Just because the utility viewpoint has been the historical norm does not mean that it is the future reality, though. A small and growing segment of enterprises (22%) view the telecom environment as a strategic asset that can be used to drive business growth. The difference in the viewpoint of these organizations, as compared to the business enablement-focused organizations, is that they have a business acceleration relationship with telecom management and they understand that the telecom environment delivers services designed to support and drive specific business objectives.

Business acceleration is an applied practice that correlates assets within the telecom environment directly with business results. Acceleration requires a strategy to illustrate how the fixed and mobile telecom environment will be used to drive bottom-line business results; and it measures telecom environment performance against business results. To achieve status as a successful business acceleration partner, telecom management must collaborate with the business and form common goals that can be tracked and measured. If the business goals are to increase sales, reduce customer churn, and gain competitive advantage, then the telecom environment can streamline sales communications, improve customer experience interactions and enable a global workforce with a singular market presence, respectively.

Identifying and measuring the effect of business communications enabled by the telecom environment against business results solidifies telecom as a business accelerator; when this relationships is accepted, telecom will no longer be viewed as a simple business utility.

Timothy C. Colwell is a telecom management industry thought leader