Corporate IM

[dales]

A while ago it was mentioned that we might look into adding corporate IM to our network (we could easily add gwIM to our current setup so its not really a config question) How many of your imperious employers use corporate IM clients and especially to those of you that have rolled it out, Has it seemed to make a positive impact on the company or do people just use it to chat to their mates a couple of desks down!?

I'm just really looking to see how widespread IM is within organisations and whether its a positive thing or a double edged sword?

[Fergal1982]

we're trialling ms office communicator at the moment. Its quite handy, in that it ties into our exchange system, so it automatically sets you to busy when you have meetings in the calendar.

[BosonMichael]

We content developers use external IM to get each others' attention... but the company as a whole doesn't use any sort of standardized, in-house IM solution.

[sunn]

Used jabber in the previous company.
Current company uses MS Office Communicator - pretty sweet as it's tied into the Exchange system. It looks like it will tie into the voice system too (once we go VoIP).

As for Pro/Con debate...
We use it here for everything informal. If I need to see if someone has time, I can send a quick IM, or if a question needs answering the IM can be sent and the recipient can look at it when they have time. That being said, we use it for chit chat too. Like organizing a coffee meeting

[GiddyG]

We're piloting Communicator 2007.

Personally, I think it's long overdue in our place, given we've pretty much all used IMs of one form or another at some point.

I like the ability to communicate via IM rather than phone or email. It isn't like email, where your message tends to get hidden away amongst all the others, which I find to be a good thing.

Sure, it could be abused, but then so can phones and email...

[Sparky]

I’m looking at a IM solution for a customer that has three sites so hopefully this will reduce some of the phone calls between sites.

IM is probably abused just as much as email and phone calls but doesn’t mean email servers fill up with crap emails and phone calls cost money!

[fortch]

Taken a look at Spark?

We're looking at LCS, mainly because my boss wants 100% MS, but I've considered this as well.

[dales]

Thanks for all the replies that opensource IM looks good, although it wouldnt really be for us as rolling out groupwise IM would basically be a flick of the switch on the server and a software rollout so nothing to break into a sweat about.

Just wondered if people had rolled it out and had a come up against any big problems.

[wizard]

Originally Posted by BosonMichael

We content developers use external IM to get each others' attention... but the company as a whole doesn't use any sort of standardized, in-house IM solution.

You mean when it's time to go out for lunch?

[Taita]

We had a look at Jabber but sacked it off and went back to MSN so we are at the mercy of MS's sysadmins

[BosonMichael]

Originally Posted by wizard

You mean when it's time to go out for lunch?

I don't have any IM clients installed, so I have to be open to GMail to get IMs. And even when that page is open, if I don't have my headphones on, I can't tell when I get an IM.

[dales]

office communicator seems quite good, just creating an exchange box at home to test it on, seeing as we might have to migrate to exchange. so might as well start getting used to it now.