The switch to hybrid working
Now that people are slowly moving back to work in their offices, most companies are facing a big decision. Will you be bringing all your people back full-time, will you be encouraging employees to continue to work remotely or will you, like many organisations, be adopting hybrid working?
A typical hybrid working model might involve three days per week in the office and two working from home, or even some people working from home permanently and others back in the office full-time. According to a recent report, an overwhelming 77% of UK employees say this kind of mix of office-based and remote working is what they would prefer in the future.
Bad news for the IT team?
But, with the unique set of challenges that hybrid working presents, this model is unlikely to be so popular with the IT teams who are responsible for delivering this ‘best of both worlds’ solution.
Working with an experienced partner is a great way to accurately assess your readiness and get recommendations based on best practice to create the optimal IT strategy to support office-based and remote workers. Here are just a few of the things you should be considering:
Assessing your current network
Like many companies, you may have already set up Microsoft Teams during lockdown to support remote working.
While you no doubt did a fantastic job of making the best of things in a big hurry, if working from anywhere is now set to continue, you may be looking to enhance the quality of your solution. You need, for example, to be certain that your network will be able to cater for the increased demand and that your technologies are capable of delivering a first-class experience for your workforce. One of the key things to consider is the uplift in simultaneous video calls that will result from your office-based team collaborating with those remotely. You should also look at the capacity of your worker’s home networks to ensure they are suitable to support remote working long-term. We can assess all that for you.
Voice quality check
Working from home for so long has made us all aware of how important voice quality is for delivering a good user experience. With hybrid working, you need to be confident that the user experience is consistent across a number of different locations. For that, we can provide a one-off or ongoing Voice Quality check.
Using our special tooling, we will assess call voice quality, video voice quality and also assess your users’ endpoints.
How effective are your collaboration strategies?
Remote working involves many means of communication and collaboration tools such as Instant Messaging, chat channels, meetings, and email. It’s important to understand if your organisation is using all these modes of communication to their full potential.
Are some departments collaborating better than others? Do people understand how to make the most of the technology available? We can review all this and make tried-and-tested suggestions to deliver improvements across your organisation.
Catching up with governance
With organisations focused on enabling everyone with Microsoft Teams as quickly as possible when the lockdowns were first implemented, things like Teams structure and governance became something of an afterthought.
As a result, it may sometimes feel like a bit of a struggle for your people to find their way around Microsoft Teams. Now would be the perfect time to put that right. We can help implement the right structure and governance model without hindering ongoing productivity.
Is your cyber security up to scratch?
As hybrid working increases, so do the cyber security threats to your organisation. Since your employees are no longer tied to a single location, it’s harder to ensure that they are not vulnerable to an attack.
With workers dotted around all over the place, it can be a daunting task trying to protect your data and employees from such threats. We can help review the security policies that you have in place for Microsoft Teams to give you better protection and increased peace of mind.
Need a meeting room rethink?
Providing a unified experience, regardless of employee location, will help drive the success of hybrid working for you. One of the key factors to consider is how your meeting rooms and office spaces can be best used to accommodate that. Now that work patterns are changing, you might well need to alter your office environment too to ensure you are optimising the space you have available.
We can assess the current situation and advise you on how best to transition to a set-up that, going forward, will ensure your users have a great experience no matter where they’re working from.
Ensuring the equipment you use in your meeting rooms is also optimised for hybrid working is key. There are now lots of options for Microsoft Teams compatible room systems and collaboration hardware that will maximise the effectiveness of your team when collaborating with remote meeting participants. Considering the optimal combination of the type, size, number and fit out of the meeting rooms in your offices will be key to success.
If you would like to find out more about how we can help you make sure your organisation is ready for hybrid working, please request a callback from our team of experts here.
