One of the greatest challenges that businesses face is maintaining efficiency and productivity. That’s why services such as business process outsourcing are available to ensure your employees don’t have to suffer from an overburdened work schedule. But now, another challenge has presented itself in terms of a global pandemic of a level that is unprecedented in recent times. And that challenge is integrating and coordinating the work of staff working from various geographic locations. It’s the challenge of remote workplaces.
Innovation Opportunities Abound in a Remote Environment
A remote working environment gives you plenty of opportunity for innovation. While there were already remote workplaces for some years, they were implemented mostly as a result of the innovative urge of certain organizations. While video conferencing and conference calls have been common, totally remote workplaces have always been considered out-of-the-ordinary for most businesses. But that was till Covid-19 came along. The work-from-home arrangement has necessitated remote working. And that has caused many innovative ideas to flourish.
Remote Workplaces Actually Facilitate Greater Productivity
A report of UK employees by Raconteur revealed that 55% actually reported higher productivity levels. Not many employees wanted to get back to working full time in the office. The most evident advantage of working from home is the fact that it saves time spent on transit from home to office. From the employee perspective, it aids in flexibility whereby they are able to attend to home needs while also giving their best to the organization. It builds up employee satisfaction.
How to Compensate for the Lack of Face-to-face Communication?
But from the organization’s perspective, isn’t there a major disadvantage for employees working as a team? Wouldn’t the lack of face-to-face communication prevent many ideas from being discussed?
However, a new report by the Universities of Cologne and Leibniz suggests that employees who work from home can be quite innovative in communicating with others. Efficient video conferencing can help team members discuss with each other. While, as per conventional research, the lack of face-to-face communication has disrupted “creative performance”, the Covid-19 lockdown has proved to be a unique scenario.
New Innovations Facilitate Collaboration
The uncertainty and increasing duration of the pandemic situation has made businesses adopt new technologies, and employees now carry out collaborative tasks with team members, all working from their respective homes and therefore in separate remote locations. These technologies, primarily video conferencing, have helped reduce any potential let-down in creative performance.
Different companies have tried different concepts. Wavemaker, a media agency, is encouraging individuals globally to call people they’d usually meet each week in office. This is to encourage spontaneous communication, which is essential for collaborating with a team through video conferencing. The idea is to just make random calls, not as part of any formal agenda. It’s to see if these calls could give rise to some great idea.
A Successful Example of the Remote Workplace
Some experiments have succeeded. Claromentis is a digital workplace that is reported to have succeeded in bringing about innovations even with the staff working remotely. Back before the coronavirus pandemic struck, the team of around 40 members worked at home or office depending on their preferences. Even if employees work from home, the company has managed to carry over their company culture to the remote workplace as well. This includes making use of project management tools, good communication and also learning online. Every staff member contributes to keeping on innovating. They are also encouraged to come up with their own solutions for improving the company’s products.
Remote Workplace Enables Diversity of Workforce
What’s advantageous in their arrangement is bringing together diverse individuals and putting all their creative energies to work. This diversity increases the number of innovative solutions coming from them. The team could include people from all over the world, since geographical boundaries are no longer a hurdle. A diverse workforce equates to fresher and out-of-the-box ideas. The remote workplace helps develop other qualities in employees too, such as self-organization and independence. These can eventually improve innovation and productivity.
Helping your business transition to a high-performing remote working era are advanced document conversion services provided by experienced companies. With their speed, efficiency and security, these high-tech services can prevent data loss and ensure that the data formats are more palatable to your organization.
