The shift to remote work has given many managers and employees their first experience of video conferencing. But while the technology was adopted quickly by companies out of necessity, there have been growing concerns about security and best practices. Fortunately, there are many options available to find the right fit.
“A trustworthy technology partner is paramount to protecting the integrity of businesses, employees and customers,” said a spokesperson for Cisco, the technology conglomerate. “Nowadays, we are letting a video conference system into our homes in order to work, learn and communicate. There is a need to make sure that whatever we bring into our home environment is safe.”
For instance, Cisco’s video conferencing software, WebEx, uses the company’s signature security design protocol in order to maintain standards. Cisco’s Secure Development Lifecycle (CSDL) includes a privacy impact assessment, to ensure it is suitable for important conversations, both professional and personal.
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The question of security has become increasingly critical now that in-person conversations are impossible, particularly for high-stakes business decisions. But experts note that many employees are also using these corporate tools for their recreational affairs, from worship services to social calls. The service that managers choose therefore has larger applications than just internal affairs.
Experts recommend that the focus for managers should be on finding an intuitive tool for staff that prioritizes security but also integrates into other platforms.
There are a number of technology platforms now offering a video conferencing solution, whether it’s Adobe Connect from Adobe or Amazon Chime from Amazon Web Services. However, Microsoft, creator of Skype for Business, anticipated the need for companies to have a comprehensive digital suite for all company activity. It has been slowly migrating its corporate technologies into its Teams solution, with Skype for Business retiring next summer.
“Apps like Slack, Zoom and Dropbox have all done great things, in chat, meetings and document storage respectively,” said a Microsoft spokesperson. “But we believe the future of work will not be transformed by a single workload. Teams uniquely brings together all collaboration experiences into a single, integrated, secure experience.”
Microsoft Teams provides access to chat, meetings, calls, documents and third-party applications within one platform.
This “completeness of solution” is also replicated within Cisco’s WebEx platform, following its redesign two years ago into a more-comprehensive and user-friendly suite of tools.
Both companies emphasize the importance of investing in a long-term solution, with applications that will prove useful for many years to come. While the pandemic has created a new environment for work, there is industry consensus that the adoption of these technological developments has only been accelerated, and businesses should be preparing for a more permanent shift toward digital communication and choose their provider accordingly.
“You need something that’s simple to use, that has security at its foundation and that provides a breadth of integrated collaboration experiences. A patchwork of unrelated tools will prove problematic over time,” said the Cisco spokesperson.
