According to Slack, the modern workplace is more complicated than ever before.
Research from the market-leading collaboration company Slack, and market research firm, GlobalWebIndex found that in today's rapidly evolving business space, employees need help making the most of their workdays. To survive in the new era of work, the most important factor seems to be "alignment."
Slack's The State of Work report for 2019 draws information from 17,000 knowledge workers around the world, from frontline employees to CEOs. The study found that in the time of the "Fourth Industrial Revolution," having the right technology is only one piece of the puzzle. Today's workers need to feel aligned with the rest of their workforce for businesses to see improvements in productivity, efficiency, and performance.
Today's Employees Crave a Connection
As today's employees struggle with more complicated work processes, Slack believes that alignment is the key to their engagement and continued productivity. After all, artificial intelligence and bots are quickly getting rid of many of the repetitive and monotonous tasks that used to fill up employee time. Now, staff members have more creative and complex tasks to focus on. To achieve their personal and business targets, these team members need to feel as though they're connected with the rest of the team.
According to Slack, it's no longer enough for the C-Suite to be the only team that understands the "big picture" in the workplace. Instead, the State of Work report found a direct connection between the communication of the company's strategy, and people rating their companies as "excellent." Unaligned workers who don't understand the purpose of the business that they're working for are more likely to feel isolated and disconnected. They're also more likely to report low morale.
Slack found that when workers understand their business strategy, 88% feel as though they understand the benefit of their work, and 84% feel aligned with their company's vision. On the other hand, when workers don’t' understand their company's strategy, only 33% can see the impact of their efforts, and only 22% feel connected to their company's vision.
Alignment Affects the Business Bottom Line
Slack found that businesses that fail to deliver alignment for their team members don't just struggle with an absence of morale among team members. There are clear and financial benefits to investing time and resources into an aligned workforce.
