<p>No, we're not talking about a new beer, we're talking about the world of Unified Communications and Managed Services. As we look at trends in communications, we continue to see the importance of blending together systems, applications and capabilities in a way that delivers the optimal experience with the least amount of risk. By definition, collaborative systems are going to cross manufacturers, vendors and departments. A good IT operations team understands the needs of the entire enterprise, and is able to provide resources that seamlessly deliver services where and when they are needed not unlike a good mixologist who needs to understand his variety of ingredient choices, mixing options and the pallet of his clients.</p><p>In our final video postcard within our communication trends series (Unified Communications, Managed Services &amp; Outsourcing Facilitates Alignment), our experts discuss how unified communications, managed services and outsourcing can facilitate alignment between IT and business units. This is really about IT organizations getting in touch with the needs of the lines of business that they support and taking a serious look at their own capabilities.</p><p>Let's say for example, a company's training department implements a video-on-demand training capability. That sounds like a very cool and easy way for subscribers/users within the network to log on and be trained by a video on new solutions, sales campaigns, tactics, etc. Unfortunately, the real underlying responsibility falls on the shoulders of the IT department which needs to ensure that by introducing this streaming video capability into the environment it doesn't impact the quality of service (QoS) across the overall network. It's all too common that one group's great idea can become a potential "great headache" for IT.</p><p>Additionally, customer-care staffs need to have a holistic picture across the entire customer-interaction experience. They need to be able to take actions based upon accurate data by having access to data feeds and reports on an as-needed basis. In today's multi-modal world, the customer experience spans interactions across social media, email, video chat, and of course, mobile phones.</p><p><a href="http://www.billingworld.com/blogs/avaya/2012/10/great-taste-less-filling-less-risk-uc-and-managed.aspx">Keep reading...</a></p><p>Read also:</p><p><a href="http://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/101112-avaya-communications-outsourcing-263257.html?hpg1=bn">Avaya doubling down on communications outsourcing</a> (Network World)</p><p>Explore: <a href="http://news.google.com/news/more?ncl=doQTvs48ifgy_GM2PjtXN04QpuqhM&ned=us">6 additional articles.</a></p>