Online collaboration tools have been a lifeline for employees working remotely. Voice and video conferencing, instant messaging, chat and other tools enable workers to stay connected, share information, make decisions and serve customers.

But the rapid transition to remote work caused many organizations to implement collaboration tools in an ad hoc manner.

All businesses need a reliable communications system to connect with colleagues, customers and partners — particularly with today’s increasingly distributed and mobile workforces. That’s why unified communications solutions that enhance connections across multiple channels have become a business necessity.

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations scrambled to implement temporary adjustments to their contact center and customer service operations. As we head into Year 2 of the pandemic, it is clear that many of those changes will become permanent.

Most historians agree that The Old Admiralty Office built in London in 1726 was the first example of a dedicated office building. For nearly three centuries since, most people have thought of work as both something they do and someplace they go.

That concept has been thoroughly upended in the last 12 months.

Although remote working was hardly new in 2020, the coronavirus forced many organizations to implement remote work strategies overnight. Technology and employee preferences were taking businesses in this direction anyway. The pandemic just accelerated the process.

A recent global survey illustrates the critical need for reliable, modern communications technologies to support remote business operations during the ongoing pandemic. Nearly three-quarters of businesses surveyed by the Savanta research firm say the shift to remote work exposed shortcomings in their systems.

Organizations didn’t have much time to prepare when the pandemic forced a sudden shift to a work-from-home (WFH) model. Many employees and even IT managers had no choice but to figure it out on the fly. Given the circumstances, businesses were remarkably successful at navigating such a significant change to continue functioning.

If the COVID-19 pandemic hit 15 years ago, think about how many more thousands of small-to-midsize businesses (SMBs) would have been forced to shut down.

Technology has made it possible for many SMBs to survive the disruption caused by the pandemic.