- Mobile devices and mobile data usage are now almost universally prevalent
- Agile working requirements for fewer formal meeting spaces, and fast growth of informal meetings and team organisation.
- The advanced evolution of meeting software
- The upsurge in use of collaborative technology including AV and video conferencing
- New generations of employees, who embrace digital technology and multi-tasking, and who need flexibility
- Retaining talent requires a good working environment that promotes wellbeing and job satisfaction
- An employment market that’s getting more and more competitive, and the best can easily move to better employment environments. The benefits of mobility and work-life balance are important to keeping them.
Today’s workplace now fills any downtime on commuter journeys, travel, and even coffee breaks.
One major workplace real estate company commented recently:
“No place or space is off limits in the world of flexible work— especially for organisations embracing this trend that is at the heart of the future of work.”
This should be the starting point for your journey on the road to workplace transformation, particularly if you’re in the fast-growing service sector.
- Start by creating a workplace that enables your employees to be as agile as your customers’ demands. They need to be able to work effectively wherever, whenever and however they do it.
- In practice, workplace transformation is getting more and more sophisticated.
- It’s not just about changing desk ratios. Full transformation requires using technology to make a complex agile workplace easy to run.
- The best technology is software that you forget is working away in the background to make everyone’s lives easier.
- By multiplying the impact across every employee, you can see how workplace transformation supercharges your team’s effectiveness when it’s done right.
- Done wrong, the same transformation process can bring your team to a screeching halt.
- The core of a good transformation is meeting software that helps you make the most of the remote working revolution.
- It means your entire team can get what they need to maximise effectiveness, improve work-life balance, provide flexibility in how they work – and gain a workplace that supports both work activities and personal lives.
- Do my people really need a permanent desk or office to work effectively?
- How do my employees engage? With video and audio?
- If they don’t work 9 to 5, can I segment their day for activities including work, social engagement and possibly exercise time?
- Could I improve their work-life balance better offering more agile working from different locations – including their homes?
- Is activity-based working a viable option for us? This style of working structures work location, space used and the tool set required around the tasks being performed.
Leading companies in many industries have unlocked the potential of their teams by creating the right space types and meeting software tools, then enabling staff to make their own right choices.
Because if you can’t rely on them to make those choices, you can’t rely on them in your business.
This approach satisfies a core set of needs, helping workers make an important contribution and feel like a genuinely valued member of the team.
Staff who contribute have been shown to stay longer, work harder and have better morale than those treated as simply cogs. With the tools and the power to deliver, you’ll find they simply do it.
Start with careful consideration of the work environment needed for each element you need your workers to tackle.
Choose meeting software that gives the support agile workers need, particularly the new generations who are the most comfortable with digital technology. They demand flexibility in how they carry out work tasks, and appreciate more informal engagement.
Three key elements for delivering workplaces that work:
Let’s look at each of these elements in a little more detail.
Considerate workplace design
The meeting software technology tool
set chosen for staff
The building’s infrastructure.
1. Workplace design
Modern workplaces are highly flexible spaces that offer more choices than the stodgy and bland offices of just a decade or two ago.
They need to include not only formal meeting spaces, but also collaboration areas, informal hang outs, different desk types and high tech spaces with collaboration technologies such as telepresence.
New build projects that link design with wellbeing and productivity are increasing, but like many companies, you may be repurposing your existing space.
The key to success is remaining flexible and responding to changing needs. It’s a fact that forecast demand and actual use of workspace are often different to what was originally imagined.
When you compare design and user experience, it’s clear that user experience adapts to the way people actually use the space. You must be responsive, because the market demands it.
And while this flexibility sounds great, it can be a challenge to manage properly.
So what works well?
In our long experience ( see these case studies ) maximising the benefits of a well-designed workplace requires three critical elements:
- Excellent information on space and desk availability
- Easy booking of the right workspace
- Clear operating rules accepted by users.
2. The technology toolset
This is a critical component that supports a more agile workforce and provides greater flexibility for staff to locate and use space around tasks being performed.
Technologies that integrate with meeting software and support workplace transformation include:
Mobile apps/portals
Offering self-service capability for workers on the move, e.g. a room or desk booking app with Outlook integration
Digital signage
For information and engagement, eg helping workers locate the right space or colleague
In-room technologies
These connect meeting participants seamlessly, saving time and creating meetings that work
Panels and other room
signage technologies
Integrated with the in-room experience, for information and supporting the provision of services such as catering.
Occupancy sensor technologies
Giving real-time information on space and people, giving people a fast route to locate what they need
Collaborative technologies
eg VC and AV, which can connect staff wherever they are.
Further technologies are on their way, including AI and automated tools for repetitive tasks, but because AI is still developing and workplace metrics are being gathered, AI support is still a future reality.
3. Building infrastructure
Everyone’s talking about the Smart Building these days. Important elements of building infrastructure to consider are:
Greater integration of building controls and building systems – 68% of respondents in a recent survey said they were planning to invest.
the internet of things will provide more and more useful data on how a building and its facilities are being utilised.
FM executives globally say they are planning to increase investment by 50%. It’s a priority for many organisations.
Because these innovations – and the management reports created by meeting software – give insight how your workspace is being used, evolving building technology will make workplace transformation easier and more cost-effective.
* Make workspace transformation work for you. Discover how meeting software makes it happen here.