The digital workplace is for everyone not just office-based workers

In my last post ‘BT field-based workers use the digital workplace‘ I  talked about the benefits and drawbacks of people who work remotely adjusting to huge changes in the way they work.

It made me think of when I have discussed with clients or people at workshops or after presentations who had the view the digital workplace only affected people in offices or more specifically ‘knowledge workers’.  They were surprised this wasn’t the case.

So, let me say now very clearly (big drum roll please) the digital workplace is for all employees.  In fact it can extend to their customers, suppliers, and other third parties who they share a working relationship with.

A digital workplace’s prime aim is to help and support employees whether office, mobile or home-based, to be more effective.  That will mean being more productive – no delays finding what you need, completing tasks when you need, sharing knowledge online with other people – and effective so your organisation benefits too.

Examples of how other employees, not office workers, can benefit from using a digital workplace are:

1. Retail staff using tablets to stock-take on products and order more.
2. Retail staff at check-outs having latest news shown on equipment they also use for payment of products.
3. Mining of minerals using vehicles and tools operated from remote locations away from the mining area.
4. Meter readings for customers’ use of utilities e.g. gas, electricity, and water uploaded in real-time for bills to be created and issued while the person is still continuing to visit other customers.
5. Parcel deliveries tracked using GPS by customer service to monitor and send updates to the delivery person’s mobile device.
6. Field engineers able to use mobile devices to receive customer information before visiting and update with the outcome before moving on to their next customer.

These are just a few examples to illustrate the point I am making here.  The digital workplace affects all employees.  The level of impact will be different depending on the work but it is hard to think of work that is NOT influenced in some way by a digital workplace with news, collaboration, online tasks and processes.

What examples can you think of?