Time to Cut the Cord? December 7, 2011 @ 07:27 AM | By Jill Huselton

You have to be living in a cave if you aren’t aware of the growing prevalence of smartphones and mobile applications. It seems like every day there’s some new, cool device or solution that makes your life just that much easier. It is one big cycle; the more we consume these ‘conveniences’, the more they are developed, each one better than the last.

My co-worker talked about how consumer trends eventually make their way into the business world, and you can see how our dependence on mobile solutions is transferring to how we work. We’ve become so dependent on being able to communicate with our friends and family through cell phones, texting and social media that we now expect the same thing from our colleagues.

That’s why the results of a recent survey shouldn’t be that surprising. They asked 200 companies in the U.S. and 200 in the UK (IT decision-makers including CXOs, VPs and directors at enterprises of all sizes) about their plans to move to mobile-only communications and their adoption of unified communication services. Their findings showed that companies are making the move faster than expected.

• "25% of enterprise IT decision makers believe desk phones will be replaced by mobile phones within two years, and 82% of enterprises have employees currently using mobile applications for communications and collaboration,
• 44% of enterprises surveyed have at least one-quarter of their workforce operating solely using a mobile phone, and 82% of enterprises have employees using mobile apps for communications and collaboration and
• 30% of enterprises support tablets; 51% support BlackBerry devices, 40% support iPhones and 31% support Android phones."

They also found that "62% are expanding their enterprise's UC capabilities, with instant messaging, web collaboration and videoconferencing identified as the top UC services they seek to support on mobile devices over the next three years." When it comes to video conferencing, the survey showed that more U.S. companies plan to roll out video conferencing in the next year compared to UK companies (72% compared to 56%).

Are you already experiencing these trends in your business? We are finding this among our customers, not just the need to support an on-the-go workforce through mobile conferencing solutions, but also a growing demand for unified communications services. Will your company be next to cut the cord on your landline and put solutions in your hands to make you and your colleagues more accessible?

Jill Huselton is a senior marketing manager at InterCall. She's been in the conferencing industry for nearly 15 years, working in operations, account management and marketing, mainly based in Colorado. Before leaving the Mile-High City, she hiked a 14er, one of her top accomplishments. Now she's traded the mountains for the beach and works from a home office in North Carolina.