New Research Reveals Collaboration Is a Key Driver of Business Performance Around the World

New Research Reveals Collaboration Is a Key Driver of Business Performance Around the World

June 06, 2006

-- Verizon Business, Microsoft Sponsor International Study; Create First-of-Its-Kind Collaboration Index to Measure Impact of Communications Culture, Technologies

 

    BASKING RIDGE, N.J. and REDMOND, Wash., June 6
/Xinhua-PRNewswire/ -- Collaboration is a key driver of
overall performance of companies around the world. Its
impact is twice as significant as a company's
aggressiveness in pursuing new market opportunities
(strategic orientation) and five times as significant as
the external market environment (market turbulence).*

    Those are the results of a groundbreaking study --
"Meetings Around the World: The Impact of
Collaboration on Business Performance" -- conducted by
Frost & Sullivan and sponsored by Verizon Business and
Microsoft Corp. The study defines collaboration as an
interaction between culture and technology such as audio
and Web conferencing, e-mail and instant messaging, and it
created a method to specifically measure how collaboration
affects business performance.

    The study also showed that a global culture of
collaboration exists, but that there are regional
differences in how people in various countries prefer to
communicate with one another.

    "The results show that collaboration can
positively impact each of the gold standards of performance
-- profitability, profit growth and sales growth -- to
determine a company's overall performance in the
marketplace," said Jaclyn Kostner, Ph.D., best-selling
author and expert on high-performance virtual collaboration.
"As a general rule, global companies that collaborate
better, perform better. Those that collaborate less, do not
perform as well. It's just that simple." 

    The "Meetings Around the World" study
surveyed 946 information technology and line-of-business
decision-makers from a cross section of 2,000
small-to-medium, mid-market and global companies in the
United States, Europe (France, Germany and the United
Kingdom) and Asia-Pacific (Australia, Hong Kong and
Japan).** The researchers created a Collaboration Index to
measure a company's relative "collaborativeness"
based on two main factors:

    - An organization's orientation and infrastructure to
collaborate, 
      including collaborative technologies such as audio
conferencing, Web 
      conferencing and instant messaging

    - The nature and extent of collaboration that allows
people to work 
      together as well as an organization's culture and
processes that 
      encourage teamwork

    Impact Consistent Geographically and Across Key
Industries

    The study, conducted in March, found that the high
impact of collaboration on a company's overall performance
was consistent across the U.S., Europe and Asia-Pacific,
and across the six key vertical industries that were
examined: health care, government, high technology,
professional services, financial services and
manufacturing.

    "Verizon Business is already facilitating better
collaboration with advanced services like Net Conferencing
and Secure Instant Messaging," said Nancy Gofus, vice
president of product management for Verizon Business.
"We commissioned this study to keep a finger on the
pulse of the collaboration heartbeat and help ensure that
our current and future products continue to address the
expanding needs of our customers." 

    Susan Conway, a senior consultant at Microsoft, said,
"At Microsoft, our research has shown that information
workers are increasing their use of collaboration
technologies to help increase productivity and improve
business efficiencies. As adoption of collaboration
technology grows, it is crucial to provide information
workers with collaboration solutions that take the
complexity out of communication. Microsoft is providing
information workers with a unified communications
experience that breaks down the silos of communications
that exist today and brings them together into an intuitive
experience that puts people at the center." 

    A Global Culture of Collaboration Exists

    In addition to measuring the relative
"collaborativeness" of companies, "Meetings
Around the World" uncovered general, positive
attitudes about collaboration, along with specific
preferences and regional differences. For example, among
the professionals worldwide who responded:

    - An overwhelming number (9:1) see their collaborative
efforts as highly 
      productive and believe that collaboration through
communication 
      technologies provides a personal competitive
advantage, keeps them 
      informed and positions them to take advantage of new
opportunities.

    - Many like to work with teams (10:1), preferably from
home (3:1) and not 
      necessarily face-to-face.

    - A majority (5:1) feel that conferencing provides a
good alternative to 
      travel.

    - Many like to be reached wherever they are (2:1), but
not necessarily all 
      the time (9:1), which may be one of the reasons why
e-mail is preferred 
      to using the phone (3:1). 

    As for the regional differences, American professionals
were more likely to enjoy working alone, and prefer to send
e-mail rather than calling a person or leaving a voicemail
message. They are also more comfortable with audio, video
and Web conferencing technologies than people of other
regions and tend to multi-task the most when on conference
calls.

    Europeans thrive on teamwork more than their
counterparts elsewhere and prefer to interact in real time
with other people. They are more likely to feel it is
irresponsible not to answer the phone and want people to
call them back rather than leave a voicemail message.
Professionals in the Asia-Pacific region, more so than
anywhere else, want to be in touch constantly during the
workday. As a result they find the phone to be an
indispensable tool and prefer instant messaging to e-mail.


    These differences highlight an opportunity for greater
cultural understanding to improve collaborative efforts
around the world, the study said.

    "Collaboration technologies allow everyone in our
company the same level of knowledge, regardless of their
location," said David Medland-Slater, product
evangelist for Touchpaper, the global provider of software
for IT Business Management (ITBM), headquartered in the
U.K. "By leveraging such tools as Web conferencing and
schedulers, we have increased our speed to transfer
knowledge throughout the company, allowing us to better
compete world-wide." 

    Web conferencing can be a significant predictor of a
company's performance

    Of all the collaboration technologies that were
studied***, three were more commonly present in
high-performing companies than in low-performing ones: Web
conferencing, audio conferencing and meeting-scheduler
technologies. Web conferencing was cited by respondents as
the most commonly present tool. (High vs. low performance
was based on a split for companies based on their
performance index, which was derived from items measured in
the questionnaire.)

    "This study reveals a powerful new metric business
leaders can use to more successfully manage their companies
and achieve competitive advantage," said Brian Cotton,
a vice president at Frost & Sullivan. "Measuring
the quality and capability of collaboration in a given
organization presents an opportunity for management to
prioritize technology investments, encourage adoption of
new tools and open up communications lines for improved
collaboration."

    For more information about Meetings Around the World,
visit http://newscenter.verizon.com/kit/collaboration/ .

      * Collaboration, a company's strategic orientation
and market turbulence 
        were identified as three main business performance
drivers. Among 
        these, collaboration was found to have the most
significant impact.

     ** Decision makers were those individuals who held key
positions in a 
        line-of-business or in an Information Technology
department, with 
        titles such as President, Vice President, Director,
or Manager. Ratios 
        are a combination of respondents who said strongly
agree and agree 
        compared to strongly disagree and disagree.

    *** Technologies represented in the study included
email, meeting 
        scheduler, instant messaging, video conferencing,
audio conferencing, 
        web conferencing, desktop or wired PC,
mobile/wireless PC, PDA w/no 
        web access, PDA w/web access, mobile phone w/web
access, pager

    Microsoft and Outlook are either registered trademarks
or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States
and/or other countries. The names of actual companies and
products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their
respective owners

    About Verizon Business

    Verizon Business, a unit of Verizon Communications
(NYSE: VZ), is a leading provider of advanced
communications and information technology (IT) solutions to
large business and government customers worldwide. Combining
unsurpassed global network reach with advanced technology
and professional service capabilities, Verizon Business
delivers innovative and seamless business solutions to
customers around the world. For more information, visit
http://www.verizonbusiness.com .

    About Microsoft

    Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is
the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions
that help people and businesses realize their full
potential.

    About Frost & Sullivan

    Frost & Sullivan, a global growth consulting
company, has been partnering with clients to support the
development of innovative strategies for more than 40
years. The company's industry expertise integrates growth
consulting, growth partnership services and corporate
management training to identify and develop opportunities.
Frost & Sullivan serves an extensive clientele that
includes Global 1000 companies, emerging companies, and the
investment community, by providing comprehensive industry
coverage that reflects a unique global perspective and
combines ongoing analysis of markets, technologies,
econometrics, and demographics. For more information, visit
http://www.frost.com .

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SOURCE  Verizon Business