Why human-centric designed workspaces are key to driving business success
Today's modern workplaces are undergoing a revolution as businesses continue evolving to accommodate the many ways that people want to get work done. According to recent PWC research, 74% of employees now want to work from home at least three days a week, suggesting that hybrid working is here to stay for many organisations that want to attract and retain great people. Many businesses are now rethinking their workspaces to accommodate the needs of all employees. Thoughtfully redesigned office spaces are becoming hubs for focused team collaboration, factoring in the needs of both office-based and remote employees equally.
Delivering true collaboration or meeting equity, regardless of location, is hugely important when we also consider that talent attraction and talent retention continue to be major competitive advantages for organisations. Keeping employees engaged and happy is crucial to maintaining business momentum and growth. Delivering a positive technology experience for all employees is a big part of this. However, while people's expectations are now greater, the current reality is that many organisations still have work to do when it comes to creating an optimal employee experience for everyone, regardless of where they choose to work.
Shifts in modern workplace behaviour have also signalled new challenges when it comes to designing the ideal work environment that delivers effective collaboration and meeting equity for all. Choosing the right video collaboration technology is no longer a siloed IT decision, increasingly we are seeing HR teams, Chief People Officers and even CEOs engaging in these conversations. The bigger issue at stake is thinking about what's needed to create the best hybrid experience possible that not only exceeds employee expectations but also helps drive business outcomes, whether that be by reducing employee churn, boosting productivity, or enhancing customer satisfaction.
Using Collaboration Technology to Deliver a Competitive Advantage
The evolution of modern workplaces is being driven by several factors, but three of the biggest are the need to improve communication and align technology investments with business objectives, the need to improve productivity and accommodate employee needs, and the growing importance of working towards environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals.
As Frost & Sullivan says, "Even though hybrid work levels are three to four times what they were pre-pandemic, two out of three organisations have put guidelines, if not mandates, in place for the number of in-office days. There is a growing emphasis on redesigning the workplace, investing in technologies, and other elements to create a better office and meeting room experience." On top of this, Tech. co also reported that 55% of companies using collaborative tools and AI experience higher productivity. Leading vendors are enhancing collaboration features with the likes of artificial intelligence to better capture meeting data, facilitate collaboration, and create equitable and engaging meeting environments.
As reported by the analysts and employers themselves, if chosen wisely, modern video collaboration technology not only enables greater productivity but can improve how businesses operate and manage resources.
Why Putting People First is Mission Critical for Modern Workplaces
The most successful hybrid workplace models are based on a human-centric work design or putting people first, with intentional collaboration, flexibility and empathy-based management at the forefront.
Intentional collaboration refers to the ability to emphasise the performance of everyone while also accommodating individual preferences and accessibility needs. More broadly, collaboration can be enhanced with a combination of synchronous and asynchronous collaboration, with the ability to adapt to the team and task at hand.
Flexibility is where leaders offer employees autonomy over where and how they work, while also providing the means and solutions for collaboration no matter where people are. Empathy describes different aspects of a workplace environment, and when it comes to leadership, it refers to a top-down approach where leaders are empathetic to employees' needs and provide guidance without micro-management.
These fundamentals can lead to a greater sense of support, increased employee performance, and improved attraction and retention of talent, with cumulative benefits over time.
To consider this in a real-world context, let's take a closer look at Neat customer, Atlassian Corporation.
Atlassian Unleashes the Potential of its Teams by Making Video Collaboration More Equitable and Productive
Unleashing the potential of teams is the core mission of Atlassian Corporation, delivering products for software developers, project managers and other teams. Over 250,000 customers globally (including Neat!) rely on Atlassian's team collaboration software like Jira, Confluence and Trello to help their teams organise, discuss, and complete shared work. That's why it's critical that Atlassian's internal teams are also able to collaborate easily to drive innovation and support their customers.
Atlassian has over 10,000 employees across 13 countries, so remote video collaboration has always been important. But, over the last several years, Atlassian has fully embraced hybrid and remote working – in the last two years, around 40% of employees are more than two hours from an office – so it's more critical than ever that remote and hybrid workers have the tools they always needed to fully engage and collaborate freely.
They decided to shift to using Zoom and Neat, making simple and powerful video collaboration available to remote and office employees in as many spaces as possible. "Since 2020, Atlassian has adopted "Team Anywhere", giving our employees the freedom to choose where they work. That means we need to be more intentional about how and where we collaborate, so we've deployed Neat devices throughout our offices. Using Zoom plus Neat devices, we can make sure that remote employees can collaborate easily and have as good of an experience as the people in the room," said Harvey Jones, Workplace Collaboration Lead for Atlassian.
As hybrid work has become the norm, it is important that Atlassian's offices are designed to optimise the video collaboration experience for people that choose to be in the office as well as team members who are remote. They are redesigning many of their offices to provide more flexible meeting spaces that can support large team gatherings and smaller focus sessions.
As part of their hybrid work culture, many teams now hold "intentional togetherness gatherings" or ITGs, coming together in the office to brainstorm, hold training sessions or for team building. Leveraging Neat Board on its moveable stand or Neat Bar Pro, the teams can create the space they need quickly and easily with the technology they need to be most effective.
A key part of Atlassian's video collaboration culture is whiteboarding. Their offices housed physical whiteboards in most spaces, but the rise in remote working presented challenges. Atlassian has adopted virtual collaboration tools, including the capabilities in their own Confluence solution as well as Zoom's whiteboarding capabilities and third-party applications such as Miro and Mural to enable teams to whiteboard and collaborate.
The 'Secret Sauce' to Designing a Productive Hybrid Workplace – Keeping it Simple
Underlying Atlassian's approach to video collaboration technology are tools that are simple to use, simple to deploy and simple to manage.
Atlassian's Harvey Jones, comments, "Using Neat has been an easy choice for us. Having a powerful solution like Neat Board that can be easily set up then moved around as needed to stand up a new space quite quickly gives us the flexibility we need to support our hybrid teams."
While collaboration technology can never replace meeting someone in real life, innovative video technology combined with thoughtful workplace design continues to shrink the digital divide between physical and virtual, helping people and organisations engage more naturally and ultimately get work done.
Are you ready to unleash the power of your team with a modern hybrid workplace?
