1. Commitment to Industry Standards and Innovation: You need a vendor that not only is committed to industry standards, but also offers superior technology to keep you ahead of the curve.

2. First-Class Support and Reliability:  You need a vendor that offers a reliable, high-quality system with automatic monitoring and dedicated 24-hour customer support to quell issues whenever they arise.   

3. Consistent User Experience: You need UC solution offers a wide range of features including video conferencing, instant messaging, find me/follow me call forwarding and much more.

4. Disaster Recovery: You need a UC solutions that harnesses the power of the cloud to keep the lines of communication open, even in the event of a disaster.  Examples include automatic call forwarding to remote locations and cell phones, voicemail access from email, and the ability to connect two Internet circuits on-site for extra security.

5. Simplicity: You need a UC provider with national footprint to provide all of the lines to an entire nationwide company, instead of acquiring separate phone lines at each location from local providers.