SMART Technologies, makers of the innovative SMART Board system which made white boards interactive, announces the SMART Room System. The SMART Room was introduced today at Enterprise Connect.

I talked with Mike Piha the founder and CEO of In2Change, Silicon Valley’s leading enterprise office designer about the innovation from SMART.  “This is a “Game-Changer” in the UC&C industry. … it will provide efficient, fast and seamless voice, data and video collaboration to meetings, our Silicon Valley customers have been waiting for this solution for years!”

In2change have been designing and furnishing offices in Silicon Valley for years and according to Piha the modernization of connected collaboration technology is the top priority for CEOs and facilities managers. “Companies have to have an active and collaborative work environment that can be viable in today’s smart phone and mobile workforce and customer bases” say Piha.

Dealing with remote employees and remote customers is the top priority for CEOs. Just last month Yahoo’s new CEO Maria Mayer came under fire for eliminating the work at home program at Yahoo.

In today’s tight job market, some of the remote workers will comply with Mayer’s new policy, but many of the productive ones in that group, especially those attracted by the firm’s former flexibility, will now feel alienated from the organization and may leave. The lack of policies to support employees’ personal lives in this new model, such as high-quality on-site day care, also has negative consequences. Remote workers who may have been willing to trade flexibility for other forms of personal support are now likely to leave or stay and struggle with the new requirement. And prospective employees who may have been willing to work on site but don’t want to sacrifice their personal lives are likely to look for a job elsewhere. Together, these responses may mean that Yahoo will be full of ex-remote workers who don’t want to be there. This will do nothing to remedy the productivity and collaboration problem Mayer says she’s facing in the ultra-competitive high tech industry.

Top tech companies in Silicon Valley and around the world are investing in tools like SMART Boards and soon SMART Rooms.  SMART worked directly with Microsoft to develop the turnkey solution for meeting rooms that simplifies the collaboration experience for both virtual and face-to-face participants and provides seamless online collaboration through sharing of real-time video, voice and data.

As the smarter workplace that In2Change services continues to be more connected, Piha expects that this is just the beginning in a modern overall of the notion of furniture and facilities planning. Employee retention will be part of the design equation.