Insights
Insights
The advice to work from home where possible is likely to remain until at least late June this year, but now is the time to start thinking about how you will be asking your people to work in the future.
That may include a return to the workplace or perhaps a blend that includes some home working, and businesses should now consider whether they have the technology in place to enable this.
Hybrid working, sometimes called blended working, is a workforce both remote and in the office. It’s predicted that employees will return to the office when it is safe to do so, but not for whole weeks at a time. Some may work at staggered times or different days to allow for distancing.
Since homeworking has proved a success for many businesses, some are already thinking about this way of working for the near future.
Before you can jump into a hybrid working model, it does have its challenges, particularly in making sure all employees are able to communicate and work together seamlessly despite being in different locations.
Here’s how technology can solve this:
Hybrid working means the technology you use needs to work for all types of users, whenever and wherever they are working – not just the 9-5 in the office.
Applications that are hosted in the cloud such as Office 365 can facilitate working from anywhere, as long as staff have a reliable internet connection. You can even move tools that would have previously needed physical equipment in the office – such as your telephone system – to the cloud, meaning that, too, can be accessed anywhere.
Videoconferencing will always be important, but it doesn’t provide the communication and collaboration needed to power hybrid work. Unified communications tools such as Microsoft Teams combines meet, chat, call, and collaborate in a single place – all integrated with apps and business process automation tools.
Google recently unveiled new productivity features that are aimed at hybrid workers. One of the new features in Google Workspace lets people list their specific working hours for others to see – ideal if you are flexibly working. Also, a recurring out-of-office message can let people know when you’re physically in the office or not. Time Insights lets employees evaluate how they’re spending their time, to help improve productivity.
Video calling has worked well for allowing teams to collaborate at home, but what about when some are in the office? Are your meeting rooms and equipment up together?
To ensure meeting rooms meet the needs of a hybrid workforce you need to ensure you have the screens, high-quality audio, technology for scheduling and facilitating meetings and real-time sharing and collaboration.
Sometimes you’ll want to have a quick chat with a colleague rather than schedule a meeting, so giving remote working staff access to a cloud-based telephone system allows them to take and make calls exactly as they would do in the office, so it’s easy and free to contact colleagues in different locations.
Cloud-based file-sharing also allows for collaboration so that workers can access important files no matter where they are or what device they prefer to use. Hybrid workers may need to switch from their laptops at home to desktops at the office, all while working on their phone at both locations. You want them to have the software and information available to them, so review what file-sharing platforms you use and if these will support collaboration.
Having employees working in different locations, with different tech and devices can present some security issues – such as maintaining data and network security.
For IT teams, that’s more ground to cover and could lead to careless mistakes by employees such as not using the company’s virtual private network (VPN), installing malware and reusing old passwords.
To secure mobile devices, workspaces should start by establishing a mobile security or bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policy that provides clear guidance on what personal devices employees can use for work and how information should be accessed in a safe and secure manner, as well as mobile security best practices.
Businesses should also think carefully about how staff are using cloud platforms, which do not always come with built-in cybersecurity features. Some of the things you can do is monitor control and limit access to files, keep your network security up-to-date, use strong passwords and encryption.
Another option is to provide access to staff office PC’s via remote desktop protocol (RDP) when they’re working remotely. This means the office-based PC has to be left turned on at all times but allows the user to log in from their remote location, meaning data never leaves your network.
Every hybrid and remote employee should also be properly trained in remote working protocols to ensure their home or remote working setup is just as secure as their office one.
When bringing staff back to the workplace, you’ll be thinking about the health and safety measures you have in place to ensure your teams are protected, and technology can play an important role here.
Voice-enabled applications will be useful to minimise touching surfaces like keyboards, doors, or light switches. Another good example is AI-driven sensors that can be built into videoconferencing platforms to monitor the number of people gathering in spaces, or to maintain social distancing in a meeting room.
A simpler solution is one you may already be using – Microsoft Teams. Staff can schedule and join meetings and communicate with each other using their own device. It also has these touchless features you may not know about:
Proximity join – a Teams Room detects your device (laptop, smartphone or tablet), and then automatically establishes a connection to a meeting.
Personal device and voice control – participants can launch a meeting using voice commands or the Teams app on their personal device.
Though we can’t predict what the workplace will look like in a year, we can say it is likely we won’t be returning to the pre-pandemic workplace. Because of this, employer must figure out how to take the lessons (and tech) learned from homeworking and modernise their workplace arrangements.
If you are looking for a hybrid working solution, we can help. Contact info@auratechnology.com