As I’ve noted before, the real value of unified communications is in reducing human latency, enabling an organization to react faster to change, opportunity or challenge. By integrating presence among a variety of real-time and non-real time applications into a common view, UC allows individuals to quickly locate available subject matter experts, see their immediate availability, join them to a call, communicate via instant messaging, or convene an on-demand Web conference.
As I discussed last week, Nemertes defines this capability as “just-in-time-fetch-the-expert.” As organizations struggle to develop ROI for UC, we find that using the just-in-time-fetch-the-expert approach leads to tangible, and more importantly, measurable, benefits such as increased sales, increased customer retention, and increased contact center throughout. Those companies that are able to quickly locate the right resource for the right opportunity gain competitive advantage over those who when faced with a make-or-break moment in a sale are forced to “take a message and call back.”
But how does one determine who qualifies as a subject matter expert? That’s where Web 2.0 tools such as social computing, tagging and collaborative workspaces come in. Organizations can leverage these tools to identify subject matter experts based on criteria such as group membership, social tagging, or by tracking who others go to for advice.
The great thing about Web 2.0 — as opposed to old-school knowledge management tools — is that it’s self-organizing. There’s no need for an administrator to track and enter data. By using Web 2.0 tools to enable your employees to tag each other, or by tracking who provided advice that enabled closing a sale or trouble ticket for a particular subject area, you can begin to gain insight into both the individual and collective knowledge within your organization.
Couple Web 2.0’s ability to enable an organization to understand who are the “go-to” subject matter experts for a particular area with unified communications and your users can not only find the right resource, but quickly determine availability to assist in a “just-in-time” opportunity.
