Video games

Technologies we have been discussing for the past five to 10 years are now becoming a reality, writes Marco Landi. Welcome to the office of the future.

Cloud, social, video, mobile and more are part of the everyday reality for most workers. However, if you really want to know about the workplace of the future, you need to look to the people, not the place. The psychology of the average worker is changing, and it’s the individuals who are driving and shaping the environment of tomorrow. 

The biggest shift in the modern enterprise has been the uptake and adoption of new technologies by the workforce – and this is certainly the case when it comes to project management. 

Changing attitudes are being ushered in by the younger generations, including millennials, but are increasingly being supported by baby boomers and ‘generation Y’ (those born between 1980 and 2000). According to the UN, the median age of the world’s population will increase by around 10 years between 2000 and 2050. Now – more than ever – organisations have to meet the demands of multiple employee age ranges, including an increasing desire for flexibility, autonomy and ease in working practices. 

Flexibility

Flexible working isn’t just about hours; it’s about location and style, too. In a globalised world, project management teams are often spread across time zones. To remain efficient, you may need to have an early- morning call with a client in Asia, and a late-evening session with your boss in the US.

That does not mean you need to work 12-hour days. The rise in remote working, improved connectivity and collaboration means that you can dial in to calls, join video meetings and present to colleagues or clients from anywhere.

“Technology is our enabler” when it comes to workplace flexibility, according to Sir Cary Cooper, professor of organisational psychology and health at Manchester Business School. A Dell study found that, in the past year, 76 per cent of workers feel that technology has had an influence on the way that they work and Virgin Media Business has predicted that 60 per cent of office-based employees will regularly work from home by 2022. 

Young project professionals entering the profession expect choice and flexibility over their physical workspace. Remote and flexible working enables employees to meet their needs, such as childcare, as well as the employer’s needs. Happy employees are hardworking employees, and ultimately derive better value for the business. 

Improving morale, staff retention and recruitment are three main reasons that employers across all industries – not just project management – give for providing employees with flexible working opportunities. That is because the average cost of turnover per employee is £8,200, rising to £12,000 for senior managers or directors, according to the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. 

On the flip side of staff recruitment and retention, a UK government survey found that 41 per cent of employees say the availability of flexible working was important or very important when they made their decision to work for their current employer. Members of generation Y, who have grown up almost entirely in the digital age, will further drive this trend, with 92 per cent identifying flexibility as a top priority when selecting a workplace, according to another government study. 

Autonomy

The modern project manager demands more control over their workplace, patterns and productivity. Project managers are seeking out consultancies and businesses that empower them to achieve maximum efficiency. This means creating an experience of autonomy, whereby you can choose the technologies that best suit you and your role. 

But some employers are letting employees down. A Polycom study found that up to one third view a lack of investment in appropriate mobile technology as the biggest barrier to flexible working, and 23 per cent of workers say that their desire to collaborate more freely is inhibited by a business culture resistant to change or new technology adoption.

The average worker expects control over the kind of mobile device they use, hence the increase in ‘bring your own device’ (BYOD) policies among firms. Indeed, 54 per cent of companies globally are allowing BYOD, according to Dell. Project managers also want to be able to choose when to see their colleagues face to face, regardless of geographical location. Business leaders recognise this, and say that video collaboration contributes to a flexible working strategy by improving the productivity of remote workers by as much as 39 per cent, the Polycom study says. In fact, two-thirds also say that flexible working has a bigger financial impact than cutting operational costs.

Ease

Technologies such as video collaboration used to be isolated to meeting rooms, difficult to book and complicated to launch. This is no longer the case. The biggest driver of technology adoption has been ease of use. This has two parts to it. 

First, the user interface has been a focus of the whole technology industry. From the iPhone to Skype for Business, the heavyweights are focusing on simple, intuitive software and hardware. 

Second is a focus on integration. For example, users who are comfortable with Microsoft Lync do not want to have to step outside of that comfort zone to make a video call, so the seamless integration of video into Lync is key to video’s raised profile in the enterprise.  

Looking forward

Ultimately, the way that we think and feel about work has changed drastically over the past 10 years, and it will continue to shift over the next 10. Geographically dispersed workforces are becoming the norm. According to CEB, 57 per cent of employees have seen an increase in the amount of work done with colleagues based in another location over the past three years. This is reinforced by the Polycom study, which found that 56 per cent of business leaders and managers expect video to be their preferred collaboration tool by 2016. Ninety-six per cent say that it helps companies defy distance and break down cultural barriers to improve productivity. 

In an increasingly connected world, this cultural part is significant, and those three key expectations – flexibility, autonomy and ease – are more prevalent than ever.

Visual technologies are becoming the standard, thanks in large part to the changing psychology of workers, driven by the consumerisation of visual communications technologies. 

From Snapchat to Twitter, FaceTime to Google Hangouts, every social and consumer application is jumping on the real-time communications bandwagon, which means that unified collaboration is becoming increasingly integral to the enterprise. The project management workplace of the future is one in which we can see each other more easily.

Project managers don’t just want unified communications; they are demanding high-quality mobile and cloud solutions that are woven into their business functions and help them deliver projects more successfully.

Marco Landi is president EMEA at Polycom.