Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C, a distinguished Wisconsin law firm, has been providing litigation and transactional legal services to businesses and individuals in the Midwest for over 150 years. Having survived many of history’s most challenging times, they were now faced with a unique challenge specific to today’s digital world.
Due to the collaborative nature of the legal industry, efficient and clear communication among the law firm’s team of shareholders, associates, and administrative staff is extremely imperative to maintain on an ongoing basis. Although the firm is already successful and well respected among their peers, they needed to equip those in the organization with the proper tools to prevent the rise of modern advancements in communication technology from becoming a competitive disadvantage in today’s on-demand business culture.
The Need to Remove an Inefficient Communications System
With an outdated onsite PBX phone system which had reached its end of life support, Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C decided to take the opportunity to start researching various systems. The law firm knew they wanted to update their communications infrastructure to eliminate existing inefficiencies, but wasn't exactly sure the best approach. After looking at multiple vendors, they chose Mitel as their unified communications and phone systems provider of choice.
“We knew we wanted to go with a Mitel solution, but we didn’t know exactly how to get to where we wanted to go,” stated Pamela Zacharias, Firm Administrator for Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C. “After reaching out to various Mitel channel partners in the Wisconsin area, we chose CT-Pros to help guide us through the whole implementation process. I heard a lot of positive feedback about them when I asked around; Our IT manager liked that they are a Platinum partner with numerous awards. CT-Pros’s solid relationship with Mitel and complete knowledge of the product line ultimately sold us on partnering with CT-Pros.”
Moving from an Onsite PBX to Mitel MiCloud Connect Proves Best Choice
After an initial meeting with CT-Pros, a full consultative evaluation was performed to review the law firm’s short and long term goals as well as an in-depth assessment of their current infrastructure. Together they agreed that Mitel's hosted VoIP solution, Connect Cloud, was the best option for the company rather than investing in another onsite PBX.
“Even though Meissner Tierney had the manpower to administer another onsite PBX, it would have led to much higher upfront costs due to licenses and hardware infrastructure which could have easily run into the tens of thousands of dollars,” comments Scott Dressel, Major Accounts Rep for CT-Pros. “Since MiCloud Connect is a hosted PBX system which resides on Mitel's secure servers, system updates and upgrades are handled by Mitel making onsite maintenance for Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C virtually hassle-free.”
Mitel Mobility App Installed on Shareholder Mobile Devices
One of the top priorities was for the firm’s lawyers to easily conduct common daily business tasks regardless if they were inside or outside of the office. Having to return to the office or coordinate with a co-worker in the office was prone to delays and sometimes cumbersome at best.
To address this issue, CT-Pros installed the Mitel Mobility app on the mobile devices belonging to each user who needed the advanced mobility functionality. Mobility users could now conduct business calls and interviews remotely from their cell phones, schedule and attend conference calls whenever needed, check user availability, and transfer calls to co-workers by typing in their extensions, just as if they were using the desk phone in their office.
“Because much of an attorney’s day can be spent out of the office in meetings with clients, mobility is a huge issue for our attorneys. After being on the old system for so many years and being used to the old way of doing things, it is taking awhile for everyone to understand and appreciate all the new features we didn’t have before. But, slowly, as with any change, the benefits are really beginning to be realized, and I am very happy about that,” states Pamela Zacharias.
Mobility App Turns Personal Cell Phone into Business Phone Without Compromising Privacy
Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C mobility users can now increase out of office productivity by making and receive calls using their personal cell phones without exposing their personal cell number. That’s because when using the Mitel Mobility app, outbound caller ID is masked with their office number, thereby preventing their personal cell number from being displayed. This protects the user’s privacy while maintaining a professional identity.
Calls and appointments that once could only be conducted from an office phone are no longer bound to such restrictions. With the mobility app, users can get more done in less time with greater efficiently.
"I AM GRATEFUL THAT CT-PROS TOOK THE TIME TO NOT ONLY HELP
US RECOGNIZE THE BENEFITS OF MOVING TO MITEL MICLOUD CONNECT, BUT THAT THEY
WALKED US THROUGH THE ENTIRE PROCESS FROM START TO FINISH."
Pamela Zacharias, Firm Administrator
Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C
Users No Longer Have to Check Voicemail Manually
To further exploit the benefits of mobility, Zacharias comments, “Users now receive voicemails along with a transcription directly to their email which allows them to be more productive while out of the office. They no longer have to take the time to manually call into the office just to check voicemail. Also, they can read the transcript to decide if the voicemail is the one they want to address immediately. Being able to look at the history of calls, which includes the length of the telephone call, on the phone or in the app has already proved to be helpful for timekeeping.”
The law office uses Scribe, a transcription service by Mitel which converts each voicemail message into email text. Users can still listen to the voicemail which is attached as an audio file.
Conducting Conference Calls is Greatly Simplified
Since conference calls are a regular occurrence at the law firm, one of the most popular features is conveniently setting up conference calls on the fly, anytime and from anywhere. The days of clunky and time-consuming third party conference call setups are now an issue of the past thanks to Mitel's truly unified communications solution where meetings are configured with just a few clicks of a button.
“With their previous system, if someone was on a call and wanted to transfer it to another person in the office, they had to park the call, then call the receptionist and have her send the call to the appropriate person,” explains Scott Dressel. “Now with Mitel's UC system, all they have to do is push a button, dial that person’s extension, tell them they have a call, and then merge the call. It’s far simpler and saves everyone in their office a lot of time.”
Bringing Mobility Home Thanks to VoIP
Mobility, however, isn’t restricted to extending desktop phone functionality to a mobile device. One of the advantages of a cloud-based PBX system is that shareholders can conveniently set up a remote location, such as a home office, without sacrificing the look and feel of being at their desk in the office.
Users simply plug in the additional desk phone at their remote location pre-configured with the same settings and features as their office desk phone. Features such as caller ID, transfer, one touch support and more are all automatically made available, basically making the remote desk phone a mirror image of their handheld desk phone at the office.
By moving to a cloud-based solution, Meissner Tierney Fisher & Nichols S.C has been able to remove business communications inefficiencies and equip their shareholders and employees with the right tools to conveniently get more tasks accomplished with greater ease and in less time. The Wisconsin law firm is now well positioned to face the communications challenges encountered by an on-demand culture both for today and for years to come.
“I am grateful that CT-Pros took the time to not only help us recognize the benefits of moving to Mitel MiCloud Connect but that they walked us through the entire process from start to finish...answering my non-stop barrage of questions and concerns,” concludes Zacharias. “We are confident that our new system will continue to prove to be a time and effort saver as we continue to excel at meeting the demands of our clients far into the future.”