No more worries: Gil Betz chose a managed services approach to upgrade the Louisville Metro United Way voice network.

The more Gil Betz listened to the speakers at a national United Way Community Leaders Conference, the more excited he became. In his role as chief operating officer of Metro United Way, the more worried he became, too.

What excited him was hearing about United Way's increased focus on direct problem solving, in addition to find raising. United Way organizations around the country are now working to identify the underlying causes of the most significant local issues and then develop strategies to solve them, as well as pull together the necessary financial and human resources to do so.

What worried him was that he could see how Metro United Way's staff would be spending more time out in the greater Louisville, Ky., area it serves. Metro United Way's phone system and other communications technologies, however, were not ready to support a more mobile staff that also needed to be even more connected. "The current system just didn't provide the flexibility we needed to achieve our mission," says Betz.

"We had some very specific requirements," recalls Betz of the long search process that followed. "We have 62 users, spread across three locations, but also working from the road and from home. That meant we needed mobility-enhancing tools. Things like office handsets that would also work from home or on the road, softphones that would turn portable PCs into office phones, a webinar platform for collaborating from different locations, and personal conference bridges for on-demand conference calls."

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Mobile staff members also needed to stay connected to Metro United Way's computer systems, files and applications. In particular, they required secure, remote access to platforms such as Andar/360, United Way's fund raising, funds-distribution, volunteer-management, marketing, and event-management and community relationship-management software.

Despite these specific needs, Metro United Way did not want to consume precious resources managing everything. "We didn't want to be in the telephone business," continues Betz. "We needed a provider that could give us a high level of support and system uptime, while getting us out of the business of doing it ourselves. We needed a provider that could craft their solution in such a way that we maintained our relationship with our current carrier, who is a longtime and very important Untied Way supporter."

United Way's decision process started with four providers and quickly narrowed to two. Staff did detailed due diligence on both, including site visits and reference checks. Ultimately, the organization chose Smoothstone IP Communications' SmoothstoneCOMPLETE--a managed suite of services that encompasses equipment, applications, professional expertise and carrier services management.

Installation began with Smoothstone working with BellSouth/AT&T, the incumbent carrier and United Way supporter, for each of Metro United Way's three locations. Smoothstone partners with such circuit providers to provide private, dedicated IP circuits between each of its client locations and Smoothstone's private, nationwide, IP-over-MPLS network.

At the main location, two T-1s terminate to a Cisco 2800 series router, which is part of that location's Cisco switched infrastructure-based LAN. Metro United Way's two satellite locations are configured the same way, except their single T-1s terminate to Cisco 1700 series routers. With this WAN configuration in place, Smoothstone is Metro United Way's point-to-point WAN provider, as well as its communications services provider.

From these dedicated routers, all communications (data, voice, video and Internet access) within each location are carried across that location's fully converged LAN. Each Metro United Way staff member has a Cisco 7960 handset connected to her location's LAN and each PC now connects to a Cisco handset.

Other than a Cisco router, LAN switches and handsets, there is no other communications--related equipment at Metro United Way's locations--no PBX, no local phone gateways, no voice mail server. All of the call switching, phone features and access to communications applications and tools are delivered from Smoothstone's network, over the non-channelized, private IP connections.

Metro Untied Way pays a monthly charge per user (approximately $40 per month) for the entire package of services (telephone, WAN and Internet, plus access to Smoothstone's communications management and collaboration applications and tools).

According to Betz, Metro Untied Way achieved its goal of not being "in the phone business." Now, if any member of the Metro United Way's staff has a question or a problem with any communications tool or application, they call Smoothstone. Even if the root cause of the problem is actually an issue with a piece of Cisco equipment or a problem with a BellSouth/AT&T circuit, calls still go to Smoothstone, which works with the appropriate vendor to solve the problem.

As important as this "one number to call" customer service model was to Metro United Way, so were the tools and applications the staff needed to do their jobs. "Each staff member can now tailor his or her phone and other communication tools to make them as productive as possible," says Betz. "For example, through a personal phone-control Web portal, our staff members can set up call-handling rules by time of day, day of week and incoming number. They never miss a call, and calls of different priorities are handled accordingly. It's like everyone has their own personal phone system."

Each United Way staff member now has a direct inward dial phone number, as well as a dedicated fax number to receive private faxes. Staff also has unlimited local calling, toll-flee calling between Metro United Way locations, and a full set of call-handling features, such as transfer, forward and do not disturb, through their handsets.

Staff can also initiate conference calls, for up to five total parties, directly from their handsets, by simply adding more parties to an existing call. For larger conference calls, staff has access to a Web portal for scheduling and notifying the invitees by e-mail. Employees also have access to a webinar platform that enables them to share files, applications and even their entire PC desktops with anyone else who has an Internet connection. This webinar platform also supports desktop-to-desktop videoconferencing, chat and audience polling.

Finally, Metro United Way executives and other key staff members can have their own, dedicated, toll-free, personal conference line phone numbers. This enables them to initiate conference calls from any phone, by just having all participants dial into their personal conference line--anytime, from anywhere. Staff members also now have unified messaging, which enables them to view faxes and voice mails delivered as e-mail attachments.

For those staff members who need access to their phone from the road, they can use Smoothstone's softphone software to turn their PCs into office phones, with all of the same functionality and dialing rules. Or they can take their office handset with them and plug it into any Internet connection and use it just like they were sitting in their office.

For the Metro United Way organization itself, an important service was 211 call center support. In Metro United Way's service area, people looking for help, but do not know which social service to contact or how to do so, can dial 211 to reach a Metro United Way representative who will guide them to the services they need. Smoothstone provides this call center functionality, which includes a broad set of call-routing possibilities, including to home-based agents.

If a Metro United Way location or staff member cannot be reached, calls automatically roll over to other 211 centers. The next step, for which Metro United Way has asked Smoothstone to propose a solution, is to integrate three presently separate 211 call centers onto one network and platform, to provide a single, seamless solution throughout the state.

Nevertheless, for a not-for-profit focused on stretching every last dollar as far as it can go to help its community, all of these features would not have mattered had the overall price not been right. "Smoothstone's solution was 15 percent less per month than the other solution we considered," says Betz. "The possibility of being able to take dollars out of our communications budget and redeploy them into our community was very attractive."

Still, there was lingering uncertainty among Metro United Way's decision makers. "The decision process took us nearly a year," says Betz. "There were a lot of moving parts involved--new technologies, an important donor relationship to maintain and a relatively unknown vendor. Going with a less-familiar name was definitely a risk."

Betz countered some of this uncertainly by pointing out that Smoothstone is a national provider itself, with client locations in nearly 40 states and a private, nationwide, MPLS network. Nevertheless, he knew that he was setting himself up for some criticism if things did not go well.

The criticism never came. "Once we finally decided to move forward, the implementation itself was easy," Betz explains.

ABOUT SMOOTHSTONE

Founded in 2000, Smoothstone IP Communications is a provider of managed enterprise IP communications to midsize organizations, with client locations in approximately 40 states. The company uses a "professional services approach" to create customized solutions, based on each client's specific needs and current communications infrastructure already in place. Smoothstone's offerings include managed, hosted IP communications, as well as IP and TDM voice trunking to on-premise phone systems, WAN services, and collaboration and communications management tools.

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Paul Borgman, chief executive officer, manages Smoothstone's strategic planning and implementation, sales, marketing and operating processes. Borgman received a BS in economics from the University of Louisville and an MBA from Bellarmine University.