The face of business has changed from every dimension. In order to enhance productivity, companies are banking upon new technologies in the workplace, like machine learning and augmented reality.

From the Millenials to Generation Z, they all face similar challenges at work, like information overload, aging workforce, and staying up-to-date with ever changing technologies. Despite different technological and cultural experiences, the future of work seems to be an exciting one. It is bound to leverage new tools, technologies and techniques to help employees get work done efficiently and effectively.

Companies have started adopting digital workplace strategy. As per a recent study done by Deloitte and Acquia, some of the apparent benefits of digital workplace are:

• 64% of employees would opt for a lower paying job if they could work away from the office.

• Organizations with strong online social networks are 7% more productive than those without it.

• Organizations that installed social media tools internally found a median 20% increase in employee satisfaction.

• When employee engagement increases, there is a corresponding increase in employee retention by up to 87%.

• Information workers prefer newer communication tools, particularly instant messaging, over more traditional ones like e-mail or team workspaces.

• 44% of information workers globally who use a smartphone or tablet for work at least weekly have personally paid for work-related apps.

A good example of digital workforce initiative is of “GE’s industrial internet”. This initiative includes sensor-enabling products, crowdsourcing design, and predictive analytics to help clients optimize asset utilization in large-scale operations like power generation or mining. GE added $800 million of incremental revenue in 2013 through additional digital services.

Considering the plethora of advantages, more organizations are committing IT budget on supporting digital workplace strategies that promise to deliver measurable returns. This trend is only set to accelerate.

CASE STUDIES:

CASE #1

• Domain: Technology solutions

• Objective: Healthy collaboration with more personalization and relevance

• Synopsis: Cisco is an MNC that specializes in leading-edge electronics, networks and communication technologies. It has over 70,000 employees worldwide.

• Challenge: As an MNC, Cisco noticed the trends in collaboration and the need for an integrated workforce. Cisco needed to expand its current capabilities to keep its competitive edge as collaboration evolved with global teams, resulting in more empowered employees, the introduction of collaboration tools and an increase in employee mobility.

• Solution: Cisco implemented various solutions to create an integrated workforce experience. It launched a Cisco video communication and collaboration platform to communicate more effectively. It also uses enterprise social software to facilitate healthy collaboration with personalization and relevance. All these platforms connect to each other for an integrated and user-friendly experience.

• Key benefits: With the implementation of seven distinct collaboration programs, Cisco recorded a total of $1.052B in net benefits from Web 2.0 collaboration solutions. These programs include a connected workspace, wiki, c-vision and video blogs, expertise locator, sales productivity, remote collaboration and telecommuting.

Source: Internet Business Solutions Group, Cisco

CASE #2

• Domain: Transportation

• Objective: Quickly building a full repository of information

• Snapshot: With ~9,800 employees, Alaska Airlines provides a fleet size of 117 aircrafts across 91 destinations operating all over the United States.

• Challenge: Alaska Airline pilots must carry 25 pounds of hardcopy flight manuals every flight. These manuals must also be reprinted for all pilots every time a change is made to their information.

• Digital workplace solution: Alaska Airlines equipped all its pilots with iPad tablets that hold all flight manuals. The iPad enables pilots to find a full repository of information faster and easier in one location, as well as provide instant updates to the manuals before and after a flight. Pilots can also access additional information in the manual with a simple link. It has become the pilots’ one stop shop for manuals and flight information.

• Key benefits: The tablet devices give the pilots a lighter and cheaper method to bring all their flight manuals on the plane. Alaska Airlines estimates that it saves ~2.4 million pieces of paper and flight weight of ~25lbs, especially for trips in Alaska where weight is a big concern.

Source: PCWorld

         When firms fail to provide the right tools, empowered employees find their own tools, working smarter with tools off of the corporate radar like Dropbox and Slack. In the coming years, Pay-as-you-go products and services will dominate customer ecosystems. Because of the flexibility that they provide, pay-per-use models will continue to replace ownership models of consumption. The sharing economy that drives models like Airbnb, Elance (now Upwork), and Zipcar positions these firms at the heart of their customers’ digital ecosystems. As more demography, products, and people (through wearables) become instrumented, firms’ ability to turn mass data into meaningful charging mechanisms for services will increase

Constellation Research identified top 3 areas for tracking around employees in the digital workplace

• Using technology to augment how teams accomplish work,

• Using data to guide actions and prioritize projects and

• Using technology to encourage more creativity among teams.

AI is no longer a thing of the future. It is catalyzing us in many ways. Be it powering the voice input on our phones or the content in our news streams. AI is already enhancing how employees work, and will continue to do so. We’re already seeing email clients that make “reply suggestions”, automated calendar scheduling, and video services that smoothly transcribe the content. Legacy whiteboards are being replaced by intelligent and interactive screens that allow people to collaborate (whether they're in the same room or across the world).

If your company is breaking free the conventional methods and ready to embrace the changes and become a digital workplace.  You can connect with any of the expert remote coder here. We’ll be happy to help you in the digital transformation.