In the wake of the pandemic, organizations around the globe were forced to evaluate nearly every facet of their business operations, including how the physical office and meeting spaces would support seamless collaboration and productivity of in-person and remote workers at scale. The shift to hybrid work environments highlighted the shortcomings and challenges of traditional audiovisual systems as companies struggled to replicate in-the-office efficiencies that employees had experienced connecting with colleagues when working from home.
Fintech, regtech and cybersecurity solutions provider, CSI prepared for the return of its employees across 11 offices. Kenny Blankenship, vice president of facilities, knew the legacy audiovisual technology in place would not support the demands of a new hybrid work environment. And it would most assuredly fail to meet the expectations of employees accustomed to seamless platforms like Zoom and Microsoft Teams. To ensure a satisfied and productive workforce, the company prioritized an AV technology migration. It sought to standardize on a more flexible and reliable platform as it prepared to re-open and welcome employees back into the office.
The Tech Challenge
Based on years of experience, Blankenship knew the traditional time-consuming, costly and difficult task of rolling out conference rooms. They needed to deploy quickly and reliably with little to no disruption to productivity. Blankenship was also searching for a flexible platform that seamlessly enabled productivity and supported a distributed workforce’s new collaboration and communication requirements. With supply chain issues, he was also struggling to find the products he needed. Blankenship turned to Wesco’s innovative Conference Room as a Service to effectively modernize meeting spaces across locations. It was unlike anything else he found from a total user experience, including equipment, monitoring portal and support services.
The Conference Room as a Service Solution
Wesco’s Conference Room as a Service, a subscription-based offering, is designed to support the comprehensive AV needs of most conference, meeting, or huddle rooms and enable seamless collaboration among employees – at home, in the office or any other remote location. Unlike legacy AV platforms, Wesco’s as-a-service offering alleviates the typical IT shortcomings and related costs of traditional equipment.
Blankenship says, “It was my top priority to identify and implement easy-to-use AV equipment across meeting rooms and conference rooms to support our distributed workforce. Wesco’s Conference Room as a Service easily checked all the boxes – flexible, secure, reliable, and easy to use – setting us up for long-term success in supporting the new requirements of in-office AV systems.”
The Conference Room Benefits
Wesco’s Conference Room as a Service uniquely keeps pace with increasingly rapid technology advances, eliminating the need for Blankenship’s team to regularly review, update or maintain existing equipment, which ensures they can stay focused on pressing facility-related needs. By relying on a service-based offering, Blankenship also avoids making significant capital investments to upgrade AV equipment helping to save the company money.
With a lean team in place, service was pivotal to the project’s success. Wesco’s 24/7, on-demand customer service – including advance replacement, remote monitoring and live support – gave Blankenship the confidence he needed to standardize CSI’s meeting spaces with Wesco as a preferred partner in this critical infrastructure upgrade.
“Tackling this project was daunting with so many priorities in play as we shifted to a hybrid work environment. We also needed certainty that the systems would work dependably since they would be supporting meeting spaces across our 11 offices,” notes Blankenship. “Wesco made sure we were up and running quickly. When we had questions, their customer support team was extraordinary – professional, responsive and resourceful – making our job much easier. Knowing we could count on them, 24/7, helped expedite the process and ensure employees had access to the tools they needed to work effectively from day one.”
By standardizing on Wesco’s Conference Room as Service, CSI is investing in a platform built for the future – flexible, reliable and secure – to ensure a productive and satisfied workforce – no matter where or how they work.
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