The Modern Workplace

The workplace has greatly changed over the years. As the world has become “flat” (to paraphrase Thomas Friedman, author of the popular best seller, The World is Flat) one of the areas that has seen tremendous changes is the workplace. This has since brought raise to the term Modern or Digital Workplace.

Before we go into what makes a Modern Workplace it’s important to look what led to this change that we’re currently witnessing today.

• First and foremost, the prevalence of personal computers and closely linked to that is the Internet and how ubiquitous it has become spanning every sphere of our lives.
• Other social factors that we see today (and again I recommend reading the book, The World is Flat to get a better understanding of it all) is there are more and more people now migrating to cities and with that the attendant challenges that come with it, for example, commute, use of scarce resources etc.
• Since the advent of mobile phones and devices we’ve seen numerous organizations leveraging this platform either as tool for working or as an additional channel to reach and serve their customers. Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella, is quoted as saying we now live “…in a mobile first …” world just to underscore the impact that mobile devices have in today’s consumer and business environment.

The above mentioned is just but a few of the major factors that brought raise to this phenomenon that we’re calling Modern or Digital Workplace.

So what really makes up a Modern or Digital Workplace?

To have a Modern Workplace consider the following:

• Mobility: Knowledge workers need to have the ability to be able to connect and work while on the road (travelling), in a branch office (either in-country or a faraway country), while at home, at a coffee shop; basically anywhere, anytime. Bottom Line: work does not have to be done in that physical building where your office is located. Use of mobile devices and access to corporate data and systems from a distance is critical for one to have a Modern Workplace.
• Collaboration and Information Sharing: Providing all your employees with access to information, tools and the ability to connect and work together despite one’s physical location is becoming increasingly important in the modern world. This facilitates faster decision making, team work and an engaged workforce. Intranet Portal, team based chat tools, enterprise social networking just to name but a few are must in today’s world
• Productivity and Resource Management: There’s a big push to deliver more with less and in record time. Climate change concerns where we’re all required to be good stewards of mother nature has necessitated that we look at how we consume resources such as paper (trees), energy and others. This is what has partly led to a raise in automation particularly moving away from manual paper-based business processes to now digital automated processes. The move to go or become paper-less is an integral part of the Modern Workplace.

To have a Modern or Digital Workplace ensure any tool or solution that you introduce in your organization has these capabilities.