Consistency Matters: Solving Everyday Collaboration Challenges at Axiom Consultants 

Customer Profile

Axiom Consultants – a Ruekert & Mielke Company, is a multidisciplinary engineering firm providing civil, structural, mechanical, and electrical engineering services based in Iowa and Wisconsin. The firm works with municipalities, businesses, institutions, and commercial developers to deliver engineering services and projects across a wide range of industries.

The firm's primary conference room serves as a central collaboration space for design teams, client meetings, consultations, and hybrid work. Used multiple times each day, the room plays a critical role in keeping internal teams connected and maintaining productive interactions with clients and partners.

Challenge

Axiom's conference room was equipped with an existing video conferencing setup consisting of a display, laptop-based connectivity, and a tabletop video conferencing device. While the room met basic conferencing needs, the experience could be unpredictable. Employees connected using a variety of laptops and peripherals, and meeting performance often varied from one call to the next.

Located at one of the busiest intersections in Iowa City, the space features glass walls on multiple sides and is exposed to significant ambient noise from outside. While video performance was generally adequate, the existing system frequently struggled to deliver clear, reliable audio for remote participants in this acoustically challenging environment.

This became increasingly frustrating for a team that relied heavily on the room for collaboration with internal teams and clients. As Rob Decker, Driector of Development at Axiom Consultants, explained, "Sometimes it was working, sometimes it wasn't. There wasn't real consistency there."

For Axiom, reliability and adaptable sound quality became the driving factor in its search for a new conferencing solution. "We go in and out of the room a lot and just want it to be very consistent," said Decker.

The team set out to find a solution that would simplify the meeting experience, improve audio quality, and provide dependable performance for employees, clients, and project partners.

Solution

As Axiom evaluated potential solutions, the team focused on many of the same factors that matter to small and midsize businesses: reliability, ease of use, and minimizing ongoing support requirements. Beyond improving audio performance, the team wanted a solution employees could adopt quickly and use confidently every day. After evaluating several conferencing options, Axiom selected the Shure IntelliMix Room Kit 50.

The decision was driven by Shure's reputation for audio performance, the system's complete solution offering, and its ability to address the room's unique acoustic challenges. The team also valued access to responsive support and the flexibility to fine-tune audio settings as needed. Ease of deployment and day-to-day management were important considerations alongside performance.

The installation was straightforward, as Colton Krumm, Senior Electrical Designer at Axiom Consultants, explained, "It was extremely simple. Everything you needed was provided. It took me, including fishing wires through the wall and ceiling, around three hours to actually be up and running." Once network settings were configured, the room was immediately available for use.

The team also began using ShureCloud to remotely manage updates and audio settings, making it easier to keep the system up and running while minimizing the time spent on administration.

The IntelliMix Room Kit delivered the consistency Axiom was looking for while simplifying the meeting experience for both users and administrators.

Impact and Results

Since deploying the IntelliMix Room Kit, the new conference room experience has directly addressed the challenges that led to the upgrade. Meetings are now more consistent, easier to start, and deliver significantly clearer audio for both in-room and remote participants.

"The audio is crisp, clean and has great sensitivity. Background noise is negligible, and call experiences are greatly enhanced. It’s super clear," said Decker.

Employees and remote participants can now focus on the conversation rather than the technology. Team members join calls with ease, collaborate more effectively with remote colleagues, and spend less time troubleshooting. The result is a smoother collaboration experience that supports the firm's day-to-day operations.

For Axiom, the biggest benefit has been achieving the consistency the team was looking for: a meeting space that works reliably regardless of who is using it or where participants are joining from. By prioritizing simplicity, reliability, and user experience, the firm created a collaboration space that employees readily adopted, requires minimal ongoing support, and performs consistently in a challenging real-world environment.