: Denphone Digest :: May 2009 :: Volume 1, Number 5 :

Business Contingency Planning Special Issue

In this issue of Denphone Digest we take a look at what companies can do to prepare for extra-ordinary events such as earthquakes, data loss, epidemics etcetera. Denphone offers a wide range of IT services that complement our Voice over IP telephony and conferencing services - and BCP is one area we have a wealth of experience with.

Why BCP? In 2001, Denphone was asked to create a BCP telephony solution, and that combined with Denphone founders Huw Williams and Louis Leclerc's background in the finance industry put Denphone in a unique position to leverage that experience.

BCP is not just for the JP Morgans and Goldmans of this world - Lenovo's Inside the Box blog had this to say about the effect of data loss:

If you're a smallish business, (below 250 seats) you probably don't have an offsite backup strategy. According to the National Archives & Records Administration in Washington, D.C., 93% of companies that lost their data center for 10 days or more due to a disaster filed for bankruptcy within one year of the disaster. Of those companies, 50% filed for bankruptcy immediately. A Price Waterhouse Coopers survey calculated that a single incident of data loss costs businesses an average of $10,000.

This facet of business planning is known as Business Contingency Planning or BCP. At Denphone we have a range of solutions to help plan for such eventualities including our 24/7 Voice Blast messaging system. The Voice Blast system was initially specifically designed for Japan and Japanese infrastructure. Recently it has been deployed at a number of sites globally.

On staff we also have Gary Binda who was responsible for BCP at Morgan Stanley for 6 years, including during the September 11 crisis, and in this issue we have a feature article from Gary introducing BCP.

As ever, if you would like to see something featured in Denphone Digest, feel free to contact us and we will see what we can do for you.

If you are having trouble reading this email version, click to read the web version: http://www.denphone.com/denphone-digest-may-2009.

In this issue:

• Presidents Corner - Huw Williams
• An Introduction to Business Contingency Planning (BCP)
  - Interview with Gary Binda
• Featured product: Denphone Voice Blast and Remote Worker Solutions
• Around the internet
• Denphone News - Nikkei Communications Seminar & Monthly VoIP Lounge

Presidents Corner

The recent global outbreak of swine influenza highlights the need for preparedness on the part of organizations both large and small. At Denphone we have a wealth of experience helping companies find solutions that enable an organization to deal with, and come out on top of, a wide range of extraordinary business scenarios. I hope you find Business Contingency Planning interview with Gary Binda useful and informative. If you wish to discuss telephony related or more general business process contingency planning, give us a call on 03-4550-1405 to discuss your needs. Alternatively, you can reply to this magazine and we will be in touch with you soon.

Huw R. Williams

President

Denphone K.K.

An Introduction to Business Contingency Planning (BCP)
- Interview with Gary Binda

Simon Gibson

Denphone's Simon Gibson spoke recently with Gary Binda about the work he has done in the field of Business Contingency Planning (BCP). Gary has also worked for many years in the telecom industry and joined Denphone to help kickstart Denphone's Nortel PBX support service.

With the recent outbreak of Swine Influenza, many businesses have been given cause to rethink their contingency plans, so we thought it would be helpful to give an in-depth overview of Business Contingency Planning with a focus on Japan and companies in Japan, and including a look at BCP for small and medium size enterprises. Many companies run their BCP operations out of Hong Kong or Singapore, however there are Japanese-specific factors which also need to be looked at.

Simon: First of all, could you tell us a little about your experience with BCP?

Gary: Well, I started out in BCP with Morgan Stanley in 2000 just prior to 9/11. This was the period when BCP started to raise its head in the banking industry, and Morgan Stanley was one of the first to seriously take on BCP in Japan as part of their overall risk management program. As far as I am aware, they implemented the first fully-blown disaster recovery site in Japan.

At that time BCP was quite haphazardly managed throughout Asia, and working in BCP meant taking up what was basically a completely new role within the organization.

Simon: Can you give us a short overview of what BCP means for an organization?

Gary: There are two main thought process or strategies when considering BCP - namely "Guardianship" and "Going Concern".

Firstly, let me define what these are. A Guardianship strategy allows any company during a disaster to close their position, manage their risk and meet any regulatory obligations they might have. This means that they would need to understand and agree before-hand how they would want to recover the business.

A going concern strategy generally focuses on recovery and maintaining certain level of services to clients and getting the organization back on track after an emergency.

For a company such as Morgan Stanley, the benefits of a soundly implemented BCP plan were easily recognizable. It allowed Morgan Stanley to reassure their employees that they would be safe and their clients that they would be able to recover from a disaster - when you are asking any company to manage your assets, you really want to be assured that your assets are safe. It is therefore very important for any organization, both big and small, to understand that it takes years to build a reputation but seconds to loose it.

Click here to read the complete An Introduction to Business Contingency Planning (BCP) interview.

Featured products: Denphone Voice Blast and Remote Worker Solutions

Voice Blast and Email Blast Service

In the event of an emergency it is esssential to have a system in place that allows you to contact all of your staff, and all of the necessary stakeholders to make sure you are able to manage the situation as effectively as possible. Automating tasks such as calling key people (both onshore and offshore) makes a great deal of sense. If you are looking for a way to send voice messages to your staff or clients, for example in an earthquake, or during a fire, then Denphone's Voiceblast system is the solution for you.

Voice Blast Overview Diagram

Denphone operates a 24 hour global voiceblast system that you can use to deliver automated telephone voice messages to your clients either interactively via interactive voicedrop / conferencing, or automatically, reliably around Asia and the world at very competitive pricing.

Voice Blast Workflow Diagram

The system has a full web interface and can be integrated to function with your internal client databases and corporate systems for a complete streamlined client management solution. The system is multilingual and is also integrated with our Email Blast and Web based systems, enabling you to efficiently handle all of your client services needs in real time.

Custom Voice Distribution Solutions

Denphone provides voice solutions via the Denphone Genie line of voice and email blast systems. Genie 3000 is a web based, Internet connected, automated systems that can deliver voice blast messaging over conventional phone lines as well as VOIP (Voice Over IP) telephone circuits.

Genie is also capable of interactive blasting / conferencing, automated attendant voice menus, automated call distribution, messaging / voicemail and many other advanced telephony services in both Japanese and English. Genie 3000 is also able to manage database driven automated email distribution to your clients, all from the control of an easy to use web interface.

Remote Worker

In the case of an epidemic driven disaster we recommend the D
enphone PBX range. These allow employees to work from locations such as their homes. Denphone PBX system's offer support for remote workers that is inexpensive while being easy to set-up, flexible and easy to manage.

For example, a remote worker can use a laptop and a softphone to connect over the internet to Denphone's hosted PBX system and call using a Tokyo 03 number, or an Osaka 06 number. The person receiving the call will see that Tokyo or Osaka number and then be able to call the remote worker back. This is the case if the remote worker is in Hokkaido or in Okinawa - the call is sent over the internte to one of Denphone's data centers. It even works if the remote worker is outside of Japan (for example in London or San Francisco).

When the laptop is switched off, calls can be sent to voice mail or to another phone number - and this can be managed by the end user. If the call is sent to voice mail, it can be forwarded to an email address as well as be archived for easy web-based management of messages at a later date.

It is also possible to set up calling so that it functions very much like a normal office system, with call transfer and voice mail.

Around the Internet

10 Tips for Integrated Voice Response System Success

There is an interesting article by Ifbyphone's Adam giving 10 helpful tips for effective IVR systems. IVR systems are used by companies to reduce pressure on the people answering phones, allowing customers quick access to commonly asked questions. This saves money for companies by freeing up staff for other tasks.

Following is the beginning of Adam's article. A link to the complete article follows the excerpt.

10 Tips for IVR Success

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 by Adam

Creating an IVR (Interactive Voice Response) can be as simple as recording a few prompts, telling a customer to press one or two, and routing the caller to an operator at the end of the call. But to create an effective, seamless, and confusion-free IVR that allows you to use a computer where a live person once was needed requires more thought and planning. It doesn't need to be a painful process, but careful outlining of what you want to do and, more importantly, what you want a customer to do will ensure an IVR that is not just another component to your business but an essential feature of your business's communication structure.

So, you want to create an IVR to expedite telephone product sales, manage a customer service department, or develop a phone directory for a 100-employee company (or a 5-employee company). Now what?

1. A good IVR is short and to the point -- no unnecessary questions or prompts. The first thing you need to do is think about what the most important pieces of information are that you want to deliver to your customers or that you need from them. A good way to manage this process is to think about the five most important prompts or questions you want to play for or ask of your customers, and begin there. Then, as time goes and as you continue to watch how the IVR is working for you, you can add or remove those prompts and questions that do not add to the overall quality of the IVR. Less is more. Start with a few prompts and build as your employees or customers get more comfortable with it.
2. Create an effective opening prompt. Be brief, concise, and polite -- watch out for 30-second introductions or too many multi-syllabic words, and make sure you appear grateful that the employee or customer is calling in to your IVR.
3. Have the system refer to itself as "I" Customers prefer to hear a first-person IVR rather than a generic "system."
4. If you have an IVR that is longer than four prompts, let a caller know what they can expect from the system immediately. Customers don't like it when they can't see the end of the tunnel. Either have the IVR share how many questions and which they are answering or provide some glimpse of the number of questions or time it will take to complete the IVR in your introduction.

You can read the original article via Google here: http://public.ifbyphone.com/blog/10-tips-ivr-success. Denphone offers customized IVR systems in English, Japanese, Chinese and a number of other languages for customers here in Japan. These systems can be hosted IP-Centrix style systems or CPE based systems.

Denphone News

Nikkei Communications: Telephone Cost Reduction in the Cloud Computing Era Seminar.

Japanese IT publisher Nikkei Communications will host a half day seminar on the 29th of May looking at the ways in which VoIP based telephony systems can help companies cut costs in these harsh economic times.

There will be five sessions, including a session led by Mr. Nakamura from Odate City Hall in Akita. He will discuss his experiences implementing a 500 phone Asterisk based IP phone system for the city offices. This project came in at a cost of only 8.2 million yen and allowed yearly call cost savings of 4.5 million yen for the city.

Other seminars include Oki Networks' Mr. Marui who will talk about recent changes in voice infrastructure for office users, and American Enotech Consulting's Ms. Michi Kaifu (http://hogacentral.blogs.com/japan_tech_blog/) who will be talking about recent developments in cloud telephony, including Google Voice.

All sessions will be in Japanese only, but this will be a good chance to meet telephony industry leaders and find out what is happening on the ground in Japan.

The event will be held the the Aoyama Diamond Hall (http://www.diamondhall.co.jp/access/index.html (Japanese language only).) The seminar will be held on May 29th 2009, and will open at 12:30 with opening comments by Mr. Matsumoto of Nikkei Communications at 1pm. The seminar will end at 5:40pm. Attendance is 27,800 yen for normal guests (this includes 24 issues of the Nikkei Communications magazine), or 14,8000 yen for Nikkei Communications subscribers.

For more information (Japanese only) please see http://coin.nikkeibp.co.jp/coin/ncc/semi/0905/.

Following the end of the seminar, Mr Nakamura from Odate City Hall will be visiting a special VoIP lounge which will be held at Cafe Lolita in Azabujaban from 7pm.

VoIP & Asterisk Lounge May 14th, 2009

The next VoIP & Asterisk Lounge will be held Thursday, May 14th, from 6pm at Cafe Lolita in Azabujuban, Tokyo. This monthly event is a great chance to meet and network with other Asterisk and VoIP users and developers in the Tokyo region.

• Cost: Free Entrance (drinks are between 500 and 900yen)
• Directions: From Azabujuban Station Exit 7 (Oedo or Namboku Lines),turn right and walk 2 minutes towards Roppongi Hills.
• Alternatively, exit at Roppongi station and walk down the hill towards Azabujuban (10 minute walk). Turn left when you get to Tsutaya. Cafe Lolita is on your left.

We look forward to seeing you there!

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About Denphone

Denphone K.K. is Japan's leading provider of open PC based VOIP Telephone PBX systems. Denphone supplies Digium / Asterisk solutions, Cisco, Polycom, Nortel, snom and Grandstream phone and video systems as well as our own bespoke solutions.

Contact Denphone

Denphone is centrally located in Tokyo's Minato Ward in Azabujuban. We can be contacted by telephone on 03-4550-1405, via this contact page or by reply to the address this magazine was sent from. Alternatively, you can Skype Denphone.

Our postal address is: #402 Azabu Nagasaka Bd, 1-4-8 Azabujuban, Minato-ku, Tokyo 106-0045 Japan.