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At least, that's my take on the biannual networking study from research house TheInfoPro, released today.

(Earlier today, I discussed another aspect of this study, dealing with why more enterprises aren't jumping on fast 802.11n WiFi networking. Check it out here!)

As usual, the survey's press release put a more positive spin on the results:

That's all fine and good, but we've been hearing the same upbeat message for years. And I still don't see UC making real inroads into the enterprise, at least not under that name.

Instead, more and more enterprises are implementing individual -- and obvious -- UC features like email, and instant messaging, and so on. Meanwhile, individuals are pulling together home-brew UC by cobbling together various consumer services -- including Google, which does a good job of providing many UC components, particularly Google Voice.

But when was the last time you heard about a big enterprise Unified Communications initiative? I thought so.

So I asked Bill Trussell, managing director of networking research for TheInfoPro, about the disconnect between my understanding and the research numbers quoted above. Trussell acknowledged UC's "confusing feature set," asking, "What is the key capability to make it enough of a business process improvement to make it noticeable and of interest to the CFO?"

Good question.

Turns out that UC's benefits often come in widespread, generalized, and hard-to-quantify productivity gains for all users. And which enterprise department is going to volunteer to put that on its budget? "The lack of hard business case justifications has really been the impediment," Trussell said. "We don't see success in organizations that have to do those sorts of soft justifications."

Instead, Trussell noted, UC has had to find its way into the enterprise riding on the coattails of new VoIP installations or brick-and-mortar projects, where UC represents only a small incremental cost on a larger project.

Once UC gets its foot in the door, though, Trussell claimed, the survey shows that business managers like it and quickly become dependent on it. UC proponents just need to "get the snowball rolling downhill," Trussell said.

I'm not so sure. While I fully embrace many of the technology components that go into Unified Communications, putting them all together often feels like overkill instead of efficiency, forcing me to change the way I work to take advantage of the technology. Of course, that could be an indictment of the UC systems I've used more than that concept itself, but it's still a red flag.

So if you ask me, CIOs might be better off increasing communications capability incrementally -- as opposed to shelling out big bucks for a comprehensive UC solution that no one really wants or needs.