Strategic Alliances and Integrations Enable Comprehensive Calling, Meetings, and Messaging Capabilities
- Video conferencing is becoming more important as a business tool as people work from more locations. Use video conferencing to bring people together, face-to-face, no matter where they are or what device they use. Collaboration solutions from Cisco provide video conferencing on any device, for any team.
- Team messaging that keeps working moving beyond the meeting. With Webex, you get more than just a video conferencing solution. You get a full featured messaging platform to keep your team connected and your work moving even after the meeting ends. One-on-one and group messaging lets you quickly chat with the people you work with every day.
- We have detected the following need: Interoperability between MS Teams users and CISCO Call Manager users, that is, an MS Teams user can talk to a Cisco CallManager user and vice versa, and also an MS Teams user can make / receive calls to / from abroad.
In my role as a product manager here at Cisco, I regularly talk to customers about their collaboration environments. One question I get asked is what they can do to bring together collaboration tools from different vendors…
Cisco meets this demand with client-based integration with Microsoft Teams. The simple-to-deploy client/plug-in integration with Microsoft Teams works with your choice of Cisco clients — Cisco Jabber, Webex Calling, and Webex Meetings. The Cisco Webex Calling Integrated Experience with Microsoft Teams For Microsoft Teams Users— Easily make calls with Microsoft Teams Call using a dial pad or turn a chat conversation into a call using Microsoft Teams for Windows, Mac, Android, iPhone, iPad or Web browser.
The Webex unified app is providing our customers with comprehensive calling, meetings, and messaging capabilities that integrate with our award-winning video devices and IP phones. The result is seamless and consistent workflows.
But we are also aware that many customers have existing investments in place with collaboration tools from other vendors, and we are committed to making sure that Webex is an open platform, that integrates with 3rd party applications to ensure our mutual customers have a solution that delivers the best possible outcomes.
Earlier this year one of my colleagues talked about how we are enabling organizations with Microsoft Teams and Slack messaging users to start Webex Meetings from these applications.
Now, new Cisco calling integrations allow you to use all your enterprise-grade voice and video calling features in combination with these messaging platforms.
Cisco Calling Integrations
Calling integrations allow you to expose Cisco calling buttons directly in other vendors messaging apps. We’ve built the Cisco calling integrations to provide you with flexible solutions plus we’ve made them very easy to deploy. We started with Microsoft Teams and Slack messaging apps. To deploy a Cisco calling integration you simply select the Cisco client you are using for calling and the calling platform you want to use.
When you have added the Cisco calling integration, you can launch a Webex Teams or Cisco Jabber call directly from your messaging app. When you click the call button, the integrations identify who you’re chatting with, resolves their calling address, and passes this information to your installed Cisco client which starts a Cisco voice or video call. The integrations support all Cisco calling platforms including Cisco Unified Communication Manager (UCM) based on-premises and hosted deployments, and Webex Calling for cloud.
There are no complex back end changes to make as these are client integrations. There are no call routing policies or dial plan changes to make, no additional licenses required, and no new hardware to manage. You can even use the calling integrations with desk phone control, which means your users don’t have to replace their handsets.
Cisco Calling from Slack
Slack has made its messaging platform very open to integrating calling providers like Cisco. Adding the Cisco calling integration to Slack means you use the native Slack call button to start a Cisco call directly from Slack.
This could be using Webex Teams or Cisco Jabber as your softphone or controlling your desk phone. If your Cisco client is controlling your Cisco desk phone clicking the call button in Slack causes your Cisco desk phone to go off-hook and call your colleague.
Slack is popular with developers where users tend to like keyboard commands to take actions like making calls. Talking to Slack users it becomes clear this is a requirement for Slack users so we implement “/jabber” and “/webexteams” slash command allowing you to make calls at the command line.
We are continuing to work in partnership with Slack and plan to implement Slack’s new shortcut controls shortly. This will give you more calling destination selectable directly in Slack.
Cisco Calling from Microsoft Teams
The Cisco calling integration for Microsoft Teams has been available from the Microsoft Teams app store for just over a month now. This month we have extended it with new features and functionality. In addition to supporting Microsoft Teams desktop and web users, this month we added support for mobile and tablet devices. We also added new contact search capabilities, you can now search your Microsoft 365 Outlook contacts and call them using your Cisco calling platform via the integration. Memory for mac mini 2012.
Building Bridges with Webex
Cisco Teams Client
These two new calling integrations are just examples of the many integrations that the Webex platform supports, enabling people to enhance their communication and collaboration within their everyday workflows. For example, we’ve also worked with Microsoft to integrate Microsoft SharePoint and OneDrive Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions into Webex team messaging services to streamline collaboration on documents.
What Next…
If you’re interested in learning more about Cisco calling integration contact your Cisco account team to discuss how to build on your current Cisco UC investments with Webex to enhance the collaboration experience for your users and/or integrate with 3rd party collaboration tools.
Read More
The Secret to Team Collaboration is Individuality
How do you use Webex Teams? The beauty of collaboration software is that it not only connects people, but allows us to work together effectively regardless of where we are in the world. What I love most about Webex Teams is getting to collaborate with my colleagues while still maintaining the ability to express my individuality. So, here are a few tips and tricks that show exactly how I do that.
Let’s Get Started
First up, how I set up Webex Teams for myself:
When I turn on my computer, I have configured Webex Teams to automatically start up – this saves me time and means I can easily see how many notifications I have. One of my favourite things about Webex Teams is that I get to decide which notifications I receive.
By going to my settings tab on windows or my preferences on Mac I can decide exactly how I want to be notified.
Spaces
Cisco Teamspace
For spaces, I prefer notifications for @mentions only, while for scheduled meetings, I like to be notified 5 minutes beforehand. For direct calls I always have my notifications on and the fact that I can choose my own ringtones for calls and messages is something I find really useful.
Personal Status
Another great feature in Webex Teams is being able to set my personal status and view my colleagues statuses. Time is precious and we all want to get the most out of our working day so, whether I am available, in a meeting, on a call, presenting or would prefer not to be disturbed my colleagues can see this and know when is best to contact me.See People’s Status in Cisco Webex Teams
Let’s Get Organized
Back to the settings tab this time!
Being able to choose which theme I want my app to use really gives me control over my experience using Webex Teams, it allows me decide how I want the application to look which helps me work better.
Cisco Teamspace
Space List
When it comes to my space list, I like to have control over this too – very quickly my spaces can seem to get lost in a sea of incoming messages so it’s really useful to be able to star my favourite spaces and then see them appear at the top of my space list. This is done with a simple configuration step in my appearance settings tab. Now I know the spaces I find most important will always live at the top of my space list and I can prioritise reading and responding to these spaces first.
Calendar Synched with Webex Teams
Cisco Teams Cvi
Another great way to keep organised within the app is to ensure that I have my calendar synced with Webex Teams. If the app is active it connects to my calendar to show my contacts status in the app and gives me a clear view of what meetings I have to attend that day. When I want to schedule a meeting I simply navigate to the relevant space, from there the activity menu allows me to easily create a meeting invite for everyone in that space. By creating my meetings this way I also have a place to store files, whiteboards and any other useful information discussed or created in that meeting. Moreover is becomes a place where the conversation can continue, even after the meeting has ended.
Edit Mistakes and Increase Productivity
Have you ever been in that situation where you’ve typed your message and pressed enter only to spot a few niggly typos, thankfully you don’t have to stress over this anymore as the app now includes complete message editing capabilities. If I want to follow up on a specific message in a space I’ll start a thread to keep the related content in one place, or I’ll use the quote feature so my colleagues can clearly see exactly what message I am referring to.
When I need to follow up on a message I’ll flag it, I can then revisit this message any time from my flags filter, this way I don’t lose track of important messages – this boosts my productivity and ensures I don’t lose track of any important information. When I see something interesting posted in a space I make a point of forwarding it on to my colleagues that would also be interested.
So why not give it a go? Let us know in the comments below what tricks you use to make Webex Teams work for you.
Learn More
Comments are closed.