Working away from the office is great in theory, but in practice it means noisy hotel lobbies, crowded restaurants and outdoor public places. Even home can be too noisy thanks to family life – especially when taking a call. That’s why the new Plantronics Voyager (R) PRO UC Bluetooth (R) headset, featuring advanced noise cancelling technology, is a genuine advance.
Despite a relaxing and blurring of work-life boundaries, most professionals who rely on high-fidelity communication often struggle to get work done effectively, especially when acoustics are poor.
Plantronics’ EMEA managing director Philip Vanhoutte says the excitement about the Voyager PRO UC is due to its WindSmart (R) technology. “Imagine you’re outside taking a call on a windy street corner,” he says. “Because Voyager PRO UC combines a clever steel mesh with a combined gore fibre membrane, it manages to reduce wind noise dramatically. At the same time, algorithms intelligently decipher your voice from any wind noise to ensure you’re always heard clearly. This sort of technology is a solid line of defence from an acoustic point of view. Our competitors do not have this technology.”
The Plantronics Voyager PRO UC headset features multipoint technology allowing users to switch between mobile phone calls and PC calls at the touch of a button. And because it comes packaged with a plug-and-play Bluetooth USB adapter there are no cumbersome software setup processes: simply insert the adapter into your PC and start talking.
Mr Vanhoutte claims that technology delivering these types of real-life benefits makes Plantronics the global market leader in the headset market – and he wants to see these benefits reflected in increased (and deserved) global market share.
In praise of powerful conversations
Plantronics originally launched its first generation Voyager headset, the Voyager 510, several years ago. “It quickly became an instant classic,” explains Mr Vanhoutte. “One version worked with PCs, the other worked with mobiles. It was compatible with Microsoft or Cisco and Skype technology. It had a very loyal following, lasting many years.”
This first-gen Voyager offering also gave Plantronics huge insight into its customers. “The Voyager 510 helped us build up an incredibly accurate profile of our clients. Mainly they tend to be male executives or sales people. Anyone who is constantly on the move in often quite demanding situations. People also who do a lot of conference calls and who need generally to be shielded from unwanted noise.”
Plantronics drilled further into their customer base. The calls that clients were getting through their Voyager PRO equipment were regularly critical to their business. “Clearly there was a reason why they were investing in high performance acoustic technology while on the move. ”
So when the Voyager PRO UC – “UC” stands for unified communications – finally emerged as a fully-fledged production model, reviewers from a rash of top profile publications (including the Wall Street Journal and Forbes) were unanimous in their praise.
“Our Voyager PRO UC features a cleverly designed speaker that delivers full-spectrum audio, so conversations are richer and more vibrant,” says Mr Vanhoutte. “There’s also an adaptive 20-band equaliser integrated into the headset that delivers distortion-free audio. This works with AudioIQ2, the next-generation of Plantronics’ digital signal processing technology, to automatically adjust sound levels based on the noise level around the user to ensure maximum audibility.”
So there’s a reason – several, in fact – why the industry critics were so excited.
Stay connected, be heard
But who will benefit most from such technology? Mr Vanhoutte says Voyager PRO UC technology will see a big take-up from anyone regularly meeting clients on the move. “Many of our clients are lawyers, accountants and a broad range of company executives. Many are sales executives, often going from an inside to an outside environment. Typically they are people who are paid not for how many days they work or turn up at the office, but how effective they are on the job.”
What is regularly underestimated, says Vanhoutte, is how much the quality and tone of voice matters in professional on-the-move conversations. “We’ve commissioned studies that show that content in a conversation is only about 10 percent of the job. Tone of voice and being heard clearly accounts for the effectiveness of most professional conversations.”
This is even more important given that face-to-face conversations are increasingly conducted via Skype or other computer-based technology. Scrappy sound quality and speaking bluntly won’t get you far – and might even alienate you quickly from existing clients, or potential new ones.
“We now give training on acoustic intelligence,” says Vanhoutte. “That means not just using the handset and headset effectively. It’s about being aware of how much background noise you have. It’s about diction. The impact of speech is enormous… the vocal chords are the second most used muscle in the human body, so you need to use it carefully and intelligently.”
Plantronics calls this training “Speech Impact.” Simply put, it is highly focused training designed to improve a company’s performance by motivating staff to use mobile equipment better: very important when more and more people are mobile, autonomous and taking and making calls regardless of the environment they’re in.
It’s also about passing on how best to use this cutting-edge technology to more than the privileged few at the top of a company hierarchy. Exactly the sort of commitment you would expect from a company that helped carry the first words from the moon back to earth: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”
www.plantronics.com; tel: 0800 410 014
Why you need to be heard… and why you need to listen better
– Professionals are increasingly paid by results, not presence
– Smarter working is increasing – which means smarter communication is also increasing
– Greater amounts of tele-working means you’re more exposed to noise, wind and networks. You need equipment that can cope with all three factors
– It’s also about storytelling and the art of powerful conversations.
– Éand cost savings. Smarter working means less time travelling to the office, a reduced carbon print and is increasingly important for corporate and social responsibility criteria
