Avaya IP Office Deployment Best Practices
5 Steps for a successful cut
In this post, “Avaya IP Office – 5 Steps for a successful implementation,” I walk you through 5 quick steps to make your installation simpler. No matter how big or small of a deployment, you learn how to align your teammates, and develop procedures to help you deploy the IP Office installation.
Early June of 2015, I was assigned to deploy an Avaya IP Office with 142 phones for an Assisted Living Facility here in West Florida. This particular customer was upgrading a Nortel System to a brand spanking new IP500V2, with capacity for digital, IPDECT, and Analog endpoints. This particular installation presented a big challenge, because someone else had started the implementation, and had missed collecting vital information. In this post I walk you through how to manage, and gather all of the pieces and put them together.
The following are the Avaya IP Office installation steps=
- 1.- Installation Prerequisites
- 2.- Putting the pieces together
- 3.- Be a better lead technician
- 4.- Dealing with the inevitable
- 5.- Keeping your customer happy
1.- Installation Prerequisites
Even though this post is about Avaya IP Office, it is suitable for any type of system deployment.
You want to start with inventorying the system, analyzing the cabling infrastructure, and finally go over the room environment.
Inventorying the system – When receiving the Avaya IP Office telecommunication equipment make sure set aside the phones, IP Office Control Units, cables, and other components. By grouping the different types of hardware, makes it easier to inventory. Find a large conference room and unbox the equipment. It is a good idea to bring the site contact to help you inventory the equipment.
Compare and assess – Now that you have a full count of components to be installed, it is time for you to get with your site contact and confirm that you have the right amount of devices ordered to accommodate any existing and new endpoints. This is true for offices, cubicles, common areas like lunch rooms, copy rooms, door phones, intercom units, paging, side cars, fax machines, etc.
In my case, I was deploying an Avaya IP Office with capacity for 66 digital, 72 analogs, and 4 SIP Phones. It was important to identify who was getting digital versus analog phones. Between the digital sets I also had a couple of administrator larger phones.
Analyze the cabling infrastructure – Open a couple of jacks in difference areas of the building to understand how the wiring is connected back to the intermediate distribution frame (IDF). See if they are using the right amount of cables to make your new phones work properly.
Environmentals – Check for building grounding, surge protectors, battery backups, as well as HVAC (Heating, Ventilating, Air Conditioning).
2.- Putting the pieces together
In this section learn the process of installing the Avaya IP Office. Techniques to make your installation easier, and how to install the necessary hardware to interconnect the existing cabling to the new Avaya IP Office. By following the process of:
Rack and Stack – Before deciding where to place the Avaya IP Office system, check the length of the patch cords provided by your team. This will give a better idea where to place each IP Office Expansion Module.
Wire Management – take into consideration where each wire management is going to be installed, and keep in mind the length required for each patch cord.
I will suggest installing a 1U Wire Manager between each IP Office Modules.
Station Cabling – Because the Avaya IP Office use modular connectors, you might need to extend the MDF wall-field to the IP Office rack. This can be accomplished by running a couple of amphenol cables terminated to 48 port patch panels in one end, and 66 hardware block in the other. For newer deployments you might find the cabling already terminated and certified directly into the Voice Rack.
Phone stacking – Keeping the same kind of phones within a general area helps you separate and later distribute the phones efficiently. I normally stack them by ten by ten (up and across). Keeping the serial number facing you. Having the labels and serial numbers can help if one of phones come defective.
Phone layout – Try to find a cart to put the phones in. grab a box to put line cords, and any other components to be added to the phones. With a floor-plan mark as you go.
Configuration and Programming – For Analog, and Digital stations, make sure that you have all the users created, then remove all the extension numbers from the Extension Tree Option. By leaving the extension blank, it will allow you to install your patch cords to patch panel ports with ease without having to worry about IP Office Port Location. Your main focus is to keep the patch panel and wiring clean and easy to maintain. Once you have installed all the patch cords, made all of the connections, it’s time to number all of your ports.
Numbering the extension ports – The best way to do this, it is by patching each patch panel port matching the 66 block or 110 block pins or positions. In other words, if you are using a 48 port patch panel, a 66 block will only be useful from ports 1 through 24, port 25 in the patch panel will be assigned to the other side of the 66 block, or 110 block. Once you understand how the ports are connected, it’s time to start assigning extension numbers to the IP Office Expansion Modules.
Associating ports to stations and their location – As you finish making the connections for the existing digital ports, it is time for you to walk around the office, writing down each Logic-ID displayed on those digital phones with un-assigned extensions. Associate the logic-ID with the corresponding station number based on your floor-plan and cut-sheet, and assign each corresponding extension through the Manager Program.
Testing – Design a test plan based on each installation that you are implementing. Start by checking each phone, test inbound/outbound calls, check voicemail pilot numbers, mailboxes, general mailboxes, automated attendants, File/Time/Email Servers.
3.- Be a better lead technician
When working with others, it’s very important to keep alignment with your team, from Project Managers, Sales Engineers, Sub-contractors, and the customer. Always keep in mind to:
Contact – It is very important to be accessible, and be able to answer teammates whenever they have questions. It is your responsibility to contact each person involved in the project.
Communicate – Always present your ideas to the team. Ask for updates through out the installation. In my case, I dealt with two sub-contractors and had a very hard time getting updates from one of them, making it very hard for me to relay updates to the rest of my teammates. If you don’t communicate your ideas to your teammates, they will make decisions on their own. Don’t let them guess, and assign them tasks.
Connect – Check that your teammates understand what their responsibilities are. Make them accountable for their assignments, providing you periodic updates.
4.- Dealing with the inevitable
Each installation will be different. You have to learn to adjust to changes, and challenges as they will be presented to you as an installer. Here, I will walk you through how to cope with some challenges:
Missing Parts or Hardware – I had a couple of obstacles with this install, from a bad server, which crashed in the middle of the implementation. to missing 30% of my patch cords, due to a design flaw. So, how did I deal with these two primary issues?
Bad Server – I immediately contacted my colleagues to make them aware, and they were able to update the customer and provide him different solutions. Lucky for me, I received a replacement server the following day.
Missing Hardware – I made several attempts to get the parts delivered, but nobody was doing a thing, leaving me with no other option than to take it upon myself to go to the hardware store and gather all the required parts to make this a successful instal. I then was able to expense it.
In case that you don’t have the funds necessary, find out if your company has a store account or line of credit to allow you to use that instead. The idea here is to be proactive.
5.- Keep your customer happy
We get so busy that we might forget the essentials. We are installing this new system to a someone who actually bought the thing. Our first goal is keeping our customer happy. This is done by providing updates, listening, and adjusting our workflows to make things easier for him.
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