Make a Confident Jump from Legacy Contact Center Infrastructure

On a gorgeous summer day with friends, my secret dream of skydiving became a reality. After the jump, the instructor suggested I get certified—and my adrenaline high and practical considerations had a midair collision. A single jump strapped to an instructor was one thing. But getting certified for a solo jump was something else entirely. It seemed impossible. Not only was there the obvious personal risk, disruption to my routine, cost and lengthy certification cycle, but also the complexity of what I would have to do on those jumps while falling at terminal velocity.

The instructor explained that there was a proven process to move forward at my own pace. And there were flexible options so I could choose the best certification path for me: static line or Advanced Free Fall. They’d also provide assessments, training and expert guidance throughout the whole process and post-certification. It didn’t have to be complicated or scary; we would create a vision of the outcome I desired, follow a customized plan and enjoy the results. And he suggested, with a twinkle in his eye, that the value I would receive would far outweigh the costs.

Migrating Your Legacy Contact Center

You also might be facing a seemingly impossible, high-risk project, such as migrating your contact center off older technology and onto a modern platform. Perhaps you’re moving it to the cloud. While there are always degrees of inherent risk in any change, even savvy IT execs can underestimate the risk of staying on their current contact center infrastructure.

In a recent Genesys webinar, Economic Impact Analysis: Are Disparate Contact Center Systems Holding You Back, Yet Costing You More, 25 percent of audience respondents indicated that 25-50 percent of their of current systems were at end of support.

Unsupported releases open companies up to a minefield of security vulnerabilities, compliance and incompatibility issues, poor performance and reliability, and high operating costs. And there are other hidden risks:

  • Eroding competitive advantage. In an era in which customer experience is the differentiator for companies, those on older technology can’t avail themselves of the latest innovations—like artificial intelligence (AI)—for exceptional customer experiences. Competitors will pass them by.
  • Undercutting employee retention strategies. Aging technology means agents are tied to older and less intuitive user interfaces, siloed systems, and a lack of contextual data for any level of personalization. They simply can’t match customer expectations—and that leads to burnout and attrition as well as additional acquisition and training costs. IT staff can become frustrated when dealing with aging systems and may look for new opportunities to build high-demand skills with cutting-edge technologies.
  • Stifling innovation. The newest third-party applications, whether CRM systems, workforce management or AI-based apps, all are optimized for modern infrastructures. Companies tied to aging systems can’t create the innovative experiences that consumers and employees expect.

IT organizations often face tremendous pressure to “make a move” to avoid any or all issues. But there are significant risks you must address when choosing the best path forward. If done properly, new platforms have the power to be incredible enablers—for the business and for individuals.

Join guest speaker Art Schoeller, Vice President and Principal Analyst at Forrester Research, and Fernando Egea, Vice President Strategic Solutions, Genesys, live on June 20th, for our expert forum, Choosing the best path for transforming a legacy contact center. We’ll present proven strategies to uncover and minimize hidden technology risks as well as critical considerations for evaluating the best way forward.

As for skydiving, taking on a project that was in a totally unfamiliar territory—but knowing I had a team behind me who had “been there, done that” successfully hundreds of times—gave me the confidence to move forward. And although the skydiving was amazing, it became the enabler for so much more, including confidence to pursue professional, educational and even personal opportunities I never considered before. I became better at embracing and navigating risk and change, and the value over time has been far more than I could have ever imagined.

Now that you know it’s time to make the jump, register for the webinar to learn the best path forward for your business.

Share: