by Your head of HR wants to build a more connected culture… but your managers are just struggling to get everyone on the same page.
Only half your workforce wants to go back to the office… but you’re staring at a multi-year lease on a commercial property.
As budgets get tighter, your teams strive to make the most of existing approaches, systems and technologies. But trying to solve 2023 problems with 2019 solutions just doesn’t work.
And while everyone keeps talking about how hybrid work is here to stay, for many, hybrid doesn’t actually work. Forty percent of companies will try to undo work-anywhere policies and mandate that employees come into the office more often, according to Forrester.
Creating an ideal workplace experience is the only way to stay ahead, whether employees are working hybrid, remote or on the front lines. But the stakes are high, so you can’t afford to make changes that aren’t everywhere.
Some companies are curtailing meetings and even banning meetings involving more than two people.
Some require most employees to work from the office — or else.
Others focus on fair flexibility for frontline workers.
If only one policy change were enough to solve all the issues.
The state of workplace experience
While an organization may mandate a return to the office, its people don’t want to return to a physical space if they don’t feel connected to their workplace culture. And they’ll never feel connected if they’re cut off from the information that connects them to the pulse of their company—or if simple, necessary tasks like finding an office, reserving a meeting room, or welcoming a visitor become too complex.
Our 2023 workplace trends and insights research confirms that workers need their tools to be productive:
- 70% say they waste time commuting between the office and remote work locations.
- 35% of hybrid workers struggle with feeling connected and engaged.
- 29% report that it takes days or more to receive important information.
With these challenges as a backdrop, it’s no surprise that 93% of respondents believe their organizations could improve the office experience.
This is the workplace experience in 2023, and it’s not good enough. The workplace should feel alive, but for many, it is on life support. Organizations need innovative ways to support and engage their employees – the nine-to-five office, the stay-at-home type, the critical first and everyone in between.
A retail giant we work with faced challenges in engaging employees and providing consistent communication among nearly 300,000 employees, many of them without an office. The retailer adopted digital signage as a cost-effective way to reach its teams, create a more connected experience for frontline workers, share important safety information and promote career opportunities.
One platform for all
Workers don’t need more tools – they need better ones.
While digital signage reinforces the messages you need to see in physical offices, workplaces need technology that connects the entire organization—its people, spaces, and spaces—through the communication channels employees use every day.
An employee app and intranet keep the latest information at everyone’s fingertips. Space Booking makes it easy to reserve rooms and offices. Seamless visitor management and intuitive wayfinding ensure people can go where they need to go. When all of these valuable solutions and more are on one platform, employees don’t waste time managing disjointed point products. And as many companies try to cut costs and IT teams are forced to do more with less, technology integration is one way to achieve that result.
Today’s reality is that some in the workforce don’t want to go back to the office – ever. Others do too. The real winners in the future of work are organizations that can use technology to make siled tools and systems a thing of the past and unify physical and digital workplaces to make work a connected and engaging experience – wherever happen. Because we all deserve a workplace experience we love.
Learn how Appspace can help your organization connect your people, places and spaces.
