On Saint Valentine’s Day, we muse on two prevalent models of love.
From their earliest memories, little girls are raised on the fairy-tale promise of that perfect prince to marry for keeps and live happily ever after. Little boys… not so much.
Throughout history, there have been two prevailing approaches to romance. First, you have your “Committers,” who bought into the fairy tale. These are the ones who prefer to make that upfront capital investment in the shindig, the dress and the honeymoon, knowing that the spouse is theirs to keep and — for only modest additional investments in maintenance — to provide a feature-rich lifetime of marital bliss.
Then you have your “Keeping Options Open” types. These are the ones who don’t want to lock in when the future is uncertain. They would rather invest in an ongoing series of first and second dates in exchange for the freedom and flexibility to change their minds and upgrade whenever a better model comes along. Perfectly sensible. Different approaches suit different needs.
The same is true of business strategies. The “Committers” and the “Keeping Options Open” types will embrace different approaches. Do you go franchise or independent? Buy or lease? Hire or outsource?
The right choices will depend on multiple factors. Which works better on the books: an upfront capital expense or an ongoing operating expense? Is this a core competency that needs to be in-house or a support capability that is better outsourced? Do you expect big fluctuations in business demand and capacity by season or over time? The answers will guide whether it makes sense for your business to be a “Committer” or a “Keeping Options Open” type when deciding whether to buy equipment, hire staff and so on.
We think you should be able to choose either approach when it comes to your business telephone system as well. With Toshiba’s Strata® CIX™ and IPedge® systems, you can own and manage your own on-site PBX and enjoy a lifetime of business communications. But you don’t have to.
As momma was reading the fairy tales to her girls, she was telling her boys, “Why buy the cow when you can get the milk delivered to the doorstep for a modest pay-as-you-go fee?” You don’t have to feed and care for the animal when all you need is the milk and cheese — and who can predict how much of that you’ll need in two years or five years?
For those who ask such questions, Toshiba offers its award-winning IPedge® business communications system in its cloud-based VIPedge™ solution. With VIPedge, you get the functionality of an on-premise IPedge system, but instead of marrying into the deal through purchase or lease, you simply pay a monthly service fee based on size and usage. You automatically get the benefit of upgrades as they come along.
It may be less romantic than the fairy tale, but it just might be the right model for your business.
“For more information visit: www.telecom.toshiba.com”
