Gavin Hill

Information sharing via social networks will soon outpace that of search engines, as users have more trust in their contacts for information.

This is according to Gavin Hill, Dimension Data business development manager for unified communications, who spoke during the ITWeb Unified Communications event held in Bryanston, Johannesburg.

“Today, users have more trust in their social network contacts and want their friends to make recommendations to them,” said Hill.

Hill pointed out the consumption of information is changing, from finding a job, sourcing business skills to finding a restaurant in a suburb. He said that it’s no longer just teenagers that are using social networks, but businesses as well.

“Organisations are using social collaboration tools to break down distance and latency in communications. These tools are also being used to manage unstructured data and rich media to create a corporate memory that’s searchable and can be indexed.”

Businesses which are under pressure need to change the way they deliver services within the organisation and to customers, Hill said. He advises organisations to use presence technologies and share information across the organisation via a social collaboration platform in order to boost productivity and communication.

However, he noted that security will need to change in order to deploy UC.

“Unified communications is about breaking down borders. However, we no longer have the luxury to view security as a closed walled garden.

“Security needs to be embedded into the application, data and services that support the organisation. Security needs to become a built-in strategy rather than a build-around.”