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 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.