JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - December Edition

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What’s Up? JAA Highlights from November

Below is a digest of J Arnold & Associates activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – two for last month:

    • Wildix Analyst Day 2025, Venice, Italy, Nov. 4-5

    • Talkdesk Analyst Summit 2025, Savannah, GA, Nov. 18-20

  • Podcast/video segments – recorded and published:

  • Podcast/video segments – recorded, but not yet published:

    • Collab Collective – Craig Durr’s recap interview for the Wildix analyst event

    • EM360 – Tech Transformed podcast, my conversation with Calvin Hohener of Dialpad

    • UC Today – my segment for their UC 12 Trends of Christmas, with analyst predictions for 2026

  • Writing roundup for November – three articles to share, and I hope you read them all

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of my industry reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during November

    • 45,011 total views and 27 posts – fewer posts than October, but views overall were substantially higher, up 63%

    • With November being another strong month, my LinkedIn views have been 20,000+ for each of the last ten months

What’s Coming? JAA Outlook for December

  • Industry events – just one for December:

    • Fall vCon, Washington, DC, Dec. 2-3

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Market research study on AI adoption for a leading cloud provider

    • Podcasts/videos - 2 are lined up for me to be interviewed later this month – stay tuned

    • TechTarget – 4 new articles being done now, and all should run during December

    • Contact Center Pipeline – 2 new articles done, one coming later this month, and the other early in 2026

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • After a few quiet months, the level of inquiry for my services has become very active, and the pipeline for early 2026 is looking quite strong now

    • Updates are very much in play for: my website, my Watch This Space podcast, and a new publishing platform that I plan to be quite active on in early 2026


Hey, Did You Know?

… I had just two events last month, and both were great. Both are essentially port cities, but with very different histories – and cuisines. Venice is, well, Venice – no place like it – and Savannah is a gateway city in many ways. Had no idea it was the 3rd largest port in the US, but it was the Deep South, small city vibe that I enjoyed the most. The host companies had interesting parallels as well - Talkdesk and Wildix - both are European, and not household names in the US, but with some help from us analysts, that just might change in 2026.
 

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration - November Edition 2025

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What’s Up? JAA Highlights from October

Below is a digest of J Arnold & Associates activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – two for October:

    • SCTC Annual Conference, Reno, NV, Oct. 12-14

    • NiCE 2025 Analyst Summit, Vienna, Austria, Oct. 20-23

  • Podcast/Video segments:

    • BCStrategies – Halloween special – What’s Scary in Comms Tech?, Oct. 31, on LinkedIn

    • BCStrategies – recap of NiCE’s analyst event – recorded Oct. 31, but not published yet

    • Enterprise Connect – speaker spotlight, interviewed by Erica Marois about my topic for Enterprise Connect 2026, Oct. 20

  • Awards judging – two updates to share:

    • Talkdesk CX Innovators Awards – judging has ended, and winners have now been announced – press release here

    • Epica Awards – judging for the Paris-based Epica Awards is now open, and I have started reviewing and rating the entries – creativity levels are very high with Epica, and I’ll be writing more about this soon

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of my industry reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during October:

    • 27,668 total views and 36 posts

    • October was another strong month, and have tallied 20,000+ views for each of the last nine months

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 1,979 views

    • Overall, 6 posts had 1,000+ views, and 16 had 500+ views

    • New stat - my tally of followers is steadily growing – added 146 the past 28 days, and 558 the past 90 days, so roughly 5 new per day

What’s Coming? JAA Outlook for November

  • Industry events – two for November:

    • Wildix Analyst Day 2025, Venice, Italy, Nov. 4-5

    • Talkdesk Analyst Summit 2025, Savannah, GA, Nov. 18-20

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Market research study on AI adoption for a leading cloud provider

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… that the life of a technology analyst is never dull. Relative to my peers, my travel schedule is pretty light, but I’ll take quality over quantity any time. I only attended two events last month, but that was plenty of learning, networking and fun for me. Just a taste here for my October, seeing Sir Terry Matthews speak at SCTC, playing with the SIPtones, and getting the Vienna experience at the NiCE analyst event (more photos from that here).

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration - October Edition 2025

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What’s Up? JAA Highlights from September

Below is a digest of J Arnold & Associates activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – three for September:

    • Verint Engage, Orlando, Sept. 8-10

    • Zoomtopia, virtual, Sept. 17

    • Sprinklr Analyst Summit, Nashville, Sept. 28-Oct. 1

  • Podcast/Video segments – these terms seem interchangeable now – podcast and video, but it was another month with more video-based output than with writing:

    • BCStrategies – takeaways from Verint’s Engage event, Sept. 22

    • Politely Pushy Podcast – interviewed by Eric Chemi from PR agency Bospar about what tech analysts do, and how independent analysts provide value, Sept. 9

    • SCTC – interviewed by Robert Cassard about how analysts provide value to the SCTC and its members, Sept. 3

  • Podcast/Video – recorded, but not yet published:

    • BCStrategies – takeaways from Sprinklr’s CXUnifiers event

  • Writing roundup – based on how the dates fell last month, I have a few pieces ready to go or done, but only one was published during September: it’s the cover story for Contact Center Pipeline, and I was a contributor: Answering the Challenges

  • New kudo for Watch This Space (fourth one since May):

  • Awards judging – two updates to share:

    • Talkdesk CX Innovators Awards – am back as a judge for the 2025 edition – details coming soon, but am in the process now of evaluating entries – 2024 winners here

    • Epica Awards – returning here as a judge as well – Paris-based Epica Awards is outside my normal scope of analyst work, but as a creative person with marketing DNA, I love getting to evaluate international entries from the worlds of media, advertising and social change, many of which make leading-edge use of the technologies I follow every day – more to come as the judging progresses

  • Other items of note from September:

    • Enterprise Connect – for 2026, the show is doing a re-set on its programming and the topics they will be including – my submission was accepted (yes, it’s AI-related), so I will be on the program – details coming soon, including a spotlight piece about my topic

    • ICMI – not sure why it’s taken so long, but I’m finally getting involved, and will be more visible in that community going forward – stay tuned

    • Book review – long-time industry colleague Mark McIlvane recently wrote a book about what he knows best – sales management- and after giving it a read, I wrote a review, which you can find here on Amazon

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of my industry reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during September:

    • 41,237 views and 33 posts – numbers are a tad higher from August

    • September was another strong month, and have tallied 20,000+ views for each of the last eight months – and three of the last four months have topped 40,000 views

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 9,047 views - this marks the fourth straight month my top post has garnered 7,500+ views

    • Overall, 8 posts had 1,000+ views, and 15 had 500+ views

    What’s Coming? JAA Outlook for October

    • Industry events –

      • SCTC Annual Conference, Reno, NV, Oct. 12-14 – updates below

      • NiCE 2025 Analyst Summit, Vienna, Austria, Oct. 20-23

    • SCTC Conference updates:

      • Analyst panel – I’ll be speaking along with colleagues Blair Pleasant, and moderator Steve Leaden – Monday at 10am – details here

      • Another SIPtones gig - if you’re coming, make sure to be there for the opening reception on Sunday night, where we’ll be playing a dinner set and a dance set - and if you don’t know about my fun side, check us out here and here

      • Continuing as an SCTC Board member – my current term is up, but as part of the AGM during the conference, I will elect to continue serving in that role

  • Webinar:

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • White paper for a cloud platform provider – still awaiting publication

    • Market research study on AI adoption for a leading cloud provider

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


  1. Hey, Did You Know?

    … change can be a good thing, and it sure keeps things interesting.
    My output last month was on the light side, but not for lack of things to do. A stubborn chest cough plus the High Holidays kept me off schedule, but with those in the rear-view mirror, a few new wrinkles are coming. I won’t say much now, but here are some changes to keep watch for as the life of an independent analyst evolves:

    • Refresh is in the works for my website

    • I will soon launch my presence on a leading publishing platform, where I plan to expand the mix of formats for creating and sharing thought leadership

    • Am still open to continuing with Watch This Space in its current format, but may also add other podcast offerings on the publishing platform – inquiries welcome

    • I’m exploring avenues to syndicate my work, not just to make it discoverable for wider audiences, but also to help protect my thought leadership and original analysis from being appropriated by AI to train LLMs

  2. And if you still don’t know what my work entails, or how I can help any vendor or service provider grow their business and brand, you really should check out the Politely Pushy podcast about me referenced earlier.

    For the times, they are a-changin’…

JAA’S Communication and Collaboration - September Edition 2025

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This is the shortest newsletter I’ve ever done, and it largely reflects the season. Our space remains as busy as ever, but by design, August was going to be a light month for me. Of course, if I was AI-first, I wouldn’t miss a beat on current developments, but for better or worse, I remain human-first, and need some time away from all this.

The good weather and scheduled vacation breaks took me offline for much of last month, which I view as the calm before the storm when many things pick up after Labor Day. As such, the updates for August are light, plus my Watch This Space podcast is still on hiatus.

Travel to industry events picks up in the Fall, and aside from new project work, I’m actively working on updates to my website, along with adding another platform for my various forms of thought leadership - and interests outside the tech space. Changes are coming, so stay tuned!
 

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from August

Below is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – none for August - a rarity, but a welcome break

  • Writing roundup – just two last month - digest is here on my blog – both are still timely, and hope you read them both!

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during August:

    • 48,906 views and 28 posts – views are down a bit from June, but almost half fewer posts; another strong month, and have tallied 20,000+ views for each of the last six months

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 7,521 views

    • Overall, 6 posts had 1,000+ views, and 10 had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for September

  • Industry events – three for September:

    • Verint Engage, Orlando, Sept. 8-10

    • Zoomtopia, virtual, Sept. 17

    • Sprinklr Analyst Summit, Nashville, Sept. 28-Oct. 1

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • White paper just being completed for a cloud platform provider

    • Market research study on AI adoption for a leading cloud provider

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients

  • Another SIPtones gig - I’ll be attending, speaking, and performing at the annual SCTC conference, October 12-15 in Reno, NV. The SIPtones ride again, so if you’re coming, make sure to be there for the opening reception, where we’ll be playing a dinner set and a dance set - and if you don’t know about my fun side, check us out here and here.

Hey, Did You Know?

… my Watch This Space podcast may still be on hiatus, but with over 80 episodes in the archive, there’s plenty to check out. Some episodes are based on current events, but others are more evergreen, so quite a bit will still be relevant.
You can check out the full archive here on my website, as well as here on the dedicated WTS webpage. If you’re not sure what topics to choose, drop me a line, and I’ll be happy to steer you to episodes that align with your interests. I’m also open to new ideas and partnerships for WTS, so let me know if you’d like to explore that path.


JAA’s Communications and Collaboration - August 2025

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By now, you should know that Watch This Space is on hiatus, and to learn more, best to check out our most recent episode. With summer in full swing, it will be another month or two before the next iteration takes shape.

Nothing new to add about this, so I’ll reiterate my calls to action from last month below.

If you don’t know, I have lifelong passions in the worlds of culture and creativity, especially around music, literature, art, cinema, comedy, history, travel, cuisine, sports, and urban architecture. I’m very much at home wearing any of those hats, not just at face value, but also where any of them intersect with technology, especially AI. Food for thought, and perhaps future podcast themes, folks.

I won’t stay idle for long, so if inspiration strikes for anything here, I’d love to hear from you. For a deeper dive on Watch This Space, you can access all my recent episodes here on my website, as well as here on the dedicated WTS webpage.

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from July

Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Video segments recorded earlier, but not yet published:

    • NiCE TV, in conversation with Sharang Sharma, Everest Research, June 17

    • NiCE TV, in conversation with Neeraj Verma, NiCE, June 18

  • Writing roundup for July – digest is here on my blog – and if you just read one, this is it - my review of the NiCE Interactions event

  • New July writing, heads-up:

    • Review of the Zoom Perspectives analyst event - will run early August on EM360

    • Article about challenges facing CX leaders - will run in the September issue of Contact Center Pipeline

  • Media citings - there were two for July - link here

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during July:

    • 48,906 views and 28 posts – views are down a bit from June, but almost half fewer posts; another strong month, and have tallied 20,000+ views for each of the last six months

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 7,521 views

    • Overall, 6 posts had 1,000+ views, and 10 had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for August

  • Industry events – none for August, and no complaints - two so far for September, though, plus one virtual event

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • New article about helping carriers assess various cloud platforms

    • White paper just being completed for a cloud platform provider

    • Market research study on AI adoption for a leading cloud provider

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients

  • Another SIPtones gig - sneak peak look-ahead for the fall - I’ll be attending and speaking at the annual SCTC conference, held this October in Reno, NV - also of note (badda boom) - the SIPtones ride again. So if you’re coming, make sure to be there for the opening reception, where we’ll be playing a dinner set and a dance set - and if you don’t know about my fun side, check us out here and here.

Hey, Did You Know?

… summers are short in Canada, so I’m happy to not have any event travel during August. It’s a great time to slow things down, disconnect and restore some work/life balance. Here’s a taste of that vibe, from our July road trip through Southwest Ontario - as you might expect, a lot of trees, water and rocks - and not a billboard in sight!

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - July Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

Well, the what’s up? here is that nothing’s up.

As per last month’s newsletter, the June episode was the last for Watch This Space in its current format. Chris and I have done 85 episodes since we started in 2018, and it’s time to change things up.

I’m formulating several ideas for what’s next, and your ideas are welcome – not just for format and content, but I’m also open to having sponsors. Aside from wanting to reach a broader audience, I’d like to reach new audiences. We’ve covered the future of work theme for a long time, but with AI reshaping everything, there are many other angles worth exploring, both in the workplace and in the ever-widening realm of customer experience.

Also, if you don’t know, I have lifelong passions in the worlds of culture and creativity, especially around music, literature, art, cinema, comedy, history, travel, cuisine, sports, and urban architecture. I’m very much at home wearing any of those hats, not just at face value, but also where any of them intersect with technology, especially AI. Food for thought, and perhaps future podcast themes, folks.

I won’t stay idle for long, so if inspiration strikes for anything here, I’d love to hear from you. To jump start that, if you haven’t listened to our final episode, here’s the link. For a deeper dive on Watch This Space, you can access all my recent episodes here on my website, as well as here on the dedicated WTS webpage.

 

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from June

Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Video segments recorded during June, but not yet published:

    • Big UC News, updates about Mitel, HP, Cisco and others, June 26

    • NiCE TV, in conversation with Sharang Sharma, Everest Research, June 17

    • NiCE TV, in conversation with Neeraj Verma, NiCE, June 18

  • Podcast:

  • New kudo:

  • Writing roundup for June – digest is here on my blog – and if you just read one – this is it: One Communications Platform – Billions of Conversations: Infobip Analyst Event Review

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during June:

    • I had 56,763 views and 49 posts – up substantially from May; it’s the highest monthly tally so far this year, and 3 of the past 5 months have tallied 50,000+ views

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 11,146 views

    • Overall, 9 posts had 1,000+ views, and 20 had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for July

  • Industry events – one for July, and then done for summer (woo hoo!):

    • Zoom Perspectives, July 15-17, San Jose, CA

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • My review of the NiCE Interactions event, to run on No Jitter

    • White paper just being completed for a cloud platform provider

    • Market research study on AI adoption for a leading cloud provider

    • Will be a guest on Kane Simms’ VUX World podcast

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… that sometimes, the fun side of event travel is just as good – if not better – than the business side of things. That doesn’t always happen, but it sure did for the Infobip analyst event I attended in early June. As good as the event itself was, the scenery and excursions were pretty, pretty hard to beat.

Aside from the event being held in Croatia, I was able to get a travel day in for Venice – and both were first time visits for me. With summer vibes here now, thought I’d share some of my photos that should put you in a good mood. Pretty good week, huh?



JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - May Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

April was a busy month for industry events, and the main focus for this episode was Jeff Pulver’s vCon event, held in Hyannis, MA. Chris spoke at the event, with the main takeaway being that vCon is a “watch this space” initiative, especially for using AI to derive new value from conversations, including unstructured data. With vCon being early stage, the focus was mainly on laying the groundwork to make this an IETF standard, and proof of concept interop testing. Chris explained how this was a different conference experience, with the participants trying to set the foundation for vCon before it gets on the radar of the hyperscalers. Following this, Jon added his thoughts on other recent events, namely 8x8’s analyst event, speaking at the Cloud Communications Alliance event, and Vector Institute’s Remarkable conference in Toronto.

Jon and Chris on why vCon is a “watch this space” development:

“The key to all of this – it’s going to become standards-based. That’s what makes it real – and, being open source-based, being an IETF standard. With Jeff, having done this with VoIP and the FCC – once it becomes a standard, then it has legitimacy. Then you can build an ecosystem around that, and that’s when the business model starts to take shape. When you get people coming to something like this (attending vCon), and they run a phone company or an ITSP, and they’re interested in this, that’s a real first step.”

  • NEWISH FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution:

    • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

    • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work Newssite. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • AND… we’ve added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 

 

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from April

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events: three very different conferences:

    • 8x8 Industry Analyst Summit, Southampton, UK, April 1-3

    • Cloud Connections 2025 (Cloud Communications Alliance), St. Petersburgh, FL, April 14-16 (spoke on two panels)

    • Servion (in partnership with NICE) – led a workshop and second presentation for customers, AI-Driven Innovation in Contact Centers, Hoboken, NJ, April 22

  • Video segment:  

  • Webinar – The Future is Agentic – in conversation with Cognigy, hosted by CUSTOMER Magazine, April 24

  • White paper: Getting Started with AI for CX – written for Cisco Webex - published June 2024, but only became accessible now – you can download it here

 

  • Writing roundup for April – digest is here on my blog – and if you just read one – this is it: 8x8 Analyst Summit Takeaways – Track Some Mud on the Carpet

  • Media citings – just one for April

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during April:

    • I had 37,596 views and 39 posts – third strong month in row, which I think reflects my continued run of recent travel to industry events

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 1,379 views 

    • Overall, 3 posts had 1,000+ views, and 12 had 500+ views

What's Coming? JAA Outlook for May

  • Industry events – just one for May – finally, a light travel month:

    • Global Relay Analyst Summit, May 28-29

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • GoTo - Practically Tomorrow podcast, should publish 2nd week of May

    • Writing a guest post on how telcos are evolving in the age of AI – will run 2nd or 3rd week of May

    • Writing an article on AI/CX trends for Contact Center Pipeline, to run in the July issue

    • Podcast recording later this month with Kane Simms for his VUX World podcast 

    • The AI Show, from UC Today – recorded a guest segment on May 5 – will publish next few days

    • BCStrategies, Q1 updates and CX news – part of a group podcast recording – will publish 2nd week of May

  • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

  • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?
… Kevin Harrington is an interesting guy, and based on his keynote during Cloud Connections 2025, I’d say that tech vendors could learn some things about how they bring AI to market. If you put his “celebrity investor” persona aside, his messages about building brands and scaling businesses resonated for me. 

Across the events I attended during April – along with others over the past few months - there’s a sameness to the messaging from vendors about AI. The widespread FOMO is warranted, as AI is evolving faster than anything we’ve seen before, and everyone knows about its transformational potential. Kevin shared how he pivoted business models with changing technology, and with AI, everyone across the value chain must do the same – vendors, enterprises and channel players. 

One of his analogies is about the microphone – “the money doesn’t go to the people who know how the microphone works, it goes to the people who know how to sing”. The more complex the product, the more applicable this is; and in our world, nothing is more complex than AI.  

There’s a fine balance to strike between making AI feel accessible, and how it delivers tangible value for buyers and users. I’m saying this not just because that’s what’s I’m seeing in my analyst travels, but also for the types of engagements coming my way now, especially around branding and messaging to stand out in this hyperactive market.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - April Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

March was another busy month, with Chris attending Leesman’s research event in NYC, and Jon doing the same for Enterprise Connect in Orlando, along with Cognigy’s Nexus event in Dusseldorf. On this episode, Chris explains the big disconnect between what management and workers want for coming back to the office, and how that’s impacting corporate real estate thinking. For Jon, Agentic AI was the big story at Enterprise Connect, and he reviews why it’s so important, but also how enterprises are struggling to find the best use cases. Another takeaway is why Jon thinks Google’s AI-first approach to CX could make them a dark horse player in the hyper-competitive contact center space. Finally, Jon shares how Cognigy is getting impressive results with Tier 1 customers using Agentic AI – mainly in the EU – and showing what’s possible when AI is deployed effectively.

Jon’s take on orchestration, and a more strategic view of how AI is being used now:

“Companies like NICE, the narrative they’re using – and we’re going to see more of this – is orchestration, as people try to tie all these pieces together, whether it’s collaboration in the office or customer service in the contact center. AI is touching so many pieces now, that to pull it all together and extract distinct value – AI has to work across multiple systems, multiple touch points, and multiple data sets and knowledge bases – and then make it relevant, almost in real time for the end user – and, providing digital assist – by your side, along the way to help you. This is how orchestration affects everything, from before you need it, to when you need it, and after once you’ve used it, to follow up on next steps. This is a more strategic look at the technology.”

  • NEWISH FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution:

    • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

    • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work Newssite. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • AND… we’ve added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 

 

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from March

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events: three very different conferences, with two being in-person:

    • Remarkable, Vector Institute, Toronto, March 4-5 (remote attendance)

    • Cognigy Nexus, Dusseldorf, Germany, March 11-13

    • Enterprise Connect, Orlando, FL, March 17-20

  • Industry events add-on: during the week of Enterprise Connect, Nvidia GTC was also running, and I was registered for remote attendance, but could not track the sessions then. Will do this shortly and share takeaways – I did this for last year’s event, and continue to follow Nvidia as they are leading the way with AI.

  • Video segments:  

    • At Enterprise Connect – segment 1 – with Doug Green for his Telecom Reseller podcast – here on LinkedIn Live, March 17

    • At Enterprise Connect – segment 2 – with Doug Green and Jeff Pulver – here on LinkedIn Live, March 17

    • At Enterprise Connect – segment with David Dungay from UC Today, March 18 – not posted yet, sorry

    • BC Strategies – Enterprise Connect takeaways, Part 1 (Part 2 ran the next day with other BC Experts) – here on LinkedIn Live, March 27

    • Video interview with PolyAI CEO on the impact of AI on CX, EM360 Tech Transformed Podcast, March 13 

    • Future of Work Expo preview – interviewed by Rich Tehrani on Feb. 11, but not posted until recently

  • White paper: for NICE - Customer-Centric AI That Encompasses the Entire Business for CX

  • Judging: I was a judge for the Best of Enterprise Connect Awards, and the winners were announced here, March 17

  • Writing roundup for March – digest is here on my blog – and if you just read one – this is it: The Death of the Desk Phone?

  • Media citings – just one for March, published in January, but only recently available

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during March:

    • I had 54,253 views and 56 posts – very similar to February, making this two very strong months in a row for LinkedIn traffic

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 18,221 views – aside from an exceptionally high tally for one of my posts in February 2024, this is the highest tally for one post to date for me

    • Overall, 11 posts had 1,000+ views, and 19 had 500+ views

 

What's Coming? JAA Outlook for April

  • Industry events - three for April, all in-person:

    • 8x8 Industry Analyst Summit, Southampton, UK, April 1-3

    • Cloud Connections 2025 (CCA), St. Petersburgh, FL, April 14-16 (speaking on two panels)

    • Servion (in partnership with NICE) – leading a workshop, AI-Driven Innovation in Contact Centers, Hoboken, NJ, April 22

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • GoTo - Practically Tomorrow podcast, March 31

    • Cognigy webinar with CUSTOMER magazine, broadcasting in April – date TBD

  • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

  • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?
… it sure seems like AI-everywhere, AI-all-the-time lately. For better or worse, there’s nothing bigger – not just in tech, but seemingly our daily lives. For my work as an analyst, I see many shades of AI, and do my best to speak and write about it. The current episode of Watch This Space has a heavy dose of AI, and across my three events last month, here are three different perspectives, all of which am happy to speak further about.

Vector Institute’s Remarkable event, Toronto
I was only able to attend virtually, and if you don’t know, this is one of the world’s leading AI research entities. Their presentations were about pure AI research, so nothing commercial here yet, but a fascinating glimpse into how some of this research is getting done. Am pretty sure I was the only tech analyst there, so it’s very likely this will be new learning for my subscribers.

Cognigy’s Nexus 2025 event, Dusseldorf
In my view, Cognigy is best-in-class for real-world deployments of Conversational AI and Agentic AI in the customer service arena. Am one of only two analysts who attended both this year and last year’s customer event, and in that short time, it’s quite impressive how far their AI capabilities have evolved. I was one of the first to write about Agentic AI, and you’ll be hearing more about Cognigy from me throughout 2025.

Enterprise Connect 2025, Orlando
This is the biggest and most important industry event in the communications technology space, and the show has now ended a long run in Orlando. Next year, the locale will be Las Vegas, and with that, the program will likely be revamped - both to keep the content fresh, and to attract more buyers, something the exhibitors need more of. Earlier in the newsletter, I cited some examples of me talking about the trends around the event, including AI. I came away with very current understanding of where the vendors are with AI offerings, along with what the market is ready to actually deploy, and got to share some of that on two panel sessions.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - March Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

February was a busy month, but the highlight was the Future of Work Expo, with Jon returning as Chair for the eighth year. Co-located with the big-tent ITExpo, the program covered a wide range of topics related to the future of work, and the highlights were reviewed during the podcast. One was from Jon’s keynote, citing industry research about how difficult hybrid work is to manage, and what attributes are most important for being in an office setting. Another main theme was how the future of work is being shaped now by AI, and how important it will be for workers to upskill to adapt. Bigger picture, Chris and Jon discussed how there’s a hunger for data now in enterprises, where everyday workplace communication is being mined to help train AI applications that will define the future of work.

Jon’s view on how AI is driving the need to tap data from everyday communications:

“There’s a hunger for data now – businesses are recognizing (the need to) feed the AI machine. Now they’ve discovered that data in the workplace – our everyday communications and interactions – has value. So, now they are investing – mandating - that IT develop the capabilities to capture as much data as possible. That means all of our calls, all of our texts, all of our emails – they’re all digital – create these new forms of data that never have been tapped.”

  • NEWISH FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution:

    • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

    • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work Newssite. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • AND… we’ve added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 

 

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from February

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events: back to it in February, with travel to three stops:

    • Zoho Analyst Day, Horseshoe Bay, TX, Feb. 3-5

    • Future of Work Expo, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, Feb. 11-13

    • RingCentral Analyst Summit, Yountville, CA, Feb. 24-26

  • Video segments:  

    • Enterprise Connect Preview, BCStrategies (recorded late February, but published March 4) – can view LinkedIn Live replay here

    • Big UC News, UC Today – latest news roundup, including takeaways from RingCentral’s Analyst Summit (recorded late February, but published March 4) – can view episode here

    • Future of Work Expo event, interviewed by Tom Brannen, posted Feb. 20 – clip starts at the 8:14 mark

    • Future of Work Expo, clip from my keynote presentation (51 seconds), filmed by Tom Brannen, Feb. 13 - thanks!

    • Future of Work Expo, interviewed by Rich Tehrani, Feb. 11 – but not yet published

  • New kudo:

  • Writing roundup for February – digest here on my blog – and if you just read one – this is it: The Future of Work Needs a Total Rethink

  • Media citings – four for February

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during February:

    • I had 56,618 views and 61 posts – up four-fold from January, and the highest monthly tally since last February 

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 9,719 views

    • Overall, 7 posts had 1,000+ views, and 18 had 500+ views

 

What's Coming? JAA Outlook for March

  • Industry events continue, with three for March:

    • Remarkable, Vector Institute, Toronto, March 4-5 (remote attendance)

    • Cognigy Nexus, Dusseldorf, Germany, March 11-13

    • Enterprise Connect, Orlando, FL, March 17-20

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Will be a panelist on two sessions during Enterprise Connect March – details here – along with their “Best Of” awards, that I am a judge for

    • Enterprise Connect, part 2 – to save $400 on your registration, use promo code “Arnold400”

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?
… the Future of Work Expo kept me in front of – and connected to – an audience for the better part of three days last month, and it was a great way to take the pulse for what’s happening as the workplace evolves.

To get a better sense of that yourself, these photos tie to citings for the video segments cited above. Below, being interviewed by Tom Brannen (link above) and Rich Tehrani (link coming soon), and the second iteration of my keynote talk - link to one video segment of me speaking is above, and I have others as well if interested. 

If you weren’t at the event, I hope this piques your interest, and it’s never too early to start talking about being part of it for 2026 – I’m not hard to find!

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - February Edition

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What’s Up? JAA Highlights from January

Below is a digest of J Arnold & Associates activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Details and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – none for January

  • Podcast/video - segments recorded and published:

  • Podcast/video – recorded but not published yet:

    • EM360; with CallRevu and using AI to improve CX for auto dealers, Jan. 28

  • New partnerships:

  • New kudo – EM360 – my podcast with Dialpad was nominated for a Most Engaging Podcast Award for Q4 2025 episodes 

  • Writing roundup for January – busy month with 5 articles published

  • Media citings – 5 for January, which you can review here

  • Social media highlights – since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of my industry reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – and here are my approximate tallies during January:

    • 12,216 total views and 21 posts – with no travel, traffic was light, and is typical for January – but when travel resumes in February, tallies will get much bigger

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 1,096 views

    • Overall, 7 posts had 500+ views

    • New stat - my tally of followers is steadily growing – I have added 172 new followers during the past 28 days, and 516 the past 90 days, so that’s roughly 5.7 new followers per day on my LinkedIn feed

 

What’s Coming? JAA Outlook for February

  • Industry events – three for February:

    • ITExpo, Feb. 10-12, Ft. Lauderdale – will be moderating four panels

    • Zoho Analyst Day, Feb. 17-19, Austin

    • RingCentral Analyst Summit, Feb. 25-27, Scottsdale

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Guest blog post about a market research study on AI adoption in the workplace for a leading cloud provider

    • Featured article for the February edition of Contact Center Pipeline

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • Updates are very much in play for: my website, my Watch This Space podcast, and a new publishing platform that I plan to be quite active on in early 2026


Hey, Did You Know?

… the look-ahead for industry events will be very busy. Aside from the three events listed above for February, there are potentially three more for March. One is firm – Enterprise Connect – and the others are TBD, and will have updates in time for the March newsletter.
 
If they come to pass, I’ll have travel to six different events over seven weeks. That’s great news for my frequent-flier balances, but a long run for being away. You don’t go to school for stuff like this, and like anything else, it’s all about good planning. I’m up for it, and hope you’ll stay with me as the next tour of duty gets underway.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - January Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

Season 8 of Watch This Space began with our look-ahead to 2025, where the main topics were how we see workplaces and workspaces evolving, why small language models will have their moment, and our concerns about how AI is becoming baked into everything. On another tangent, we discussed how sensibilities in the digital age are so different from the analog world we are grounded in, and why that’s making it easier for AI to take hold. We also continued the literary theme from our last episode by revisiting some lingering thoughts from the sci-fi novella With Folded Hands, then veering into another AI-related must-read, Benjamin Labatut’s The MANIAC. If you’re wondering why DeepMind’s AlphaGo is a foreboding sign for how AI could reshape our very humanity, this is the book for you.

Chris Fine on office space evolution for 2025: 
“I think the trend is more hospitality-like than a traditional type of office – the lighting is more subdued, the space is more welcoming and comforting, more oriented toward collaborative work – but also quiet work if needed.”

  • NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – a new look and feel coming for January – a refresh has been in the works for a while – I think you’ll like it, and will help kick off Season 8!

  • NEWISH FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution:

    • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

    • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work Newssite. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • AND… we’ve added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 

 

What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from December

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events: nothing for December, but several on the calendar from February onward 

  • Video segments:  

  • Podcasts:

    • In conversation with CloudBolt about finops and AI, Tech Transformed podcast for EM360, Dec. 11 

    • In conversation with CallTower about UC business models for channel to offer customers, UC Today, recorded Dec. 12, but not yet published

  • Webinars:

  • Writing roundup for December – digest here on my blog

  • Media citings – three for December

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during December:

    • I had 8,524 views and 19 posts – very light month for traffic, but the drop-off is consistent with previous Decembers

    • My top LinkedIn post registered only 721 views – only month during 2024 where the busiest post had under 1,000 views

    • Overall, only 2 posts had 500+ views

What's Coming? JAA Outlook for January

  • No industry events for January – none on the calendar, but will also be away for two weeks on a personal trip

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Article about the importance of call testing for CX

    • Article about the rationale for integrating UCaaS and CCaaS

    • Article highlighting my new market study for Aizan about the on-hold experience

    • Finished another white paper for a leading CCaaS vendor about how AI can be used to elevate CX – should be published this month

    • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the latest e-blast outlining what’s on for the events, the press release announcing the agenda, and Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… 2024 was my best year so far, and going into my 20th year as an independent technology analyst, I figure I must be doing something right, so my plan is to stay the course. 

Normally, I do a by-the-numbers year in review for this issue, but time is short, so you’ll have to get in touch if you really want to know how many conferences, how many articles, how many webinars, how many new clients, etc. there were for JAA during 2024. 

I will, however, share my month-by-month LinkedIn traffic tally below. As you can see, there were several strong months during 2024, with February being the highest month I’ve ever had. My overall number of views for 2024 was 434,580 – my highest annual count to date, and was a solid 30% higher than 2023.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - December Edition

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We mixed things up for the December episode, with our first-ever book review. A novelette, actually, from the sci-fi genre, that we found to be very timely. Written by Jack Williamson in 1947, With Folded Hands is a prescient story about a world that’s looking very familiar, and with Humanoids running everything, the parallels to the trend du jour – Agentic AI – are pretty striking. We discussed what it all means, and after you listen to us, we hope you’ll give it a read. In response to the conformity that comes with this brave new world, we raised the question about where is the next Bob Dylan to push back on all this? Following that, we reviewed our recent industry events – CREtech, ISC East, and the Talkdesk Analyst Summit. Being the last episode for 2024, we closed out with some big picture takeaways from this year, along with some things we’re expecting for 2025.

On the potential impact of Agentic AI and future of work:

“As these autonomous applications come in, they’ll be doing more and more of our everyday tasks at work – meeting summaries, writing emails, planning meetings. Basically, your personal bot is doing all these things – just like With Folded Hands, there’s nothing left for us to do. This is a big existential future of work issue – we’re going down that path, and it takes us right back to the story, where that’s exactly what happened.”

  • NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – a new look and feel coming for January – a refresh has been in the works for a while – I think you’ll like it, and will help kick off Season 8!

  • NEWISH FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution:

    • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

    • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work Newssite. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • AND… we’ve added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from November

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – 1 for November:

    • Talkdesk 2024 Analyst Event, Charleston, SC, Nov. 18-20

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

  • Video segments – recorded, but not yet published:

    • 2025 UC Predictions, UC Today

    • Hot Take on 2025 AI Investment Trends, RingCentral

  • Market research report – just published, in partnership with Aizan – US Consumers’ Attitudes Towards Contact Center Queues – Nov. 21

  • Awards judging – am back for the Paris-based 2024 Epica Awards – judging has completed, and short list has been announced – details here

  • Writing roundup for November – digest here on my blog

  • Media citings – just one last month 

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during November:

    • I had 25,571 views and 23 posts – a tad higher than October

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 7,373 views

    • Overall, 5 posts had 1,000+ views, and 10 had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for December

  • No industry events for December – but plenty lining up for early 2025

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Webinar with NICE – Can Customer Journeys be Automated with AI? – Dec. 12, register here

    • New podcast recorded December 2 with a FinOps vendor in partnership with EM360

    • Completed two writeups for Contact Center Pipeline – both will run in the January issue

    • Article highlighting my new market study for Aizan about the on-hold experience

    • Just finished another white paper for a leading CCaaS vendor about how AI can be used to elevate CX – should be published during December

    • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the latest e-blast outlining what’s on for the events, the press release announcing the agenda, and Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… I do more writing than speaking, but that got flipped last month. As per above, I had six video segments that ran during November, and here’s a peek from being on both sides of the mike – hope you check out the links as well.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - November Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

With travel to industry events in full swing during October, we had a lot of ground to cover. Jon recapped both events from earlier in the month – Verint, British Telecom and UC Expo – along with previewing upcoming October events that were to take place after our podcast was recorded, namely Cisco WebexOne and NICE Analyst Summit – which took Jon to Zambia. From Chris’s end, he updated us on VON Evolution (now vCon), where Jeff Pulver’s community explored the future of voice and conversations, then WorkTech, where the focus was on the return to office side of hybrid work, and how the corporate real estate world is thinking about these things. Things are never dull here on Watch This Space, and this episode will update you on the worlds of AI, customer experience and future of work in more ways than you might imagine.

On the bigger picture for getting an ROI with AI in the enterprise:

`“There’s huge pressure in enterprises to show an ROI on all that data (from AI)… every line of business has its own needs and priorities for what the data for their lines of business means to them… the pressure on IT now isn’t just about getting optimum network performance – that’s the meta level – but the actual data itself is creating all these new forms of intelligence that AI is harvesting for its learning models.”


NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – as mentioned above, we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution. Aside from listening to us talk about, here’s the gist for the updates:

  • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

  • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work News site. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • ALSO NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – but less recent - we’ve now added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from October

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – 3 for October, all in-person:

    • British Telecom Focus 2024, London, Oct. 1 – photos here

    • UC Expo, London, Oct. 2-3 – photos here

    • NICE Analyst Summit, Livingstone, Zambia, Oct. 21-24 - photos here

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

    • Big UC News – updates on Intermedia, Slack, HP and X, Oct. 2

    • UC Today – interviewed during UC Expo, Oct. 2

    • EM360 – interviewed during UC Expo, Oct. 2

  • Video segments – recorded, but not yet published:

    • Interview with RingCentral, during UC Expo

    • Interview with 8x8, during UC Expo

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during October:

    • I had 24,235 views and 25 posts – about 60% higher than September

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 2,370 views

    • Overall, 9 posts had 1,000+ views, and 13 had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for November

  • I have one in-person event for November:

    • Talkdesk 2024 Analyst Event, Charleston, SC, Nov. 18-20

  • Two video segments coming up:

    • SCTC – am going to be Steve Leaden’s guest on the Nov. 6 edition of Fireside Chat, where I’ll be reviewing highlights from my recent conferences

    • UC Today – will be a panelist for the November edition of Big UC News

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Watch for commentary about a new market research study I just finished with a vendor in the customer service space

    • New podcast recordings being scheduled now for November in partnership with EM360

    • Just finished another white paper for a leading CCaaS vendor about how AI can be used to elevate CX – should be published during November

    • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the latest e-blast outlining what’s on for the events, the press release announcing the agenda, and Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published – those with my byline will be shared as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… I was a pretty global guy last month, where my airport stops included London, New York, Frankfurt, Johannesburg, Livingstone and Zurich. Not my normal itinerary, and here’s a quick taste of where my travels took me.

First stop, London for the UC Expo – on the Ask the Analyst panel, and at the British Telecom Focus 24 analyst event.

Enroute to Zambia – long layover at Frankfurt. My new best friend for long trips – NapCabs, where you can rent a sleeper pod by the hour – great idea. At the Lufthansa lounge – when in Germany, local beer goes with just about anything.

In Zambia, for the NICE Analyst Summit – the executive Q&A session, with Barry Cooper, Einat Weiss and Barak Eilam. During our safari outing, as he always does, Barak gets a group selfie.

Just a taste of Africa below, and several more photos were in my LinkedIn posts during the event, along with my blog post, which was referenced earlier. First - helicopter view of Victoria Falls – think Niagara Falls, but bigger and more dramatic. Next - my turn to feed the elephants – no doubt this guy is the alpha male for this group.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - October Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

October marks the start of the busy season for technology events, and we provided a preview of what’s coming, namely Jeff Pulver’s new-and-improved VON event, Verint Engage, British Telecom’s Focus analyst event, the UC Expo in London, and NICE’s analyst event in Zambia. Ahead of that we introduced changes coming to the podcast, both for updating the format, and two new channels where WTS can be found – TMCnet, and EM360. On the tech news front, we discussed the implications of Amazon’s new mandate for full-time back to the office – definitely a Watch This Space topic.

  • NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – as mentioned above, we’ve added two new channels for broader distribution. Aside from listening to us talk about, here’s the gist for the updates:

    • For EM360, a dedicated website has been created, and hosts the 10 most recent episode. You can read more about this, along with all the related links in this blog post of mine.

    • For TMC and Future of Work Expo, TMC is now a media sponsor for the podcast. This does not impact our content or topics in any way, but since the podcast is about the future of work, we’ll talk more about the sponsorship in the context of my Future of Work Expo. There’s a natural tie-in here, as the podcast is another way to support the Expo. In return, the podcast is now in regular banner rotation on three of their sites: TMCnet, our Future of Work Expo website, and their Future of Work Newssite. If you visit any of these sites on a regular basis, sooner or later, you will see banners for Watch This Space podcast, where all those clicks link directly to our WTS website.

  • ALSO NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – but less recent - we’ve now added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from September

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – 

    • Sprinklr, Source24, NYC, Sept. 9-11 (unfortunately, I had to cancel last-minute)

    • Verint Engage24, Orlando, FL, Sept. 23-25

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

    • IoT Marketing – short excerpt from my fireside chat session with Tiffani Neilson about AI evolving role in the enterprise

    • Nutun – guest on their Global Experience podcast

    • Parallel Universe – guest on Glenn Goldberg’s podcast – need I say more?

    • EM360 podcast on the AI in the contact center

    • Verint – Blue Room guest interview on LinkedIn about AI and CX

  • Video segment – recorded, but not yet published:

    • Big UC News, recorded Sept. 26

  • White paper – new paper for NICE on digital self-service is published now

  • Awards Judging – am back for the 2024 Talkdesk CX Innovators Awards - entries have closed now, and the judging process is now underway 

  • Writing roundup for September – just one post - here on my blog

  • Media citings – three during September – you can review them here

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during September:

    • I had 14,832 views and 30 posts – very similar to August’s numbers

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 1,832 views

    • Overall, 7 posts had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for October

  • I have three in-person events for October:

    • British Telecom Focus 2024, London, Oct. 1

    • UC Expo, London, Oct. 2-3

    • NICE Analyst Summit, Livingstone, Zambia, Oct. 21-24 

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Watch for commentary about a new market research study I just finished with a vendor in the customer service space

    • Just finished another white paper for a leading CCaaS vendor about how AI can be used to elevate CX

    • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the latest e-blast outlining what’s on for the events, and Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… the time comes for all of us, and it came far too soon for Alan Percy. I can count one, maybe two hands for the people I’ve worked with in this space from the beginning, who I’m still close to. Alan was definitely one of them, and at this point, it’s as much about friendship as being peers in the world of tech. 
Sadly, he had very recently retired, and was ready for the next chapter, but this wasn’t the plan. My partner, Sara and I, spent time with Alan and his family last December, when we drove down from Toronto to see my Patriots play his Bills. They were gracious hosts, and Alan gave us the down-home tour of where the locals go in Buffalo.  
More on Alan’s story here, and am sharing a nice photo of us after eating at the legendary Schawbl’s during our Bills trip. They don’t make eateries like this any more, they don’t make ‘em like Alan any more. RIP, sir.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - September Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

Our September episode began by talking about the best things that came from the summer. In terms of technology, the highlight was how good streaming has become, and how great a showcase the Paris Olympics were for this. From there, Jon talked about the recent NCEC Technology Conference for rural utilities in North Carolina, where he returned as a speaker. He reviewed the challenges and opportunities they face for adopting AI, along with highlights from his session on the use of conversational AI in the contact center. 

  • NEW FOR WATCH THIS SPACE – starting last month, we’ve now added an additional mail-out for newsletter subscribers, specifically about the podcast. In case you don’t check it out now, it will provide more detail about the episode to encourage you to give it a listen then. Watch for that in about a week’s time!

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website.


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from August

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Video segment – recorded and published:  

    • Big UC News – industry roundup, including Microsoft Teams Premium, Avaya’s new CEO and the CrowdStrike outage

  • Webinars

    • NICE - in support of my new white paper for them, Aug. 8

    • VentureBeat – video segment on impact of AI on enterprises, in conversation with Gary Sorrentino from Zoom, moderated by VentureBeat’s Thom Langford, Aug. 19

  • Awards Judging – returning for the 2024 Talkdesk CX Innovators Awards

  • Writing roundup for August – summary of posts is here on my blog

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, they are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – I’ve stopped using Twitter/X for some time – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during August:

    • I had 13,088 views and 25 posts – almost identical to July’s numbers

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 2,093 views

    • Overall, 5 posts had 700+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for September

  • After a travel-light summer, I have two conferences for September: 

    • Sprinklr, Source24, NYC, Sept. 9-11

    • Verint Engage24, Orlando, FL, Sept. 23-25

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • 3 podcast interviews coming in September: with EM360, Nutun, and Glenn Goldberg’s Parallel Universe (all were supposed to run in August)

    • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?
…this what no travel for industry events looks like – at least in August. Our summers are short, and it won’t be long til travel resumes again, so am taking in the moment. Hope you did the same during your off-the-clock time this summer! 

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - August Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

Here’s a taste of what Chris and I had going on the podcast, talking about the Patagonia class action lawsuit for how they’ve been using AI:
            “Using everyday conversations to train AI models raises issues of consent and privacy, and it shows you how disruptive and transformative new technologies can become – and when they hit, they happen big and fast. We’re in so deep now with these technologies, we just can’t walk away.

  • The main focus for our August episode was on the recent Leesman Corporate Real Estate Poll, and the emerging need for enterprise leaders to develop a workplace strategy. Senior management has numerous priorities to manage for their organization to function effectively; such as employee experience, office utilization and cost management, but they lack the tools to develop an integrated strategy. This where AI comes in, not just for integrating disparate elements across the organization, but also to provide the datasets management needs to make decisions and develop strategies. We discussed how there’s an unmet need here, and a possible opportunity for the UCaaS and CCaaS vendors, who are already capturing much of this data with their AI-driven platforms. Our discussion was based on my recent No Jitter article, which includes a link to the Leesman research. Ahead of all this, we opened the episode with a review of recent tech and AI missteps, namely CrowdStrike, Patagonia and Ticketmaster – not just for the risks we’re all exposed to, but also for how dependent we’re becoming on Big Tech.

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the new Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from July

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – none for July, but I had plenty keeping me busy

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

    • Big UC News – industry roundup, including NICE launching UCaaS, state of RingCentral’s partnerships, and Microsoft’s anti-competitive case in the EU

    • Let’s Do Video Boardroom – my first guest spot with David Maldow, talking about the future of UC and contact centers, July 15

    • Intelligent Thinking AI Summit – a virtual IoT event, where I did a fireside chat about AI trends and opportunities with Tiffani Neilson, July 18

  • Video/podcast segments – recorded but not yet published:

    • Big UC News – industry roundup, including MSFT Teams Premium, Avaya layoffs, and implications of CrowdStrike’s mini meltdown, Aug. 1

    • VentureBeat – video segment on impact of AI on enterprises, in conversation with Gary Sorrentino from Zoom, moderated by VentureBeat’s Thom Langford, July 31

  • New kudo – Named a UC All-Star, UC Today, July 11 

  • Writing roundup for July – summary of posts is here on my blog

  • Media citings – there were two for July, listed here

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, the metrics are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – fyi: have now stopped using Twitter/X – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during July:

    • I had 15,863 views and 25 posts – about half of June’s activity, but not surprising given I had no travel, plus a lighter vibe with summer in full swing

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 1,377 views

    • Overall, 8 posts had 500+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for August

  • For conferences, I have one for August - returning to NCEC to speak and be on a fireside chat with Cognigy about the growing role of AI in the contact center for utilities:

    • North Carolina Electric Co-operatives Technologies Conference, Wilmington, NC, Aug. 13-15

  • Active work to keep watch for:

    • Two white papers are complete now, and will be publishing this month, finally – one with Cisco, and one with NICE

    • NICE webinar on August 8, in support of my new white paper for them

    • 3 podcast interviews coming in August: with EM360, Nutun, and Glenn Goldberg’s Parallel Universe

    • Fall is just around the corner, and that means conferences – details coming next month, but for now, I have two events on tap for September – Sprinklr and Verint

    • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

    • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

    • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?
… there’s more to life than being an indie tech analyst, and with our summers being so short, when a cottage opening comes, you have to take it. Sometimes it’s enough just to watch the waves and the clouds go by – with no AI in sight. We had a window for that during July, and another one coming for August – woo hoo!

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - July Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

Both of us attended major industry events during June, with Chris at HPE Discover, and myself at NICE Interactions – both in Las Vegas, as it turns out. HPE and NICE are different companies in different spaces, but both were showcasing how they’re pushing the envelope with AI. Given our focus on future of work and digital transformation, Chris noted the impact of AI-driven network technologies on smart buildings and how that can support return to office. With NICE, I reviewed how their vision for AI is taking us to a world where live and virtual agents will work symbiotically, much like the Digital Centaur that may some day come to transform the workplace. Aside from our take on these events, we took some side roads to expound on Vegas’s unique vibe, and how HPE’s acquisition of Juniper is another example of Big Tech getting bigger.

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the new Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from June

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – two for June, plus a local event:

    • Zoholics – Zoho’s customer event, June 4-5, Austin

    • NICE Interactions 2024 - June 10-12, Las Vegas

    • RingCentral – invited to attend an update session with consultants, June 18, Toronto

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

    • Big UC News – news roundup, including MSFT Teams, Zoom, RingCentral and Avaya – June 12

  • Video/podcast segments – recorded but not yet published:

    • Glenn Goldberg’s soon-to-be-rebooted Parallel Universe Podcast – very fun, coming soon

  • Industry awards judging – in addition to the 2024 UC Awards, I’m doing judging again for Talkdesk’s 2024 CX Innovators Awards

  • Writing roundup for June – summary of posts is here on my blog

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, the metrics are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – fyi: have now stopped using Twitter/X – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during June:

    • I had 34,570 views and 35 posts – a bit lighter than May, but fifth month running with over 25,000 views

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 5,298 views

    • Overall, 4 posts had 1,000+ views, and 14 had 600+ views


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for July

  • For conferences, am happy to report there is no event travel during July!

  • Active work to keep watch for:

  • Two white papers are complete now, and will be publishing soon

  • Big UC News – was part of the latest roundup of industry news, recorded June 28 

  • NICE webinar on August 8, in support of my new white paper for them

  • For my Future of Work Expo event – running next Feb. 11-13 - here’s the Call for Speakers for anyone interested in being on a panel or to propose a new topic

  • This August, I’ll be returning to the North Carolina Electric Cooperatives Technologies Conference in Wilmington, NC for another session on AI use cases – this time with one of the leading conversational AI vendors – details next issue

  • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

  • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?
… that AI is good at some things, and not-so-good at other things? Often at industry events, there will be a sketch artist doing caricatures, and in my experience, some have been good and others awful. Turns out that AI isn’t any different, at least based on the gallery of images it came up with for attendees at NICE Interactions.
At the event, NICE eschewed the sketch artist, and instead, each of us sat in front of an AI device of some sort for about two seconds, and about two more seconds later, came with its vision of you in the future. Sketch artists work pretty fast, but not this fast!

All we had to do was select a persona type – super-heroes were very popular – and AI did the rest. I actually can’t remember the persona I chose, but here’s what it came up with for me. Somehow, I keep getting younger in the future, and I’ll take this guy’s hair over mine any day, but is that really me? I guess this is my post-Apocalypse Fonz look, and if AI feeds me this image often enough, I’ll have to believe it. Are you ready for your AI close-up, or would you rather just stick with a selfie?

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - June Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

With AI moving so quickly - yet without much ROI to speak of – it’s fair to ask if we’re at the beginning or the end with this revolution. For this episode, Jon shared insights from recent events with Zoom and Verint – two companies going all-in with AI. Both are aiming high, solving problems that only AI can handle, and we explore the bigger picture as to whether they will succeed. While they seem to be on the right track, there may be limits to how much automation workers and customers really want, making this another Watch This Space topic. Find out for yourself by checking out our June podcast.

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the new Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from May

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – am finally able to travel again, and I attended two analyst events:

    • Zoom Perspectives, May 20-21, New York City

    • Verint Analyst Days, May 22-23, Dallas

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

    • Big UC News – news roundup, including NEC, Intermedia and Microsoft Copilot – May 2

    • CX Today – in conversation with Content Guru about barriers to cloud adoption – May 13 

    • Ecosmob – Future of VoIP, in conversation with Krunal Patel (also here on YouTube) – May 22

  • Video segments – recorded but not yet published:

    • Big UC News – news roundup, including MSFT Teams, Zoom, RingCentral and Avaya – recorded May 30

  • Industry awards judging – registration for the 2024 UC Awards opened on April 29, and more recently, the roster of judges was profiled – details here

  • Writing roundup for May – a rare month with no public, JAA-bylined posts – largely due to being away for two weeks in Israel 

  • Media citings – none to report for May

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, the metrics are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – fyi: have now stopped using Twitter/X – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during May:

    • I had 40,749 views and 33 posts – about 60% higher than April, largely due my return to travelling 

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 4,750 views

    • Overall, 12 posts had 1,000+ views, and 19 had 500+ 


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for June

  • There are two industry events on the June calendar:

    • Zoholics – Zoho’s customer event, June 4-5, Austin

    • NICE Interactions 2024, June 10-12, Las Vegas

  • Active work to keep watch for:

  • One new white paper will be publishing soon, and another one is in the works now

  • Review articles for both Zoom and Verint events in May – both coming on BCStrategies

  • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

  • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… not too many people are going to Israel right now, but I was there with my partner Sara for almost two weeks in May, mainly on a personal trip. Since it dominated most of my time last month, thought I’d share a few photos here. It’s a change of pace for my newsletter, but hey, there’s more to life than chatbots and video calls – and we’ll get back to that soon enough.

JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review - May Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

For this episode, we explored what technology innovation looks like both in physical and virtual spaces. Just back from the ISC West event, Chris shared how technology is now being applied in the physical security space, and how commercial property managers are thinking about smart buildings. Following that, we reviewed a recent demo I had with Welo, illustrating use cases for virtual workspaces and new forms of visual collaboration. To better envision this, please see the visual in the Hey, Did You Know? section below. Welo isn’t the only player in this space, but this is a good starting point to re-think workspaces as the physical and virtual worlds further overlap.

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the new Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from April

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. Detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog, or posted on my website.

  • Industry events – no travel during April – there were five events on tap that I had to decline, as I was grounded recuperating from foot surgery – life happens, but I’ve got others lined up for May and beyond, so April is really just a blip on this front

  • Video segments – recorded and published:  

    • LinkedIn Live – in conversation with Jeff Pulver

    • LinkedIn Live – in conversation with Doug Green on his Telecom Reseller podcast

    • LinkedIn Live – Enterprise Connect review with BCStrategies

    • Big UC News – Enterprise Connect and other news topics, April 9 

    • UC Today – State of AI in 2024 – interviewed by Kieran Devlin 

    • UC Today – in conversation with Valerie Berezuk of Intermedia

  • Video segments – recorded but not yet published:

    • CX Today – in conversation with Content Guru about barriers to cloud adoption - recorded April 23 

    • Big UC News – news roundup, including NEC, Intermedia and Microsoft Copilot – recorded April 25

  • Webinar – with Enghouse Interactive, about cloud migration for contact centers, April 30

  • Podcast – in the current edition of NICE’s Ignite CX Newsletter, two of my recent podcast interviews were featured

  • Industry awards judging – am back as a judge for the 2024 UC Awards, and registration to submit entries opens April 29, so the process is underway now – details here

  • Writing roundup for April – details here – and if you were to read just one, this would be my choice – The EU AI Act – the Shape of Things to Come

  • Media citings – two citings to report for April

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, the metrics are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – fyi: have now stopped using Twitter/X – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during April:

    • I had 25,727 views and 36 posts – about half of March’s tally, largely due to not travelling to any industry events during April

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 1,006 views

    • Overall, 14 posts had 500+ views 


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for May

  • There are two industry events on the May calendar:

    • Zoom Perspectives, May 20-21, New York City

    • Verint Analyst Days, May 22-23, Dallas

Active work to keep watch for:

  • One new white paper will be publishing soon, and another one is in the works now

  • Three new speaking gigs are in place now, and two others are pending

  • Every so often I get approached to write and publish a book – the latest pitch is getting me thinking about it again – hmm…

  • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

  • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients


Hey, Did You Know?

… visual collaboration and virtual workspaces are things now? Tech never stops evolving, and here’s the screenshot from my recent briefing with Welo, and their approach to this 2D+ form of working. If you give the latest Watch This Space podcast a listen, this image will help you visualize what Chris and I are talking about.

While not as immersive as 3D, it’s richer than 2D, and not as clunky as the Metaverse, which requires annoying headgear and often legless avatars. That world still has a long way to go, at least for enterprise use cases, but players like Welo are here now. First generation platforms like Second Life and web.alive were 10 years too early, but the technology is so much better now, and it’s time to give platforms like Welo a closer look.

’s Communications and Collaboration Review - April Edition

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What’s Up? Part 1- Our Latest Watch This Space Podcast

Having returned from Enterprise Connect the night before, the time was right to talk about takeaways from the 2024 edition, of which there were many. Before talking about how AI has now become the main focus of the event, we felt compelled to put things in perspective first. This conference used to be solely about PBXs – hardware-based telephony – and we reviewed how the communications technology space has been radically transformed in very little time by AI. Digital natives may not find this perspective relevant, but trust us, it is, and we’ll leave it for you to decide after giving our latest episode a listen.

  • For those of you who don’t subscribe to our podcast directly from a commercial platform – you can access it any time here on the new Watch This Space website. Otherwise, the easiest platforms and sources to find WTS are Apple Podcasts, Google Chrome/Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Overcast, iTunes, Spotify and Amazon Music. Believe it or not, we’re also getting found on LinkedIn, Safari, and Alexa-enabled devices. For a more extensive replay archive, you can access all our podcasts here on my JAA website. 


What’s Up? Part 2 – JAA Highlights from March

While the Watch This Space podcast is the main form of original content for this newsletter, Part 2 here is a digest of JAA activities from last month, including my other forms of original content, along with my social media stats. More detail and links for most of these activities can be found on my blog or posted on the website.

  • Industry events – following travel to five industry events in February, I was very happy to have just one event last month, albeit the biggest event of the year in our space:

    • Enterprise Connect, Orlando, March 25-28

    • I spoke on two sessions – one as the leader and presenter, and one as a panelist

  • Podcasts – two were recorded - but one had an audio glitch and needs to be re-done – and another one is still awaiting a recording date:

    • Caller ID Reputation Podcast – I recorded another episode with Gerry Christensen about current KYC issues for managing telecom fraud – see March 19 blog post

    • Kristine Konrad’s new podcast – Innovative Tac-Tips – I’ve been announced as an upcoming guest – recording date TBD

  • Social media highlights - since these stats change every day, the metrics are just a basic snapshot, but they provide a good sense of reach beyond my blog and newsletter. For my business, I use LinkedIn – fyi: have now stopped using Twitter/X – so, here are my approximate tallies for LinkedIn during March:

    • I had 53,832 views and 49 posts – well-above average, mainly due to activity during Enterprise Connect

    • My top LinkedIn post registered 3,048 views

    • Overall, 9 posts had 1,000+ views, and 27 posts had 500+ views 


What's Coming? JAA Outlook for April

Under normal conditions, the road would continue for me in April, as I have five events on the travel calendar. However, I’m having minor foot surgery soon, and will be off my feet for a bit, and definitely no air travel for pretty much the whole month. Too bad, but I’ll be working as usual, and where possible, will follow these events remotely.
Active work to keep watch for:

  • One new white paper will be publishing soon 

  • Continued guest posts coming – some with my byline and some without – will post about these as they are published

  • New projects are in play with several vendors, both current and new clients

  • Several companies I met with at Enterprise Connect are promising prospects, and should lead to new project work very soon


Hey, Did You Know?

… all you need is two minutes to get the gist of what Enterprise Connect was like? Dave Michels and I know how to work a room, and we really should take this on the road. Here’s the link from UC Today on LinkedIn Live with our take – and then some - enjoy.

While I have you, this is a good spot to share some other photos from Enterprise Connect. See anybody you know? Will share more in upcoming articles and posts about the show.
Below: my panel session on the state of speech tech and AI in the enterprise (photo – Dan Miller), at the SCTC booth with Fran Blackburn

NICE sure had a strong presence at the show – speaking of which - Chris Irwin-Dudek and Schevone Johnson, Dan Miller by the sign

I caught Amir Hameed in a good moment while speaking at the RingCentral booth, with Fred Hussey from Aizan and Vonage CEO Niklas Heuveldop, with Doug Green and his ubiquitous Telecom Reseller podcast

Ok, yes, there is some upside to all this gruelling travel – 30-year Highland Park at Jim Burton’s famous scotch/wine tasting event – wow, enjoying a sip looking at the incredible atrium here, tomahawks at the RingCentral reception – yummy!