White Paper RingCentral Professional Services Implementation & Onboarding Methodology
RingCentral Professional Services Implementation & Onboarding Methodology Any technology transition can be challenging; and moving your communications system to a new platform is certainly a significant transition. It s critical that your new communications vendor has defined, comprehensive, and proven processes for implementing the new system with minimal disruption. The new vendor must also provide superior training, and ongoing post-implementation support for future systems changes, and a responsive service team for ongoing support. 2
Implementation Process Overview This document provides a detailed look at RingCentral s proven methodology for implementation and onboarding of customer accounts (starting at 100 users) and post-sale support. The experienced RingCentral team is with you every step of the way, to ensure a smooth transition with zero downtime. Introductory Meeting System Discovery Deployment Training Ongoing Support Voice of the Customer The RingCentral Zero-Downtime Implementation Process We take a multiphased approach to guiding and advising you, with multiple touch points throughout your engagement, from the time you first evaluate our solution, through in-depth consultation with our engineers to understand your unique technical situation. We work with you and your technical team, offering expert assistance. RingCentral provides complete implementation services to get the your account up and running, walking your team through the physical setup of phones and networks, and the configuration settings for your employees. Our world-class after-sales support team stays with you for the life of your account. The RingCentral implementation specialist assigned to your account holds a customer kickoff meeting with your technical team to gather detailed information about your needs, current setup, n umber of locations, and more, to tailor an implementation plan that is custom-designed to meet your specific profile, including your locations, your mobile workers, and your timeline. Rollout can be phased in, or done all at once, according to your requirements. We assist with the demanding details of the number transfer/porting process. To achieve our goal of Zero Downtime during porting, our dedicated porting team follows our proven process to ensure that the number transfer truly is seamless. RingCentral s experienced implementation team provides your IT team with the detailed information they need to prepare your network for deployment. We train your administrators on the system--and train users to manage their own settings. The RingCentral Professional Services Methodology creates a smooth process that removes unpredictability and allows us to keep your implementation schedule on track. 3
1 Introductory Meeting At the introductory meeting, we introduce your team to your RingCentral Implementation Success Team, discuss your project at a high level and set expectation as to the lifecycle of the implementation will look like, and schedule the discovery and design calls. The RingCentral Implementation Success Team is our expert, experienced team who will surround you during the implementation and afterwards to ensure that you have the smoothest transition, and are able to take full advantage of RingCentral s superior features now and in the future. The team is composed of these members: Your Implementation Advisor is here for one-on-one sessions to address your unique business environment. Your Advisor works with you to transfer existing phone numbers, connect multiple locations, add user accounts, and set up mobile users. They ll also provide training programs for your administrators and rollout programs for your entire workforce, ensuring that everyone will be able to use RingCentral Office quickly and efficiently. Your Implementation Project Manager provides project management assistance and is your main contact for any major concerns. With such a feature-rich new phone system, it s reassuring to have someone who can help re-verify your requirements and fine-tune the end-design. You can rely on your Sales Account Representative to inform you of the latest updates to your phone system, the latest innovations, and relevant programs to keep you ahead of your business needs. Your Account Executive ensures continuity of knowledge of your account from sale to implementation. Your Technical Support Representative is here to keep your phone system on track. When you have technical issues, you need answers quickly and can t waste time. It s good to be able rely on a responsive Support Representative with high SLA standards who has a deep level of product knowledge, combined with a sound understanding of your account setup. Your Technical Support Representative will provide you with timely, guided, and accurate expertise. 4
2 System Discovery The RingCentral Implementation Advisor does a comprehensive analysis of your telephony requirements, to understand your unique processes and needs, for example for call routing and for connecting remote employees. RingCentral Office is a highly adaptive and reliable system with many included features that can handle complex and fast-growing businesses. To craft your requirements into the design for your new RingCentral system that meets your precise needs and plans, we discover and document: Goals for your new phone system Current phone system current PBX and its features, types of phones, mobile phones, networks, so we can help you consolidate and simplify systems Number of current locations Current configuration and approach for connecting locations, mobile workers, and remote workers into a single integrated system Requirements for mobile and distributed employees and consultants Requirements for your auto-attendant, call groups, and call flows Network requirements Timeline and rollout approach - phased rollout or one-time deployment Craft the Design Document Analyzing data from the discovery phase, we craft and review with your team the Design document and Implementation test plan. Generate the Statement of Work We develop the Statement of Work (SOW) for your approval. The SOW defines the services and deliverables, expectations and processes, and your and our responsibilities for the implementation process. This document reduces uncertainty and your transition risk issues by providing you with a clear blueprint and road map, with clear lines of communication and expectations on both sides. Help Ensure Network Readiness To ensure the highest quality of service, the RingCentral team provides your IT department with all necessary information regarding Internet connectivity, capacity, and VoIP quality (QoS). See the RingCentral Brief Quality of Service: The role of QoS in Network Readiness and Reliability and the RingCentral Whitepaper Strategies for Delivering Reliable Call Quality in Cloud-Based Business Phone Systems. 5
3 Deployment The RingCentral implementation process addresses every aspect of a successful deployment to keep the migration on track. This is no cookie-cutter template: We customize the implementation to your specific business needs and your timeline. Here are the key steps. Establish the Transition Timeline For enterprise deployment, the transition from the old system to the new is typically done in phases, due to several factors: Larger employee population Multiple distributed locations Mobile or remote workers More complex multi-vendor contract renewals to navigate Greater complexity of number porting Greater complexity of network infrastructure, especially with multiple locations Accordingly, we consult closely with you to customize the transition timeline according to your needs and your situation. Typically, this involves working with you and your team to set up a single site and test it. Following, you are ready and able to roll out and test successive sites. In some cases, you may need to transition all your users and locations at once. If so, we work closely with your team to plan and execute accordingly. Upload User Information Now we set up your users. You provide the user names, extension numbers and names, email addresses, and E911 addresses. The RingCentral Implementation team assists in importing your list of user information into your RingCentral system. Subsequently the team will set up each user account. Set Up Auto-Receptionist and Install Mobile App We help you set up and test the auto-attendant according to your needs as well as ensure that fax communications works optimally. We show your staff where to download the RingCentral Mobile App for ios and Android to their smartphones and tablets, which will enable them to use your RingCentral system to make business calls, hold meetings, send faxes, texts and more from their personal devices. 6
Deploy Desk Phones Desk phones that you order from RingCentral arrive at your site preconfigured, ready to plug in and use. We check that the phones are live and registered. Manage Number Transfer We know that you have concerns about how the number transfer process will impact your business, so we make an extra effort to minimize delay and ensure Zero Downtime. The experts on our dedicated porting team have developed a systematic approach to porting based on our experience with over 300,000 customers. We guide you through the entire process: Number transfer has rigid paperwork requirements, so our Implementation Team provides you with our Number Transfer Checklist and instructions for your team, and collects and reviews all the necessary info for completeness and accuracy. Our Porting team reviews, packages, and sends the information as a bundle to the existing carrier, to minimize the chance of errors and inconsistencies that might delay the transfer. Meanwhile, we recommend that you forward all your existing numbers to RingCentral placeholder numbers until porting is completed. These temporary numbers are mapped to the RingCentral DIDs, so you can use your new RingCentral system and phones during the number transfer process, no matter how long it takes. The existing carrier provides us with estimated porting dates. As number transfer is completed, the ported numbers replace the forwarded numbers. This process is transparent to you and your users as well as to your own customers. The result is Zero Downtime. Your RingCentral cloud phone system is now fully deployed, tested, and operational. 7
Onboarding Overview 1 Training Once your new system is in place, you want your administrators and users to get up to speed as fast as possible so they can make the most of the feature-rich Ringcentral cloud phone system. During deployment, your RingCentral Implementation Advisor arranges for introductory training for your phone-system Admins to familiarize them with the main features of the phone system, including the online process for: Adding, moving, and deleting user accounts Organizing groups and departments Managing company greetings, screening, and hold music Call-handling and forwarding Voicemail settings Your users also receive training in managing their own systems, including their personal greetings, hold music, call forwarding, and call screening. In our experience, users welcome the chance to manage their own settings through easy-to-use Web forms from their desktop computers or even their smartphones. Your users learn about the many included communication and collaboration capabilities in RingCentral Office, such as audio conferencing, HD video meetings, business SMS, faxing, call handling, and more. 2 Voice of the Customer Program Ongoing customer feedback is critical to ensuring a world-class customer experience. After implementation, we continue to engage with you to monitor your satisfaction with your RingCentral service. In our Voice of the Customer Program, we send you a customer-experience survey three months after implementation, and then yearly Voice of the Customer surveys to ensure that RingCentral service is meeting your expectations and continuing to satisfy your business needs. These surveys help drive continuous improvement to the product. 8
Ongoing Technical Support Once your system is fully deployed, we assign you a Technical Support Representative whose job it is to keep your phone system on track. When you have technical issues, you need quick and accurate answers. You can rely on a responsive Support Representative with high SLA standards who has a deep level of product knowledge, combined with a sound understanding of your account setup. Your Technical Support Representative will provide you with timely, guided, and accurate expertise for the life of your account. Online resources: For additional detail and deep information, turn to the RingCentral Learning Center where you and your users can explore the wealth of in-depth resources available to you. You ll find: Onboarding Guides and Getting Started wizards for setting up new features. Detailed Administration Guides and User Guides. Tutorial videos that demonstrate how to get the most value out of each feature. Extensive knowledgebase of articles with feature overviews, how-to s, and cheat sheets. Easy access to contact Customer Support or log a case for technical issues. Community resources: The RingCentral Blog for tips and ideas; Forum boards for sharing experiences and learning from others; and our monthly Webinars where RingCentral Product Managers demonstrate new features. Conclusion RingCentral is experienced in onboarding enterprise customers like you, with our Zero Downtime methodology that makes the implementation process a customer success. We flex to support you whether or not you have a dedicated IT telephony staff. And RingCentral stays close to you, year after year, helping you keep your cloud phone system relevant, with our unique, world-class Customer Success after-implementation support program, delivered as an integral part of your RingCentral solution. Recommended Reading The RingCentral Customer Success Program 9
RingCentral White Paper RingCentral Professional Services Implementation Methodology About RingCentral RingCentral is the #1 cloud business phone system, with enterprise-class voice, fax, text, conferencing and HD video meetings. Intuitive to operate, RingCentral Office provides ease of management across your business, making it simple to connect distributed workforces and locations, and easily scales as your business grows. For more information, please contact a sales representative, visit http://www.ringcentral.com or call 855-774-2510. RingCentral, Inc. 1400 Fashion Island Blvd, San Mateo, CA 94404. www.ringcentral.com 2014 RingCentral, Inc. All rights reserved. RingCentral, RingCentral logo, RingCentral Office, and RingCentral Meetings are registered trademark of RingCentral, Inc. Other third party marks and logos displayed on this document are trademarks of such respective third parties. CT-2892