Would you like some punch?

Since the start of this decade the cloud has been the end all and be all of IT. If you are in sales then you were trying to convince your clients to put everything including the kitchen sink into the cloud because the cloud is awesome and everyone is doing it. For those that work in IT the pressure both internally and externally has been ‘why haven’t you moved it to the cloud?’ The cloud is awesome and everyone is doing it. The cloud is safe and warm and fuzzy. It has taken some time for everyone to stop drinking the punch and come back down and see that somethings are better in the cloud but it is still better to maintain control and ownership of others.

Nowhere has the push to the cloud been felt as hard as in the voice services area. No one buys phone systems anymore. Just ask the guy selling hosted VoIP he will tell you. Vendors have a great incentive to switch you to hosted service as well. They get paid every month instead of selling you a new system every 7 to 10 years. Hosted PBX service has been going like gang busters and traditional manufacturers have suffered. Unlike the data side, IT has not stopped to consider a balanced approach to hosted versus private ownership of voice services. IT does not want to be bothered with owning expensive phone equipment that costs a significant amount to maintain and is not easily upgradable. The skill set for voice is just a bit skewed from your typical IT perspective, so good riddance.

There are many reasons why balance has not been found but it does need to be found. In key areas where voice security and availability should be at the front of decision makers thoughts, they are taking big draughts of the punch and signing up for fully hosted PBX systems. I have spoken with a managed IT service group that oversees a slew of schools in the Mid-Atlantic states and they have systematically removed phone systems and converted to fully hosted voice. Many health groups, lawyers, financial companies, local and state governments have converted to 3rd party hosted services.

Some organizations have responsibilities to their clients or the public and should not be switched to hosted 3rd party voice services. Those institutions that have privacy obligations or concerns can be assured that hosted voicemail and recorded calls are not as secure as they should be. In the case of schools, lives actually hang in the balance when no local dial tone is present. People need to stop drinking the punch and come to a common-sense approach with hosted versus premise solutions just like they have with general IT services.

Fortunately, cost-effective hybrid approaches do exist and vendors need to help their clients find them not just hand them a drink and say please sign the dotted line.