Server and storage technology company transforms how it communicates and collaborates with Microsoft 365 Business Voice

Facilitating collaboration 

Boston gradually adopted Microsoft Office 365, first implementing Exchange Online and then migrating to SharePoint Online and OneDrive before turning its attention to Microsoft Teams. “Teams met all of our needs,” says Doyle. “We were already using so many essential services within Office 365, and Teams tied it all together very elegantly.” During an initial testing phase, IT employees found themselves switching from their phones to Teams calls and chat channels. As they began to have more conversations each day, overall collaboration increased. Very early on in the testing process, employees across multiple departments became eager to gain the benefits of Teams and began requesting access.

This organic wave of interest grew swiftly, and soon Teams had become an integral part of day-to-day operations at Boston. Sales employees who used third-party software for sales pitches or dialogues with international colleagues easily switched to Teams for their calls. Employees who wanted to collaborate on documents began sharing drafts and edits through group chat. “I rarely check my email anymore,” says Doyle. “I’ve set up an auto-reply redirecting everyone to Teams. It’s just so much more effective as a communication tool.”

Newfound avenues of growth

Shortly after all this activity kicked off, Boston received notice that its PBX telephony system would soon reach end of life. A cloud version of the existing product was available, along with other traditional PBX products, but nothing seemed like the right fit for the company’s new cloud-first business model. “I knew that if we were to take any of those options, we’d be in roughly the same place that we’d always been, which is tied to our desks,” says Doyle.

Doyle wanted something that gave employees the same calling features, whether they were at their desks or on their mobile devices. He also wanted a solution that gave the company’s growing community of international employees the same capabilities that the home office enjoyed, but without the need to invest in costly infrastructure projects. “We have recently opened in China and South Africa,” continues Doyle. “In these locations, renting and outfitting office space would have made the whole venture cost-prohibitive.” Thanks to Office 365, Boston quickly gets new employees and locations up and running with Teams and Microsoft 365 Business Voice.

With Microsoft 365 Business Voice, a cloud-based phone system, Boston has business and user lines and the ability to receive calls from any phone number, all from within Microsoft Teams. This has been especially useful in the case of South Africa, where the company’s new employees conduct much of their business from their mobile devices. Boston also requested a service number in Johannesburg, created a call queue in Teams, and routed incoming calls to his employees’ mobile phones—all in just five minutes and at a cost of USD30.

“Previously, we would have had to contact a local telecommunications company, obtain a SIP number, and then route it to our UK offices, which would have to forward the calls again to our employees in South Africa,” says Doyle. “The whole process would have taken weeks to set up, at a sizeable upfront cost, while providing a lower standard of service to our customers.”