depending on the equipment used). 

Configuring the Room Layout 

A good room layout is the key to an enjoyable and effective collaborative experience. This is more than hanging a display and setting up a conference table with chairs. The most effective room layouts provide the right audio and visual interaction between participants, whether it’s 2 or 20. 

What do you need to consider when setting up the layout of your collaboration rooms? The Room Prep Guide goes step-by-step with information like the following: 

• Can I use a Studio X30 system in a large conference room? Studio X30 systems are designed for huddle rooms that hold only a few people. For larger conference rooms, Poly recommends a Studio X70 system or a G7500 system with a connected Studio E70 camera. 

• Is it a good idea to mount a camera under a display? You can, but cameras are best positioned near the horizontal and vertical centers of your display. Placing cameras too high or too low can cause eye contact problems or skew images of the participants.

• How far can a meeting participant be from a Studio X Family built-in microphone? The microphones integrated in the Studio X Family products can typically pick up speech between 2.5 m (8 ft) and 3.5 m (11.5 ft). When integrated with a Poly Trio system, you can use the Trio microphones to extend the distance or allow for audio pickup in other areas of the room. 

• What does camera framing look like for a Poly Studio X50 system at full HD zoom? Luckily the Room Prep Guide provides detailed images that show what speaker framing looks like. Check out the guide for some examples! 

• How do Poly Acoustic Fence and Poly Acoustic Fence with Beam Shaping Technology work? Poly’s Acoustic Fence technology uses various microphones with G7500 systems to set up a virtual area where sound is picked up. Poly’s Acoustic Fence with Beam Shaping Technology is integrated into the Studio X Family systems and uses a defined beam to limit sounds outside of the beam area. These are great options to reduce background noise if you can’t update your build environment with acoustic materials. 

We Welcome Your Feedback 

We’re excited about our new Room Preparation Guide as a resource to support our customers in planning their return to office strategies. Access this document at Poly Support and use the guidance to build out your best collaborative environment for Poly G7500 and Poly Studio Family systems.  

We developed this guide to serve our customers, so let us know what we can improve or update it. Please join us in the Poly Community or send us feedback directly to documentation.feedback@poly.com.  

It’s clear that the office environments we return to this year won’t be the ones we left in 2020. Over the past two years, many employees have come to appreciate the flexibility of working remotely. A survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in January 2022 found that 78 percent of people, most of whom are working from home, want to continue to do so after the pandemic. Joblist’s US Job Market Report: 2022 Trends revealed that 45 percent of people who currently work remotely, at least part of the time, would quit if their employer required full-time in-person work. Compare this to 2019, when, according to the New York Times, about four percent of employed people in the U.S. worked exclusively from home.

As a result, 98 percent of meetings include at least one remote participant and most include even more. So, it’s no longer enough to have on-site rooms optimized to allow in-person participants to communicate comfortably. Instead, all the spaces people work, in the office and remotely, must be optimized for seamless collaboration and effective communication.

As you plan your company’s return-to-office strategy this year, it’s important to understand how your people work, where they work and which technologies empower them to communicate and collaborate most effectively.

UNDERSTAND HOW YOUR PEOPLE WORK

Each of your employees has specific technology needs to excel in their role, whether they’re at home or in the office. IT decision makers must take these preferences into consideration and strategize ways to provide the necessary tools. Are employees in the office 99 percent of the time and prefer traditional communication devices and technology? Do they spend most of their time on the road and depend on mobile devices to get things done? Are they working from a remote office and need technology that allows them to participate virtually, but look and sound as good as if they were in a room with colleagues? These are just some of the many considerations.

Whether you have tens of employees or thousands, figuring out how they work and how you can best support each workstyle can feel daunting. But it doesn’t have to. Poly research shows that 92 percent of employees fit into six consistent workstyle categories. While everyone is still an individual, with different wants, comfort factors and situational needs that can affect device choice, understanding the details of these six categories will be foundational to your return-to-office strategy.

TAKE STOCK OF WHERE YOUR EMPLOYEES WORK

Today’s employees work from a wide variety of spaces, including at their desk in the office, at home, in a customer’s office, at the airport, in shared or co-working spaces, in office huddle spaces and in conference rooms. And it’s up to the IT team to enable every employee, wherever they work, to communicate and collaborate effectively.

The secret to conquering this challenge is understanding that all these places can be broken into two categories: personal spaces and group spaces. By taking geography out of the equation, you can see how an employee desk in the office and a desk at home may be alike since both are individual spaces. It can also expand your viewpoint on meeting rooms as group gathering places for all your hybrid workers, who must be able to participate both virtually and in person.

UNDERSTAND HOW TECHNOLOGY CREATES CONSISTENCY ACROSS PEOPLE AND PLACES

Your technology choices need to ensure the same level of professionalism for all employees. In the pre-2020 office, employees in the building typically had professional communications devices, while those at home and on the road used the camera in their laptop with the same consumer headphones they used to listen to music. Now, you need to enable professional-grade collaboration for everyone from everywhere.

This means taking advantage of features like high definition (HD) audio and video, features like speaker framing, seamless content sharing between devices and digital whiteboarding. It also means ensuring that no matter where the technology is being used, it’s easy for everyone to utilize. Before the pandemic, Sapio Research found that about 15 percent of the time spent in meetings is wasted time, largely due to inefficient meeting room equipment. And that won’t meet your organization’s need for productive collaboration in its new hybrid environment.

Before you develop your final return-to-office strategy, download our eBook to learn more about how to understand your employees’ workstyles, your hybrid workspaces and the technology choices that can enable everyone to collaborate at a consistently productive level.

Back in the 70s, huge advances in telecommunications led NASA to encourage its workers to adopt a new form of working termed, ‘telecommuting’. However, despite the obvious benefits (think decreased costs and increased convenience) remote working didn’t exactly take off. Fast forward to the late 90s, the emergence of new technologies, including cloud PBX and others, and remote working became far more mainstream.

A 2019 study revealed an average of 62% of companies worldwide offer employees some form of flexible working and, with the emergence of COVID-19, that number is estimated to be much higher –even long after a vaccine. In this post, I’ll assess the best kinds of (mostly free) tools for establishing and running an effective remote or hybrid working environment.

COVID-19 Offers Few Alternatives to Remote Working

Recent events have thrown many companies in at the deep end when it comes to remote working. National governments and authorities are giving them no choice but to implement work from home orders to ensure social distancing. And, overseeing newly remote teams can prove overwhelming for the uninitiated. Plus, it’s inevitable that some employees will start to feel stressed and isolated without the right systems and support in place.

No Need to Panic

Luckily, the evolution of IOT, wireless devices, and other technology means there are now plenty of useful tools available to make working online and collaborating with others easier.

The four main elements that need to be resolved when it comes to working remotely are:

• Effective Communication Tools
• File-sharing
• Project Management
• Time Management

So, let’s start with tools that facilitate what is arguably the most important aspect of remote working: effective communication.

1. Effective Communication Tools

Perhaps the most widely used of all recent communication tools are remote conferencing tools and instant messaging platforms.

Remote conferencing tools enable you to hold online team meetings, webinars, presentations and training sessions with ease. Make sure you source tools that offer high-quality video and audio and give you various options to play with. For instance, you’ll likely want the ability to mute or unmute participants. As well as being able to record sessions for later playback and assessment.

If you manage a small team or work with freelancers, choose easy-to-use web conferencing tools that send participants a link to take them directly to any meeting you need to hold. That way, there’s no downtime required to learn a new system. This is excellent if you work with skilled professionals whose strengths don’t lie in technology.

Instant messaging is popular around the world. It’s now overtaken SMS in terms of the numbers of users and usage is predicted to continue to rise rapidly.

Instant messaging (IM) tools are also a favorite of many companies when working remotely. Most offer group chat, direct messaging, and voice calls, along with screen sharing. You can set up private or open channels in your workspace and invite people to share files, live chat and upload images.

Free plans are often fine for some companies, but they may only support direct voice and video calls. If you want group calls, it may be worth your while to upgrade to a fee-charging plan. However you choose to utilize IM or similar communication tools, they’re sure to boost the productivity of your entire team.

2. File Sharing and Collaboration Tools

Collaboration tools enable remote team members to view and edit documents, as well as create text docs, spreadsheets, and presentations. Good file sharing tools also allow users to edit documents at the same time, with all changes stored and traceable. This means your team can work on a project precisely as if they were in the office together.

Most collaboration tools are straightforward to use and allow you to quickly and easily share large files. All you need do is simply upload a file and you can share access with a team.

There are quite a few generous free plans available with plenty of cloud storage per user. If you need extra storage, it’s worth paying a bit extra. Remote collaboration that’s as effective as working side-by-side under one roof is worth the outlay.

3. Project Management Tools

Project management tools are popular because they deliver on so many levels for remote project managers and team members alike. The best tools in this area help you to stay on top of how different tasks are progressing. You can allocate time for different projects, and always ensure that everything stays on track.

The tools are generally simple to use but some find the free versions restrictive in terms of in-depth reporting features. Upgrading to a business plan may cost you a bit more (either on a user basis or for a team) but they promise to boost productivity and make working together easier.

Opt for a project management tool that allows you to store project docs along with notes, descriptions and roadmaps. Others useful features to look out for are systems that allow you to reference, embed, format, design and share files as well as make use of templates and track changes.

Additionally, if you have certain docs you want to keep secret, opt for a tool that allows you to assign permissions and keep key information private from users that don’t require access.

4. Time-Tracking Tools

Time-tracking tools allow you to set clear goals for team members. You can use them to remove confusion around who’s doing what and when. This is particularly useful when you’re working on many tasks at the same time.

Time tracking tools can give you a high view of any potential hiccups on a day to day basis. They also allow you to create longer-term strategies to help you work more efficiently. These tools help your staff to become more accountable and communicate progress towards deadlines.

There are numerous useful tools out there that allow you to track the time you and your workers are spending on projects. From there, they also make it straightforward to analyze how efficiently everyone’s working. Most of the tools can be used across multiple devices, including smartphones, and they’re especially useful for tracking hourly rates for employees to ensure accurate payment.

Time tracking tools can also be highly valuable if you’re seeking to get more productive. Quite a few free plans are available, and often include basic time tracking, unlimited projects and tasks, productivity reports and mobile and desktop apps.

We hope you found this information useful. The impact of Coronavirus has impacted businesses irretrievably. The future is looking increasingly remote, in more ways than one. However, this doesn’t have to be a bad thing — at least not when it comes to collaborating over distance. As long as you use the best remote working tools, you can actually increase productivity, help to improve customer relationships, and create a positive virtual workplace.

For more information about Poly’s solutions for remote working, visit https://www.poly.com/work-from-home

Author Bio

Sam O’Brien is the Senior Website Optimization & User Experience Manager for EMEA at RingCentral, a global UCaaS systems provider. Sam has a passion for innovation and loves exploring ways to collaborate more with dispersed teams. He has written for websites such as SmallBizDaily and GetCloudApp.

Poly and RingCentral

Poly’s industry-leading unified communications solutions are certified with RingCentral’s cloud phone, meetings, and contact center solutions. That means easier implementation and management for IT, and a better experience for everyone using audio, video and screen sharing. Poly and RingCentrals’ tight integration delivers a seamless experience between the Poly endpoints and RingCentral’s cloud platform.

As the pace of change around the world and in our daily lives becomes more intense, Poly has been ramping up our resource offerings to support employee wellbeing and maintaining their mental health. In acknowledgment of Mental Health Day on October 10^th, I thought I would share how Poly is tackling the important question – how do we ensure our employees are receiving the proper care they need to be mentally strong and healthy while at work and in their personal lives?

As a Human Resources professional, I think of mental wellbeing as a state of being that allows a person to cope with the normal stresses of life, be productive and effective at work, and can contribute to their community. It’s more than just a day of focus – it’s a sustained effort. This is why finding the right tools for your employee wellbeing program is essential. In this blog, I will share with you what approach Poly is taking to assist our employees with the hope that our actions can inform HR professionals and individuals alike while we navigate our new ways of living and working during these extraordinary times.

IDENTIFY WHAT RESOURCES YOUR WORKFORCE NEEDS

As soon as the pandemic hit, the HR team began proactively reaching out to managers and employees to understand their concerns, as well as gathered insights into how employees were truly feeling during these turbulent times. The two most common themes we identified were isolation and burnout.

Feelings of isolation were understandable given social distancing requirements, but also, many employees enjoyed conventional “office life” and the social interactions they had with their coworkers on a regular basis. Additionally, feelings of burnout resulted from the new challenges presented by the need to establish boundaries between personal and work life. Many of our employees have spouses, partners, or roommates who are also working from home full-time, which led to difficulties in separating responsibilities and social time. Additionally, many employees that we heard from were juggling the obligation of assisting their children with distance learning and caretaking while trying to remain productive at work.

Through a number of programs and initiatives, Poly aims to provide support to our employees’ mental and physical health during and after the pandemic. We hope that by providing tools that are free, available on-demand, and easy to use, we can help our employees develop repeatable skills to maintain their mental health in a variety of ways.

PROGRAMS FOR A HEALTHY WORKFORCE

Mental health isn’t something that will be tackled in a day, so it’s important to take the long view with a multi-pronged approach. With stressors coming in from all angles, it’s more important than ever to look after your employee’s wellbeing. Mental Health America claims that “stress from work can impact [employees] family life, mental health, and even increase risks for chronic illnesses and heart attacks.” Making it appropriate that many employers are increasing their investment in health and wellbeing programs.  In the same survey, it was found that stress management ranked among the highest when it comes to how companies expect to increase investment in employee wellness programs.

If you’re thinking “stress management” sounds a bit broad, I would agree. This is because everyone manages their stress in different ways depending on their preferences or even how they are feeling that day. This is where the multi-pronged approach comes in. There is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to supporting the wellbeing of multiple (if not thousands of) individuals. At Poly, we offer wellness programs in areas such as digital training programs to help people improve mental wellbeing, physical activity, and telehealth services.

Tools for Employee Wellbeing & Mental Health

Platforms that offer digital training programs to help people improve their mental wellbeing, interpersonal relationships and sleep are a popular choice for many organizations. At Poly, we use a platform called WHIL which offers a set of activity-based, micro-learning sessions, and daily audio or video sessions in a variety of different areas designed to reduce stress and anxiety. The top three topics our employees are interested in have been, Learning to Meditate, Reduce Stress and Anxiety, and Sleep Better. Finding a platform that offers an array of wellbeing-centric personal development has the potential to go a long way for the health of your organization.

Staying Active

Remaining physically active during a time of isolation has proven to be a challenge for some. But when it comes to managing stress, any movement can make an enormous impact. According to the Mayo Clinic, “exercise in almost any form can act as a stress reliever.” In January, we will offer our employees a flexible fitness platform called Peerfit, which offers access to gyms and studios in the US (actively operating in person or virtually), live virtual classes, and digital streaming providers.

Remote Counseling

During a time when some might be feeling lonely and in need of personal space all at once, it can be extremely beneficial to speak with a professional who is external to our personal lives. For our employees based in the U.S., Poly is enhancing our Employee Assistance Program (EAP) offering to include a clinically reviewed, evidence-based wellness platform through Aetna that provides messaging-based emotional health therapy and support. Additionally, we’ve expanded Poly’s virtual care solutions to include mobile cognitive behavioral therapy options.

SUPPORTING OUR EMPLOYEES YEAR ROUND

Our hope is that these programs benefit both our employees and their families during the pandemic and beyond. Aside from the above-mentioned programs, we recommend that if possible, our employees create a comfortable and private place in their home to work, try incorporating exercise or meditation breaks, and take time to ensure social interaction in their daily routines. We also recommend limiting emails before and after working hours and try to maintain a normal sleep schedule. Establishing parameters that help to balance work and home life will help maintain a feeling of normalcy.

Mental health Day is especially important this year as many struggle with anxiety and isolation directly correlated to the current event, the pandemic and the shift to working from home. Check-in on your colleagues. Invite them for a virtual water cooler break. At Poly, recognize the positive impact that  employee wellbeing and mental health programs can have on our employees and we will continue to focus on implementing or increasing workplace wellness initiatives. Additionally, we encourage other companies to implement similar programs to start improving the mental health of employees today, for the long-term.

Learn more about life at Poly.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, only 21 percent of public schools and 13 percent of private schools in the United States offered any courses entirely online [1] prior to COVID-19. In the wake of a global pandemic, learning institutions had to change their instruction overnight with IT decision makers tasked with identifying solutions that could best connect teachers with students. These unsung heroes had to act fast to address a diverse set of users with varying degrees of experience with technology. Today, we spotlight a success story in the Pennsylvania School District along with top tips to help learning institutions ramp for another school year where distance learning will undoubtably play a starring role.

Beginning March 23, Governor of Pennsylvania, Tom Wolf ordered a number of counties to stay at home as the state braced itself for the spread of COVID-19. By April 1st, Wolf announced shelter in place orders to be enforced statewide [2]. Although these orders dramatically impacted everyone, many K-12 schools throughout the state ‘really felt the pinch’ [3] of needing to quickly move their students, teachers and staff online— however, some were prepared to meet the shift.

Lancaster-Lebanon Intermediate Unit 13 (IU 13) is an education service agency dedicated to delivering K-12 services to schools and communities across the state of Pennsylvania and beyond. IU 13 wears many hats when it comes to the services they provide for students, their families, and their educators and has always been an early adopter of new technologies to provide its services. We had the opportunity to sit down with Roy Hoover, IU 13’s Network and Telecommunications Coordinator who has been leading the charge equipping his organization with the resources and telecommunications solutions he tailors to the needs of educators, facilitators, and administrators.

Hoover uses his expertise to provide products and services not only to the 22 public schools within Lancaster and Lebanon counties, but also to non-public schools, education agencies, parents, preschools, adult learners, businesses, municipalities, and more. Everything that IU 13 does is ultimately meant to support their core mission of improving student learning — and, from where Hoover stands, that means staying ahead of the curve on the latest technology.

A Track-Record of Innovation

IU 13 first created its own bridge using Poly (then Polycom) in 2007 with the reception of a grant. Hoover chose to outfit each of the participating schools in the district with Polycom HDX video conference units (the newer iteration of this product is the Poly G40-T). Later on, in 2011, the transition to a voice over IP (VoIP) phone system prompted the purchase of Poly (then separately, Polycom and Plantronics) handsets and headsets — a move Hoover described as, ‘a big step’ back in 2011. This shift to softphones would turn out to pay off in a big way during a time of crisis.

The Poly G-T40 Small/Medium Room Systems for Microsoft Teams

Early Adopters Stay Ahead of the Game

While speaking with Hoover, one of the prevailing themes to our conversation was the notion of IU 13 being an early adopter of new technologies. This enabled IU 13 to be ready for this moment thanks to some of the moves they made in the past that provided less of a barrier to digitalization and integration when it came time to move operations online.

Hoover reflected on the transition away from traditional desk phones to soft clients positively, stating, “Now, in the time of COVID-19 […] we found out that [transitioning to VoIP] was a really good decision, because the day we closed (for COVID-19 health and safety precautions), we told everyone to “take your computers with you.’” Hoover continued, “Now, everyone is using that same set-up […] we’re working the same way we were before, now we are just doing it from home.”

When it came time to shelter in place, Hoover underlined that not all schools were as lucky as the ones in his district, as some ran into a multitude of roadblocks because they never enabled certain ‘telecommuting’ features. Issues such as their phone systems not allowing for off-prem use, needing to provide trainings for headsets and VaaS platforms like Zoom and Microsoft Teams have led to many schools struggling in the remote transition. Hoover explained that it’s a painless process to add capabilities like voice once you’re already up and running on a collaboration platform like Teams.

Top Tips for Educators

IU 13’s early adoption of collaboration infrastructure poses a great case for equipping workforces with technology that is both flexible and agile in that, it has the ability to seamlessly transition between traditional and remote working environments at the drop of a dime. However, emergency preparedness was far from the main reason Hoover chose Poly to power IU 13’s network. The key factors guiding the decision boiled down to: consistency, user friendliness, interoperability with different collaboration platforms and devices, integration with Microsoft collaboration platforms, and high-quality voice and video.

Consistent and User Friendly

With so many endpoints facilitating both classroom and distance learning sessions throughout the two counties, consistency plays a huge role in ensuring the best experience for teachers and students alike. Additionally, tools that are easy to use and are interoperable with other endpoints such as, headsets, phones, video conferencing equipment tend to garner better adoption rates and source fewer troubleshooting calls to IT.

When asked what considerations were made with the end-user in mind, Hoover explained, “When we looked at Poly headset devices to outfit our IU, they worked well and had the right charging and wearing style options that just worked for folks.”

A Complete Microsoft Experience

The partnership between Poly and Microsoft is essential for any organization committed to delivering the richest and most complete collaboration experience. Meanwhile, the partnership between Microsoft and education runs equally as deep. Hoover explained, “Microsoft is sort of the 800-pound gorilla. Microsoft’s education site licensing is extremely attractive and is just kind of a no-brainer for a lot of schools.” Poly, which has the broadest range of devices that work with Microsoft Teams was the obvious choice.

Interoperability

Hoover noted the ability for devices to ‘play nice’ with other tools and platforms as another significant factor. “Platform interoperability is critical; we need devices that can scale across many online platforms and collaboration tools” said Hoover, “I need something that, as an IT administrator, I can put in a conference room and know that regardless of who sent the invite, or what form factor or platform it was on, that people will be able to use that device and conduct a meeting” he continued.

Quality Endpoints

The above-mentioned attributes can hardly make an impression without quality endpoints to deliver the experience. Poly prides itself on providing a comprehensive, end-to-end portfolio of collaboration tools for the education sector — students, teachers, and administrators. “When I think ‘Poly’, I think great audio and video. Poly has done such amazing engineering feats with things like Acoustic Fence and the cone of silence, that’s why I buy Poly products,” explained Hoover.

Poly Solutions for Education

Poly provides next generation learning solutions for the road ahead. Empower your educators to deliver exceptional, high-impact learning experiences with Poly’s signature video, voice and content sharing solutions. Additionally, school staff and administrators can save time and work better together using Poly solutions for voice, video and content sharing.

Be Prepared with Poly

With Poly solutions for education, you can rest assured that your organization’s telecommunication infrastructure is prepared to adapt to in-office or remote working scenarios as needed. Our priority is to provide a comprehensive portfolio of collaboration endpoints that work beautifully where you need them, when you need them. For more information about Poly’s solutions for education contact a Poly representative.

Additional Resources

How-To: Video Conference Programs

Search hundreds of video conferencing programs from different providers. The database provides content providers, educational outreach programs from organizations such as zoos, museums, authors, experts in the field and much more. Learn more.

Brochure: 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 brochure.

Brochure: Academic and Instructional Training

To ensure successful implementation and adoption of video conferencing and collaboration, our services are designed to fit your administrative, instructional, or other needs. Download brochure.

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[1] National Center for Education Statistics, Fast Facts, Distance Learning. https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=79

[2] Mervosh, Sarah, et al. “See Which States and Cities Have Told Residents to Stay at Home.” New York Times, 20 Apr. 2020, www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-stay-at-home-order.html.

[3] Kilmer, Liz. “Emergency Funding on the Way to Help Pennsylvania School Districts Struggling during COVID-19 Pandemic.” 11 New Wpix, 14 May 2020, www.wpxi.com/news/top-stories/emergency-funding-way-help-struggling-pennsylvania-school-districts/FIJNFUVIGRGHFCPZXPE6N3H73E/.

In March 2020, we closed the doors of our Poly contact centers around the globe and sent staff home to ensure everyone’s safety as shelter in place orders went out worldwide. The atmosphere was surreal. Our personnel didn’t know how long they were going home or when they would be able to physically see their colleagues again. All we knew was that we would continue to strive for ‘business as usual’ in providing best-in-class service to our customers and partners, despite doing our jobs remotely.

Everyone was confident that we would be able to seamlessly make the transition to working from home (WFH), as we already had a flexible working model in place.  However, ‘flexible’ typically had meant only working from home a few days a week, and without a full house. Our previous experience didn’t account for partners or roommates all on video calls at once or children needing home schooling.

The additional impact and dynamics brought about by COVID-19 called for increased focus on three key areas in order to ensure the ongoing success of our contact centers. They boiled down to equipment, workspaces, and maintaining camaraderie.

THE RIGHT EQUIPMENT

Poly’s contact center agents were in a good position to make to make the shift to full time remote working as we had already supplied the baseline essentials such as a laptop, keyboard and mouse.  However, no WFH setup is complete without a high-quality headset and external camera.  So naturally, we sent each agent home equipped with an EncorePro HW525 headset and Poly EagleEye Mini USB camera.

Thankfully, many of the intelligent features designed to block out distracting noises in the open office also work great in the home as well.  Features such as our a noise-canceling technology which protects against background noise and SoundGuard which safeguards against hearing discomfort and listening fatigue have proven to be valuable to our agents while working remotely.  The supplement of quality video is a simple addition that users can easily get up and running in seconds and makes a profound difference in the quality of video interactions. The Poly EagleEye Mini provides robust, high definition 1080p video with electronic pan, tilt, and 4x zoom – allowing those on the video call to feel more connected.

THE RIGHT WORKSPACE

Working from home full-time with the whole family under one roof creates a very different dynamic and new constraints. Now, multiple people may be needing a quiet place to work and there are additional demands on the Internet.

Although we can’t change the physical environment for our staff, we have found the use of virtual backgrounds to block out the personal space invaluable.  As for how to divvy up bandwidth and gain access to the quiet part of the house, there’s not much we can do about that either.  Here, we recommend staying in communication about when the home will need to be quiet and try coordinating as much as possible around Internet usage.

ESTABLISHING & MAINTAINING VIRTUAL TEAM SPIRIT

People are used to seeing each other in the office and socializing, holding ad hoc meetings, and having brainstorming sessions.  We recognized that these needs had to be sustained at a minimum – if not increased while teams are 100% remote to keep people from feeling isolated or overwhelmed.  We have worked hard to ensure that the team stays connected virtually through the use of video calls on a regular basis and making time for social interactions. Additionally, we created channels on Microsoft Teams focused on social activities such as virtual coffee breaks and water cooler moments.

PLANNING FOR WHAT’S NEXT IN THE CONTACT CENTER

Now we are looking at the next phase and planning for people to return to the office.  This has given me the opportunity to consider what we’ve learned from this experience and what our business model should be moving forward.  It’s provided me the chance to stop, think, and talk to the team about how we can best operate and provide the best service to our customers.

My goal is to orientate our staff to the most efficient working configuration based on workforce needs.  For the business, introducing a hybrid working model provides the opportunity of expanding talent acquisition with a more dispersed workforce. This creates opportunities for people who hadn’t previously considered working in a contact center due to physical restrictions.  Additionally, we’re able to increase our number of agents with native language skills and improve our customer service.

So, what is next?  The way I see it, virtual training is key.  The on-boarding of new agents, readapting our existing agents to a hybrid working model, as well as creating and sustaining remote teams are all ongoing requirements.  To do this, managers will need to hone skills focused on objective outcomes. These will support the model and opportunities for existing personnel to virtually mentor and further develop both themselves and others.  The key thing to remember is that physical distance no longer matters, and as new HR and company policies are developed to support such a model, contact centers will flourish.  And at Poly, we have the proven technology and systems, people process, and technology in place for this to be a reality.

VIDEO’S ESSENTIAL ROLE IN DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

All of this is achievable with the use of video – and, not simply as means of sustaining the business, but as a medium for enhancing it. There is greater accessibility to people through video than physically.  I can meet with all of my teams in one day, everyday while the flow of business continues.

This is just the beginning of a new way of working, and not only in contact centers.  For now, video is our great enabler.  And, once we are back in the office, people will have become more comfortable with video calls and see the great convenience they afford.  I see this bleeding into all areas of interaction and video will be the key for our customer interactions in the future.  In Poly contact centers, we use video conferencing internally all the time ­– it’s second nature to us.  Over the last few months we’ve had more video interactions directly with customers helping them resolve technical issues and showing them how to set up their equipment. In fact, I’m proud to report that our Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) has improved during the lockdown period.

I believe that flexibility will be central to the success for contact centers moving forward with blended working being the working model of choice.  Companies that offer this will benefit from a more diverse and widespread workforce and agents will benefit from this positive working environment.  Furthermore, contact centers will be more resilient with this robust, flexible working model in times of emergency – reducing risk and exposure and being well positioned to provide uninterrupted support to customers.  A blended workforce in the contact center provides the flexibility to be successful.

Just under two months ago, I moderated a webcast with technology and collaboration managers from firms such as Google, Morgan Stanley, Poly, Verizon and others, and asked how they were handling the transition to 100% remote working.  I was expecting the comments to be about issues with technology and other 20-20 hindsight – but surprisingly, the panelists didn’t have many complaints.  They described a generally painless and successful transition.  Now that approximately forty-five days has past, I thought it would be a good idea to check in with them again and see how they were doing.

The prior participants that were available joined me on a new webcast (which you can watch here) and continued to report that things were going well.  The collaboration tools that each firm was relying upon were holding-up well, with no major failures or issues to report.  They did, however, have some interesting insights into managing a nearly 100% remote workforce and working from home for an extended period of time.

Time to Perfect the Home Office Setup

When the stay-home orders first came out, people didn’t think they’d be home for as long as they have been (with still no end in sight).  As we approached two months of remote working, employees have started making requests to improve their home set-ups.  In some cases, this is asking that larger displays and higher-quality headsets be retrieved from their prior office workspace and sent to their homes.  In fact, some enterprises have small teams doing just that and making these available for their employees to curbside-pick-up.  In other cases, employees are realizing that they need higher quality equipment than they previously used.  When joining a meeting remotely was a once-in-a-while event, it was fine to use a tablet’s embedded camera and speaker.  However, when you are making daily presentations to colleagues and clients, the quality of your sound and images is much more critical.  Enterprise managers have been generally open to providing this essential “better than basic” gear for employees’ remote workstations.

Adjusting to Managing Fully Remote Teams

The further into the 100% remote working experiences we go, the more enterprises have realized that it is easy for most employees to be very productive from home.  However, they have also realized that the job of managing a remote workforce takes a completely different skillset than most managers have used in the past.  When you don’t bump into your employees in an office every day, you need to be good at staying in touch, being available, monitoring output, fostering communications and a few dozen other skills that many managers have never been introduced to before.  There are some excellent remote-workforce-managers in the world, so expect these skills to be highlighted, sought-after, and further developed through employer provided educational programs.

Camaraderie Will Take Some Extra Effort

All the participants reported that top-down company culture was doing just fine.  High-quality/high-reliability collaboration tools and platforms were allowing company executives to stay in touch with their teams and provide high-level direction.  Town hall events are reaching tens of thousands of individuals with great success.  However, our participants reported that the typical, daily interactions between employees around the office have been somewhat neglected.  Chats about travel, community, family and similar topics foster a sense of camaraderie between employees, and remote working will not automatically provide such opportunities.  Some enterprises have not yet taken action to replace these experiences.  It is clear that this will require specific efforts to be replaced via collaboration tools.  Enterprises that have done a better job with this issue use events like scheduled “hallway chats” amongst teams for about fifteen minutes twice a week, where video calls that explicitly don’t talk about work take place to allow for social exchanges.  Other activities such as photo galleries and/or contests (with family, outdoor views, pets, etc.) can be shared on a team chat channel.

As the pandemic moves through its various phases, we will see some employees be able to return to traditional offices, but there will likely be significant changes to prevent the spread of the virus (pre- any vaccine or treatment). This phase – “The New Normal” – will see fewer people in the office, but mostly out of fear and/or caution.  Once there is a vaccine or effective treatment and fear begins to drop away from the equation, “The Next Normal” phase will be greatly influenced by the widespread success of remote working – bring about significant changes to the model that was in use before the pandemic.  Some people will return to offices, some will now make their homes their primary workplaces, and some will mix the two.  As this future unfolds you can be assured that high quality collaboration tools will be the glue that keeps knowledge workers productive for many years to come.

During a recent webinar featuring Poly experts, Becky Yeutter (HR) and Mike West (TAC) discussed how Poly teams are now working from home, and what planning is underway for a return to the office.

As an early adopter of remote and distributed working, Poly employees have had the ability to work from home for the past 10 years, which made the transition driven by Covid-19 no sudden rush.  Are we alone in this?  Apparently not. In a survey that kick-started the webinar, over 50% of participants said that in the move to home, their service levels hadn’t missed a beat.  Only a small minority (7%) said they still had some work to do.  This is an incredibly good reflection on the call centre industry and our ability to maintain a high level of service across the biggest disruption organisations have seen.

Keeping Workers Engaged

When it comes to managing remote teams, our experts recommend looking at the emotional impact of home working on your teams and ensure they are being looked after.  First of all, over communicate. This means increasing the type and amount of team meetings (and be sure to have one on ones to ensure people can speak without their co-worker’s present). As a leader, you may need to adjust your management style to reflect a distributed and remote workforce. These actions will ensure you prevent employee burnout or disengagement – this is essential to ensure those great employees are able to keep delivering the high level of service that keeps your customers loyal.

Is WFH the New Normal?

As the poll at the start revealed, most call centres moved home without skipping a beat… so, does this mean working from home is the new normal?  Whilst it has many benefits, it can’t be the norm for everyone – many employees do not have an ergonomic space at home, there may be roles that need to be done in the office, and employees may want the social aspect of being around other people.  This is reflected in a second poll that showed approximately 33% of attendees were considering returning most of their employees to the office.  The most common approach from attendees was planning for the return of approximately half of their employees.  The experts at Poly talked through our employee-based approach for a return to the office.  Through surveys, we have identified who needs to be in the office, and which offices can support distancing and cleaning.  By bringing these together we can prioritise a safe return for employees.

For many attendees, the return to the office is not something that needs to be rushed.  A majority of 66% of employees have a timescale of 0 to 4 months – a likely timeline for many organisations will coincide with children returning to school.

The Recommendations from Our Panel

• Empower, and look after your employees – make any plans central to their health and wellbeing. These employees can now work anywhere, so their retention is essential for you to continue delivering great service.
• Make the most of your cloud systems by increasing the type and amount of team meetings, and employee communications. And, ensure your employees deliver great audio across all these systems.
• Make video a part of your daily communication with teams, so they feel better connected to their colleagues.

The transition back into the office is going to vary from place to place and will likely continue to be an emotionally changed topic for many involved.  The key here will be listening to local and federal officials as well as your employees while navigating these unprecedented conditions.

Visit Poly.com for more on remote working strategies and solutions.

Our need for human connection is integral to our well-being and livelihood — a fact that is central our mission here at Poly. More than ever before, staying connected is incredibly important. From work and personal relationships to doctor’s appointments, some of our most important connections have gone digital to keep people together — even while we’re apart. If you are looking for ways to keep in contact, read on to find creative ways to stay connected with the important people in your life.

Virtual Team Building Activities

For some, the shift to working from home hasn’t been easy. Keeping employees and coworkers connected is essential for minimizing stress and maintaining work productivity. Virtual team building activities are a great way to help employees get to know each and boost morale. Videoconferencing platforms like Zoom are a great option to host virtual team building activities. Below are some of our favorite activities for staying connected with coworkers from home.

Show-and-Tell

Some of your fondest childhood memories may include the much-anticipated show-and-tell day at school. Turns out, show-and-tell is also a fun virtual team building activity for coworkers. One way this could work is, each team member gets approximately one to two minutes to share something tangible or intangible at the beginning of the call. This can range from the cookies you baked on your lunch break to the exotic pet no one knew you had. Not only does this give insight into the lives of the people you work with, it’s also a unique way to break up the monotony of regular meetings.

Virtual Home Office Tours

Coworkers may have fun by showcasing their home office setups and any modifications they’ve made to support working from home. This is an activity that can be done by inviting team members to a virtual gathering for the purpose of connecting, sharing tips and tricks, or it can simply serve as an icebreaker at the beginning of a regular virtual meeting.

Weekly Happy Hours

Video happy hours are a great way to stay social after work hours. Whether your happy hour is dry or not, happy hours allow coworkers to spend time with each other without being in ‘work mode’. Set up the grid view on your video conference so everyone can see each other and dedicate an hour to just hanging out. Sometimes setting a topic of the week can help keep conversations flowing, such as, “what’s your favorite restaurant in town?” Or, “where will you go on vacation when you can?”

Virtual Activities for Family and Friends

We are wired for connection as human beings. Thus, missing family and friends is one of the most difficult things to deal with during quarantine, especially when it means not celebrating birthdays, graduations, and other special events together. Not being able to physically be there to support individuals through times of grief and tragedy is also very difficult. Below are several ideas that can help you to remain connected to those you care about, as well as take care of yourself and your family:

Group Meals

Poly partners with leading video conferencing platforms that are awesome for staying connected. Get your friends and family together and host a virtual happy hour, afternoon tea, dinner party or Sunday brunch. To enhance the feeling of being together, send everyone the same recipe to prepare ahead of time and eat together.

Movie Sharing

Get out the popcorn and your favorite candy for a social distancing movie night. The Netflix Party Chrome extension allows you to watch Netflix shows and movies together. TwoSeven is another movie sharing tool that enables you to share content from Amazon, Netflix, Vimeo, YouTube, and HBO Now.

Virtual Book Clubs

Oprah has a book club. Reese Witherspoon has a book club. Lots of people have book clubs. Now, however, meeting in person to discuss our favorite and not-so-favorite books is not an option. Virtual book clubs are a great way to stay connected to friends and coworkers.

Parade Drive-Bys

Families have gotten very creative in supporting each other during social distancing with different types of drive-bys. Birthday drive-by parties, where friends and family members drive-by the birthday person’s home with huge “Happy Birthday” signs, balloons, and more, to celebrate with them is one option. Drive-by baby showers and gender reveal parties are also excellent ideas.

Virtual Health Check-Ins

Keeping our communication channels open for personal and professional relationships is important, but don’t forget about yourself. Many healthcare professionals have modified how they see patients so everyone can stay safe while still receiving the appropriate care. Each service may approach things differently, so be sure to call in or email to check to see what to expect for your virtual appointment. Here are some popular ways that people are maintaining their physical and mental health during this time:

Virtual Doctor Appointments

Concerns about maintaining your health are natural at any point in time, so feeling like you or your family members can’t make it to the doctor when you need to can feel stressful. Fortunately, many doctors and clinics offer virtual doctor appointments for routine checkups and to address specific illnesses and conditions. Though not all conditions can be addressed remotely, many can. Contact your healthcare provider to find out what your options are in the event that you might need medical care or a checkup.

Virtual Mental Health Counseling

Maintaining your emotional balance and well-being can be challenging in its own right. This has been exacerbated by feelings of isolation or being stuck inside attempting to cope with work and family responsibilities all together at once. There are several virtual mental health counseling services you can research for support. You may even find the service beneficial for years to come.

As we settle into the uncertainty that encompasses us, it requires us to find creative ways to remain connected while continuing to be apart. Whether it’s for school, medical appointments, business dealings, or saying hello to family and friends, technology and creativity provide numerous options to foster a sense of closeness during this time of collective isolation. Try to make the most of what technology has to offer and have fun with putting your own spin on the ideas above!

Visit Poly.com for more on remote working strategies and solutions.