Dallas Law Firm Cuts Commuting Time and Overhead with Avaya Collaboration Technology

Because you don’t go anywhere in Dallas-Ft. Worth without hopping in the car, you don’t plan anything without considering the potential for being caught in a traffic jam.  That’s forcing companies to look for innovative ways to use collaboration technology to get around the rush hour commute. Right now, Dallas is trying hard to relieve its chronic traffic congestion. It is spending billions to reconfigure roadways, add more light rail, increase the number of managed toll lanes and more.

If these plans go through—always iffy given the billions of tax dollars involved—commuters should see a difference in the next three to five years. But for many, that’s not soon enough and they are starting to look for ways to ease the commuting burden right now.

Avaya recently did a short video profile of one of these companies: Scott & Scott, LLP, an intellectual property and technology law firm. For years Scott & Scott was located on one of the top floors of the Chase Tower in downtown Dallas. Given the highly collaborative nature of a legal practice, it’s always been a given that people need to be working together in an office. But with some employees spending as much as three hours a day commuting, Scott & Scott decided to rethink that approach.

Scott & Scott relocated 25 miles northwest of Dallas to Southlake, cut the office size down to 2,200 sq. ft. (it was 17,000 sq. ft.)  and directed employees to work from home two days a week.

How do you make it easy for people to work together when they are miles apart? Scott & Scott did it by adding Power User software and the Avaya one-X portal to its existing Avaya IP office communications solution. As a result, employees have one-number reachability, presence, conference calling capabilities, access to a fax, etc. from any communications device. They can be working at home, on their mobile or even in the office and they are reachable and they know who else is reachable as well. In the video, you see members of the firm working in home offices, in the kitchen, at poolside, traveling, at the courthouse, etc., and managing all their calls either via a laptop or a mobile.

Reducing office space helped Scott & Scott lower overhead costs by one-third.  The firm also calculated the annual savings in commuting costs at nearly $60,000 a year, plus a reduction of nearly 40 tons of pollutants.  Check out their success story (video) athttp://www.avaya.com/usa/portfolios/small-business