The fast-spreading COVID-19 virus has forced millions of workers to w*************, with no immediate end in sight. While some companies have announced w************* options till the end of the year, others have gone to the extent of allowing workers to w************* permanently. As most co-workers wait for their lives to resume to normalcy, experts believe this may not include going back to an office. For the corporates, it brings its own set of challenges including:
Collaboration
One of the fundamental pillars of business is collaboration.
Collaboration between employees, partners, customers and other key stakeholders is a must to drive the business forward. Most companies have invested in collaboration, directly or indirectly, by building large offices and bringing people together to work. But post-pandemic, this natural order of centralization has been upended.
Almost all interactions with stakeholders across the organization are happening via online platforms with no physical contact. No wonder, employees highlight collaboration as one of the biggest challenges in remote working. Workplaces need to evolve as people can no longer be centralized.
Remote teams need to feel connected and cohesive, no matter where they’re working from, and collaborate with ease, regardless of the distance.
Employee experience and productivity
Research from Citrix has shown that better employee experience leads to improved productivity and eventually better business results. On the flip side, disengaged employees could cost companies dearly –only 21% of workers report they are engaged. With 86% of organizations conducting virtual interviews to hire new candidates, employee experience matters right from the moment you interview an employee for the role.
In fact, hiring and retaining talent revolves around workspace environments and the employee experience that enterprises offer. For example, when we consume services from Netflix or Amazon, is it easy for us to get ourselves on-boarded and consume them on demand? This is what employees are expecting when they actually consume enterprise applications.
However, the transition to remote work culture is not as seamless as it seems.
As all enterprises are now rushing to build workplace strategies, they realize that the strategies have to be designed in real-time. This requires shifting the focus onto employee productivity combined with immediate response and diagnosis. This can be done by providing employees with appropriate remote working tools and gathering real-time updates from them regularly to untangle the complexities and offer support.
Another obvious challenge that remote employees are facing is frequent interruptions. From kids being around at home to carrying out household chores and answering the door, there can be several interruptions during the day. And the problem is compounded by the number of interruptions from mobile apps, email, IMs and other collaboration tools.
Research shows the average employee connects to as many as36 cloud services to get work done. A future digital workplace therefore, must not only aggregate work from these cloud services and minimize interruptions, but also develop higher intelligence capabilities to drive improved outcomes. This will help employees focus on their overall well-being whilst juggling between work and home.
Corporate culture
Corporate culture is the secret ingredient that builds loyalty and aligns teams together to achieve the ultimate company goal or mission. Not too long ago, culture was built within the four walls of the office. However, post-pandemic, this could very well be a watershed moment in history for corporate culture as cultivating it won’t be easy, especially when employees work remotely and lack the ability to meet face-to-face or gather in a conference room. One HR association survey highlighted that almost one-third of all employers face difficulties with sustaining culture. At a micro level, existing management practices and workplaces have to be re-engineered to foster a digitally-enabled corporate culture.
Security
With a majority of employees working from home, the physical perimeter has completely disappeared altering the threat landscape. Staff members accessing enterprise applications such as Office 365, Workday, and Salesforce from personal devices don’t have the same security protections as that of corporate devices.
Nearly half of all security professionals are concerned about the need to scale-up cybersecurity. Future enterprises need to be secure by design and focus on a multidimensional security model that takes into account identity, UI, network and behavioral analytics.
Light at the end of the tunnel: Digital workplace to the rescue
With this sudden and uncontrollable change in working style, CEOs, COOs and CIOs are coming together to redefine business processes and find new ways to engage with employees. It’s not hard to imagine that the pandemic might just be a tipping point in re-imagining the workplace.
Work may no longer be a place, but a curated set of tasks and activities that can be securely carried out via any device and that is aided through AI and automation for a personalized and relevant employee experience. In addition, digital workplaces may soon become the backbone of modern business and analysts estimate the market to grow to a staggering $40 billion by 2025.
Companies like Citrix along with its vast global partner network (including my own company) are encouraging businesses to take a holistic approach to digital workplace strategies by taking into account various ways in which people work, skills they need to develop, and tools they need use to have a certain impact on the company culture. No doubt, delivering a modern empathetic workspace is at the table stakes and whoever can manage to deliver a seamless employee experience will find success.
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