Patrick Watson; Unified Comms Journalist to Analyst

Patrick Watson is a Research Analyst at Cavell Group specialising on collaboration and customer engagement. He focuses on platforms like Microsoft Teams, Cisco Webex Teams, and Slack, but also on the CPaaS side of things.

Patrick Watson is a Research Analyst at Cavell Group specialising on collaboration and customer engagement. He focuses on platforms like Microsoft Teams, Cisco Webex Teams, and Slack, but also the CPaaS side of things.

Straight off, I asked Patrick if he thought CPaaS was still as hot as it was a few years ago when it hit the Unified Comms market. He said that it is absolutely still growing.

As a technophobe myself, I asked if CPaaS was only attractive to developers and engineers. Patrick said it really isn't that anymore. Look at the angle of "what will improve the customer process?" and how do we make a difference to our technology.

As with most guests on this podcast, we agreed that the marketing of Unified Comms has been far from customer-friendly in the past. CPaaS was perhaps guilty of this too.

Career

Patrick started off at a reseller that was acquired by Chess Telecom where he specialised in networking, rather than Unified Comms.

Patrick says he was a pretty terrible salesperson hence leaving for UC Today. When I met Patrick for the first time a few years ago, he introduced himself as a failed football commentator. Rather than commentating on football, at UC Today, he commentated on happenings in the Unified Comms industry.

Today, at Cavell Group, he gets to dissect the market, thoroughly analyse the nitty-gritty, and present new findings. Cavell Group also has a good reputation for high social media and broadcast presence so I doubt it's the last time you've seen and heard commentary from Patrick.

What is Unified Comms?

Patrick says his definition of Unified Comms hasn't changed since moving from journalism to analysis roles. He says Unified Comms is a concept and a philosophy that doesn't exist yet.

It would be an interconnect of all different communication mediums. As all the different vendors come at Unified Comms from very different angles, it's difficult to present a fully unified solution. There's usually a key component missing per vendor - even with giants like Microsoft and Cisco.

As a result of this, you have silos where vendors operate. Even with high profile vendors like Salesforce, Patrick doesn't think it will be possible for one single vendor to provide full Unified Comms. It will take an amalgamation of different platforms and services to provide the solution.

I throw in the new-age question of "What about Slack?" Here, Patrick references how Microsoft Teams have replicated this style of platform and are currently trying to keep up with the number of integrations. Recognising, the integration and API element of Unified Comms is more critical than ever before, Patrick thinks every missing piece of the puzzle could be solved by the API-sation of Unified Comms.

Unified Comms Resources

Rather than calling out specific resources, Patrick is a fan of an aggregator. He says if you rely too much on a particular resource, you could swayed by them. Instead, he relies on Twitter, LinkedIn, and the Google News aggregator and Pocket for keeping up with articles on Pocket.

You can find Patrick on Twitter and LinkedIn.

For more insight into the life of a Unified Comms influencer, make sure you follow the host Dominic Kent on Twitter, subscribe to the podcast on your favourite platform, and visit www.unifiedcommsinfluencers.com

Music: bensounds.com
Voiceover: https://www.fiverr.com/jay717

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