The role of the IT department in many businesses has expanded to increasingly take on responsibility for voice communications and telecoms, a survey of IT managers has found.
When questioned, 52% of respondents admitted that they believed the responsibility for voice communications now fell under their jurisdiction.
The study also showed a serious lack of knowledge within organisations concerning their corporate telecoms provisions, with 35% of respondents saying that they didn’t know whether their company used a single network for voice and data, or shared the load across different solutions.
Charlie Whelpton, Director of Unified Communications at Timico, said: "In times gone by, telecoms was a responsibility which needed the dedicated support of specific staff members. Now the line between IT and telecoms has become so blurred that telecoms management is often falling onto the shoulders of IT managers, especially in SMBs.
"In many cases, IT managers are already facing demanding and complex workloads, so adding telecoms is an added strain on resources. This not only means that IT managers could be missing out on the best deals – like migrating to SIP instead of relying on IDSN lines – but could also open businesses up to dangerous and costly mistakes, like PBX phone hacking. "
The survey also found that this crossover could be putting businesses at risk of serious risks, such as PBX phone fraud, whereby hackers gain access to company phone lines and rig them to make costly phone calls. Overall, it found 54% of IT managers were unaware that PBX phone fraud even existed, exposing a worrying situation for companies where the two roles were combined.
"Savvy businesses should recognise the importance of telecoms and should be providing the resource for their IT managers to explore new trends," Whelpton added.
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The survey was carried out by unified communications provider Timico, which announced earlier this week that it would be withdrawing its IPO, due to take place this Friday in London.
The company blamed waning investor appetite for smaller companies coming to market in particular, according to The Times.
"We have a duty to our existing shareholders to ensure that the success of our IPO is not eroded by recent IPOs performing less well than expected and hence have made the decision to postpone our process," Timico Chief Executive Tim Radford said.
