The Intranet has undergone a drastic transformation over the years, going beyond just an internal website used for internal communications within a company. The traditional intranet has now shifted into what is now popularly referred to as the digital workplace. The idea behind a digital workplace is to boost the productivity of employees and allow them to connect easily, with remote access to work whenever required.
The Evolution of the Intranet into the Digital Workspace The main purpose of an Intranet in the earlier days was to help employees connect with each other and enable them to accomplish their daily tasks in an efficient manner. It was also a powerful medium for communication, delivering all the essential content in the form of company news, updates, events etc. Company Intranets were used essentially for top-down communications from HR and Management to the employees.
Over the years, the scenario started changing where collaboration and activity started gaining more importance, but the original purpose of sharing content and improving communication remained critical for the organizations. As a result, intranets have now turned into networks of digital tools and information that are accessible through the organization’s networks.
What do we mean by digital workplace? The new digital workplace allows for better collaboration, improved communication and employee engagement, sharing knowledge and information that has more of a focus on using business applications and systems more effectively. One of the key features of digital workplaces is the ability to have more agile remote access to work, enabling users to access all the essential tools within the digital environment.
Digital workplaces comprise of all the relevant technologies and features, right from HR applications and key business applications, to emails, social media tools and instant messaging, blending intranets and portals together. There are several definitions of digital workplace and it means different things to individuals across the organizations.
For some it may be the employee experience covering a breadth of applications, hardware or physical interfaces which are the equivalent of a physical workspace. There may be others who view digital workplaces as a digital ecosystem offered by the company with some integration for allowing employees access to a wide range of third-party applications. Digital workplaces may be considered as a holistic approach of delivering a better employee experience with technology in a dedicated online work environment.
Benefits of using digital workplaces for organizations
1. Improve collaboration
Digital workplaces can help in solving business problems and improve productivity of the organization. Employees can improve their ability to leverage knowledge across the companies using online, seamless and intuitive collaboration tools to increase their ability to work together as a team, e.g. Team rooms, web conferencing and communities.
2. Foster better communication With the enormous amount of information available today, there are more tools that can be used for employees to create their own content rather than simply consuming the existing content. Digital workplaces can help in ensuring that the right information reaches the right target audience and provides the essential tools that encourage a two-way communication with focus on personalization of content, e.g. information sharing through portals, blog content, personalized homepage, mobile messaging, emails etc.
3. Establish connections and networking Employees need key tools to connect within the organization, allowing them to share their ideas, opinions and gain insights into business related activities and issues. Crowdsourcing enables organizations to get ideas and inputs from employees through a variety of surveys and polls. Digital workplaces help in accessing tools away from the physical workspace through home office, smartphones and remote scanners.
Discover an Intranet that Embraces the Digital Workplace... Speak to our intranet specialists to see how a Hub could help you boost employee engagement and productivity, and make your office communications seem seamless. Call: 020 7099 6370 Email: hub@pancentric.com
