6 Ways to Evolve Your Digital Workspaces

Remote worker parity considers situations where these employees may be at a disadvantage when it comes to fully participating or feeling engaged during meetings or collaborations with onsite workers. Their situations are often exacerbated by “old-school” thinking by some who believe the only people who matter in a meeting are those in the room, says Brian Matthews, the senior manager of CDW Canada’s digital workspace technology strategy.

“There are solutions and policy changes that (organizations) need to make that ensure everybody in a meeting – whether they are in the room or not – is given an equal voice and equal opportunity to participate,” he says. An over-reaction to the situation sometimes sees some companies believing, “If one person can’t be in the room then nobody is going to be in a room,” and an entire meeting might be conducted virtually.

“I don’t think that’s the answer either,” Matthews adds. “There is still value to having people in the same geographic location. I don’t think we should promote all or nothing. Instead let’s use modern solutions that leverage technology to give people a greater voice in hybrid working.”

A few simple ideas could help put remote workers on a more equal footing.

For example, in most outdated boardrooms, video screens used for virtual meetings are often situated at the end of long conference tables and remote meeting attendees may not be able to clearly see everyone in the room. Repositioning and redesigning boardrooms so that cameras are placed in front of people would improve the experience for remote participants.

Another consideration would be to avoid having those in a meeting room sitting on both sides of a table, where one side would always have their backs to the videoconferencing camera. Individually broadcasting the faces of each person in the room could also correct this situation.

Creating parity for remote workers also extends to the support they receive when they need help or when things go wrong with the technology they use. CDW Canada Field Solution Architect Ritu Dhaliwal, who specializes in digital workspace technology, says organizations need to empower end users to have flexibility when it comes to their work. They need to work from anywhere and on any device, while being fully secure.   

“This is where CDW can offer support,” Dhaliwal says. “Our team of solution architects can recommend the right solutions that work for your environment, to ensure your end users have the flexibility they need to do their best work, while your organization’s data is secure.”

Many businesses over time may have introduced applications that do similar or the same things. Typically, these were individually purchased collaboration tools used by various teams – purchases that had not been vetted or approved by IT or other departments. Today these can present challenges of interoperability, complexity and support. And too many similar tools create unnecessary complexity for users as well as inefficient ways of doing things.

Many organizations that made the move to hybrid and remote working introduced Software as a Service (SaaS) or moved to single platforms that offer more complete solutions as simpler approaches.

“Why would you buy 10 separate products and figure out how to integrate them if you can buy one product that is pre-integrated, will always be updated and innovated and you’ll always get releases of a new update,” Matthews says, explaining the key benefits. “That value doesn’t take a lot of work to articulate.

“All of our customers want to automate; they want to consolidate and they want to do more with less. And there’s just no way you can do that if you’re buying point solutions and managing them on your own.”

Dhaliwal adds that organizations may also be using outdated solutions that don’t support the way their businesses operate today or simply can’t create interoperability with the many different systems and solutions they use.

“It’s not easy for an IT team to manage multiple platforms, especially when they are being constantly updated.” she says. “On the end-user side, this can be a frustrating experience to work from and require training on multiple platforms.”

Easy processes and seamless experiences help to improve customer satisfaction and ultimately engender loyalty. Digitized self-services are a preferred choice for many people who would rather resolve on their own simple matters such as finding tracking numbers for deliveries or obtaining invoices.  

However, when it comes to bigger problems and complex queries, that’s where a customer looks for a quick response from qualified service agents. Company representatives who can be highly responsive need a digital environment that allows them to be available and react quickly.

“Technology has to be at the front of your brand,” Matthews says. “There are no more non-technology companies. If you’re in any industry, you must be technology savvy and technology centric. By delivering user experiences and providing (technology) tools to your team, they’re going to be more engaged. That engagement will help them drive customer success and loyalty. It’s a trickle-down effect.”

“From a customer loyalty perspective, it’s all about creating digital workspaces and digital experiences that allow (customer support representatives) to be effective in their efforts to serve customers and drive loyalty,” Dhaliwal says.

Matthews likes to say hybrid work isn’t hybrid work anymore. It’s just work. Most people are balancing work and home lives and often need to adapt by taking meetings or phone calls on the move and from the locations where they happen to be – in cars, perhaps from an airport or hospital, or wherever their lives happen to put them in any given moment.

“That’s the life that we live,” he says. “We have to be able to connect and be productive no matter where we are.” But securing endpoints is a huge challenge for many organizations and can be a significant barrier to enabling mobility. The cyber risks of remote computing are among the most advanced and sophisticated threats to any organization.

“When we think about security, there is no one silver bullet,” Matthews says. “You have to have a comprehensive and agile set of solutions that are constantly being tweaked and evolved in order to keep pace.”

There are also significant considerations regarding the security and use of corporate data.

“How do you ensure data is protected regardless of the device or location your end user is working from – and make it secure?” Dhaliwal asks. “Or if your data cannot be accessed outside of a certain geographic location, do you have the right conditional access policies in place to protect your organizational data?

“Or if you go outside of Canada, you’re now having to adhere to different data protection laws. How do you make sure that the organization’s data on devices is protected?”

An organization’s conditional access policies will ensure that data is protected when end users are traveling with their devices. It’s a challenge many organizations face today and they often don’t know where to begin when it comes to securing their data, Dhaliwal says.

Return on investment (ROI) might be less of a business priority when economies are healthy. But in a climate of economic challenges, ROI looms front and centre and is a primary consideration for all investment.

“With so much uncertainty around the economy, every dollar spent is being scrutinized for the value any investment might contribute,” Dhaliwal says. “It is important to talk about ROI and the benefit that will be delivered in the long term.”

Funding digital technologies to enable hybrid or remote workers must show the dollar benefit and potential payback of greater employee efficiency and productivity as well as the value of customer satisfaction achieved.  

Automating as many manual IT processes as possible becomes an important consideration in realizing better ROI and helping IT organizations focus on higher-value tasks, Dhaliwal says. She adds IT departments that spend too much time on keeping things running often means they’re not devoting enough time on systems improvements or exploring new technologies and solutions that might deliver better value, enable greater productivity and efficiency and ultimately provide better business performance and ROI.

"Simplifying and consolidating the number of platforms you manage allows IT to focus on more important tasks for the business,” Dhaliwal says. “Many IT teams spend most of their time with manual processes and managing multiple platforms that don't allow them to focus on innovation and improving the end user experience. By consolidating platforms and simplifying the tools being leveraged, organizations can save time and money by reducing the amount of time IT spends managing multiple platforms and tools."

Adding further to IT operational expenses is the new technology equipment and software licences required for those who are hybrid and working remotely. It’s also important to closely manage your digital environment, to understand who is using what and to what degree of function. Lack of visibility means losing track of things and perhaps having more than what’s needed in the way of software licences or technology equipment that doesn’t get used.

To further maximize the ROI on their investments, companies should also consider providing instructions on how to use technologies that may not be utilized as fully or frequently as they should be.

“If you’re going to make the investment in technology, no matter what it is, you need to make the corresponding investment into adoption or user training,” Matthews says.

Finally, newer generations of workers and those who will eventually join the workforce are savvy tech users that want and expect to use technology in their jobs to be productive, innovative and creative.

“The level of understanding of technology that they have…they don’t have to unlearn the things that (earlier generations) had to unlearn because they go in and see the best way to use it, right out of the gate,” Matthews says. “This generation is the most tech-savvy of all time. They are digitally native and have the highest level of education of any generation.”

And technology will be a key differentiator for employees and a major factor in whether they choose to work for a company. Research shows 71 percent of millennials say that the degree to which an organization embraces technology and innovation is a factor in influencing where they work.

"It's crucial that you give the right tools to your end users – to keep them engaged, drive collaboration, productivity and efficiency. No one wants to do manual work when there are solutions in the market that can automate and make it easier to do your job." Dhaliwal says.

To attract and retain employees, their preference for hybrid and remote working is clear. Deloitte research reveals a vast majority of Gen Zs (75 percent) and millennials (76 percent) “would prefer working patterns where they split their time between remote and onsite work or work entirely from home.”