The question businesses are asking is how we best communicate, collaborate and then consolidate on the technology we need both now but also in the future. The sticking plaster most businesses applied in March 2020 at the beginning of the first lockdown is starting to lose its adhesion, so a more permanent solution is being sought.
The knowledge transfer to the end-user is complete, we all now possess a desire to push on and collaborate with colleagues, including external parties, and it’s almost as though we are all part of one large global enterprise.
This new appetite is fuelled by our ability to all embrace a major tech change and realise that there was nothing to worry about – if I can do this then so can everyone else. In fact, research from Gartner indicated that less than a third of digital workers will choose the corporate office as their preferred place of work by 2023.
“We’re working smarter, more efficiently, and more accurately because of technology and I can’t see people going back to how we used to work,” said Paul Harrison, MD of Evolve IP.
“We had to find a sticking plaster to work remotely when we left all our comms behind. But now what do we do when people do go back to the office? Do they pick up the old telephone? How are they going to communicate with their colleagues who are now using Teams?
“There needs to be a strategy that everyone is comfortable with because we won’t go back to how it was”
Gartner’s research also revealed that responding to COVID-19 has forced organisations to accelerate the evolution of the work environment by five to ten years.
Time travel is from science fiction, but this ability to fast forward 10 years to change how and where we work has been astonishing; productivity has not declined, it has, in fact, increased. No more long drives and time wasted on commutes means more time to collaborate and better ways to share information and ideas.
However, with every upside, there is a downside, and this is the holy grail of ‘WLB’: Work, Life, Balance. Now that we can work anywhere our demarcation points have blurred. For example, our home life is also our work life, our work desk is also the kitchen table and the barriers are no longer there. In fact, we no longer work from home but ‘Live at Work’.
Evolve IP understands the benefits of the new way of working. It trademarked “Work Anywhere” several years ago and has been promoting all the C’s. However, it took a global pandemic for most businesses to pivot to this understanding.
Evolve IP also knows technology can bring back the important demarcation points and bring back the barriers from home life to work life.
A large part of its global customer base works from home or works anywhere, and its full Microsoft Teams and Cisco Webex collaboration offerings ensure that customers have the options of market-leading solutions. Its integration also ensures they never lose features and functionality and don’t need to compromise to collaborate.
All the C’s is our future tech roadmap, and now is the time to choose the right partner to ensure we can all work anywhere and with anyone and protect the work-life balance.
Make communication the forefront of your technology plans and consolidate on one telephony provider so you can collaborate wherever you are. With Evolve IP that can be in Microsoft Teams or Cisco Webex and from one of 72 countries globally.
