There is an old saying attributed to Henry Ford, explaining why he didn’t wait for consumers to tell him that they needed automobiles.
“If I asked them what they wanted, they would have said ‘faster horses,” he said.
Some people use that quote as proof that amazing things only come about through the vision of innovators. And this same philosophy is guiding Lumen Technologies and its customers through the 4th Industrial Revolution. I also see Innovation as a learning opportunity, because often we don’t know how customers will define what they consider amazing.
Innovation as a Pandora’s Box
Our network provides a platform for “amazing things,” because innovation is like a Pandora’s Box. Once it is unleashed, no one can say for sure how it will be used. Every customer can take Lumen technological solutions and use them in ways that we may have never considered. It supports solutions that rapidly adapt to the changing connectivity and capacity needs of any enterprise.
Our adaptability is our strength, and we can rely upon the intelligence built into our platform, so we can learn how our customers are using these tools, and then adjust quickly to these learnings.
One of those learnings is a growing desire by customers to have “real-time” control over the purchasing, configuration, and management of their networking, security, cloud and communications solutions. This fall, Lumen announced its self-service online digital interaction interface, Control Center, for enterprises to do just that.
“Through an online portal, businesses can easily price and order products on demand. This do-it-yourself experience is one that clients have been requesting to help them become responsive to their specific needs,” said Shaun Andrews, Lumen chief marketing officer, in the news release announcing this new offer. “The quick deployment of services can help businesses do amazing things in the 4th Industrial Revolution.”
Self-Service and the Remote Workplace
I recently participated in a Cisco-sponsored session around the “Future of Work.” The growing acceptance of remote or hybrid work arrangements reflects a corporate willingness to take a new look at how they will approach their networking needs.
Adaptive networking helps transform the office from a series of fixed corporate locations to any location where employees call home or can work. In a very short period of time, we have moved from a predominantly “work from office” landscape to work from home in the height of the pandemic to work from anywhere. And as you move farther and farther from the ‘fixed’ premise, trust becomes even more important, because companies need to know their solutions and data will be delivered as promised and in a secure way.
Late adopters to new technologies were caught off guard by the pandemic, because institutional constraints hampered their abilities to adjust to changing network needs. Lumen self-service solutions allow them to develop a corporate culture around empowerment and prepare their workforces for the change today, tomorrow or the future.
The intelligence within our network makes it secure and helps ensure the performance our customers want and their data requires. It supports an environment in which members of the workforce can acquire, analyze and act upon data fast.
Ford may have been right. From time to time, companies do want “faster horses” to meet their perceived needs, but Lumen Technologies provides the platform for innovation that meets the needs of tomorrow. Through our adaptive networks, we make it easier for them to get all the speed and performance they need, when they need it, where they need it and how they need it.
Learn more about how Lumen collaboration solutions can help your employees stay connected whether working from home or in the office.
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