This blog post was written in collaboration with Poly.
Laura Marx, the author of the original blog post on Poly’s website, has worked from home for over ten years. Until the COVID-19 pandemic hit, she was the minority at Poly and was what you would call an original work from homer.
Thankfully, she was one of the lucky ones. Poly had the meeting equipment many need to maintain communication at enterprise-grade levels. Now, that’s not to say they didn’t have the same dogs barking and kids climbing the walls like everyone else, but they definitely had the tools to make WFH work.
Every day during quarantine, Laura was so thankful that she had noise-cancelling headsets and a good camera. Amidst the global crisis, however, Poly realized quickly there was a mission-critical opportunity that it was uniquely positioned to fill.
CHALLENGES OF WFH
There were two core issues to the pandemic state of WFH.
1. People didn’t have the right devices.
2.There was no way to centrally manage the devices that were being used.
It was from this backdrop that Poly developed its Poly Studio P Series of personal video devices. These devices bring together professional-grade video and audio technology with gorgeous design elements that you would want in your personal space! They are USB-connected devices, so they work with all services like gloCOM Meeting, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, etc.
The Studio P Series devices, P5, P15, and P21, work with Poly Lens, a remote management and insights platform geared to giving IT the ability to manage remote workers with the same ease and confidence as they manage conference rooms. Additionally, each of the devices can be enabled with Poly+, a software subscription that keeps the device fresh with the latest software release plus 24/7 service and extended 3-year device coverage.
The long-term value of products like Studio P Series and Poly Lens is strong. According to Metrigy, the WFH trend is almost certain to continue after the pandemic. Their research shows that 74.7% of respondents expect to be asked to WFH or will have the flexibility to choose to. Almost half (48.7%) wish to remain remote due to improved quality of life resulting from their new WFH arrangement – this includes avoiding long commutes and having a more flexible work schedule.
Workers need to “show up” in their meetings, looking and sounding their best, so collaboration doesn’t miss a beat. Low-quality cameras, inferior audio devices, poor network performance, poor lighting, and background noise disrupt productivity.
Not only do employees need to show up to their meetings to be productive, but they also need to have the proper tools to do their actual work. An appropriate unified communications solution is crucial for WFH employees. What good is beautiful lighting and camera quality if you can’t set up a virtual meeting?
gloCOM Meeting integrates seamlessly with Poly hardware. The additional features like screen share, chat, and drag and drop take video conferencing to a whole new level. The pair will ensure your virtual meetings are as productive as they are flawless.
As Irwin Lazar, President and Principal Analyst for Metrigy, explains in his latest white paper, “Video and audio conferencing are the technologies for achieving work-from-home success. This is true globally, with more than 89% of North American-based organizations viewing video as important or critical, similar to 82% of those based in Europe and 83% of Asia-Pacific-based companies.”
According to Lazar, AI-enabled devices offer audio and video quality advancements to minimize distractions and improve video quality while adding interactive elements to make video meetings more enjoyable. Poly addresses each of these excruciating pain points to enable an enjoyable, sustainable, and democratized collaboration environment.
Lazar also emphasizes the need for customers to “evaluate endpoints based on their ability to support present and future planned meeting and calling platforms” and advises they prioritize “vendor certifications and integrated management approaches.” Learn more from Metrigy and this research here.
Poly and Bicom Systems are on the same journey as the rest of the world. Let us help you and your teams to be their best selves no matter where they are working. We are committed to driving innovation across audio and video technology and lead the vanguard of next-generation meeting experiences that create independence from a location. Whether working from an office, home, or mobile, work is no longer a place; work is what you do.
Join Bicom Systems and Poly on Tuesday, April 13th, to learn more about all of our work-from-home solutions and products!
Working Remote Simplified: Bicom Systems and Poly Solutions
Tuesday, April 13th, 2021
12:00 PM USA/CA (EST): Register Here
4:00 PM EUROPE (CET): Register Here
This blog post was written in collaboration with Poly.
