The key to embracing the digital workplace is to not merely provide users with devices. Organizations should be developing a common communication infrastructure and leveraging business applications in a mobile setting to create virtual teams. An article from the strategy+business website outlines some of the vital components and concepts at play.
For starters, it’s important to stay away from email and file shares as the primary ways to interact and deal with unstructured content. Tools such as rich multimedia meeting software and web conferencing will allow remote employees to feel more connected to each other and their work than was previously possible. The goal should be to make the world a smaller place.
Along the same lines, providing easy access to enterprise applications is important whether employees are at the company’s headquarters, a remote office, their home or a client’s office. Knowledge management solutions and collaboration platforms are integral to the digital workplace, so limiting access to them can really hinder productivity. Many cloud-based solutions, and some on-premises solutions, offer this type of functionality out-of-the-box, and third-party add-ons can further improve these capabilities.
Of course, digital security is one of the most essential elements to working in the cloud. But security doesn’t have to be a barrier to taking advantage of the cost savings offered by the cloud. It’s simply a matter of understanding what industry you’re in and whether there are any laws or compliance regulations related to data security. For some organizations, a multi-tenant architecture such as the one in Office 365 is completely acceptable, and any security risks are offset by the added features and convenience of a shared environment.
The bottom line is that with solutions like Office 365 and SharePoint 2013, Microsoft is providing an entire suite of products in order to facilitate the digital workplace for organizations. From mobile to cloud computing or videoconferencing, it’s all there and, even better, relatively simple to implement.
Source: strategy+business, January 2014
