The core tenets of a successful digital workspace

I speak about digital workspaces a lot. But when sitting down to craft this blog, I was curious to know how other people define a digital workspace. So I researched (code word for Googled) the definition of a digital workspace – here are the best I found:

“The digital workplace enables new, more effective ways of working; raises employee engagement and agility; and exploits consumer-oriented styles and technologies” – Gartner (simple and punchy).

“Deliver anytime, anywhere access to all applications, services, and resources across all devices”VMware.

“A digital workspace is an integrated technology framework designed to deliver and manage app, data, and desktop delivery”Citrix.

“The digital workplace encompasses all the tech people use to get work done in today’s workplace”Deloitte (check out their great ebook on the digital workspace).

…You get the picture. So now that we know what a digital workspace actually is, what are the core tenets or key characteristics of a successful digital workspace?

  1. Always secure
  2. Productive from anywhere
  3. An awesome employee experience
  4. Serviced from anywhere
  5. Automated
  6. Managed digital experience

Let’s dig into those a little deeper…

  1. Keeping your digital workspace secure

Security is at the top of our list for a reason. If a digital workspace can’t keep organisational data and user identity secure, it will never even get off the ground. Security’s a big topic (I sense another blog coming on…) but let’s keep it brief to start with. Begin with good web and email filtering, end-point security, and multi-factor authentication. Then consider conditional and contextual access, CASB, and information protection. Whatever you do, ensure you’re using tools that are always secure, and tapping into the resources and people that can help you ensure that.

  1. Enabling productivity anywhere

One of the key drivers for digital workspace adoption is improved productivity. This often starts with ensuring people have access to the apps and data they need for their role. Start with communication and collaboration tools, then determine which line of business apps would make the biggest impact on productivity by enabling people to work anywhere from the best device for their job. Cloud-based printing solutions like Printix allow people to print from anywhere, while augmented reality (AR) is showing some pretty awesome promise for increasing productivity. I particularly like the demos I’ve seen for Hololens Remote Assist

  1. Creating an awesome employee experience

I’ve been having a number of conversations with CIOs around how they’re improving their employee experience. People are what make an organisation great, so attracting and retaining the best people should be a high priority for you – especially if you’re being affected by a tight labour market. According to Jacob Morgan’s book The Employee Experience Advantage, organisations which have nailed employee experience have twice the revenue, quadruple the profits, and 40% lower staff turnover than those which have not. Business technology solutions must be intuitive, take a lead from consumer products, meet the needs of your employees, be reliable, and have excellent performance. Check out my blog What are you doing to create an awesome employee experience? for our guide to using technology (and more) to build an amazing employee experience.

  1. Servicing and supporting from anywhere

Of course, you can’t have a successful digital workspace without the team who will keep it in top form so the users can actually use their tools – IT. For a digital workspace to work for your team, IT must easily be able to service (patch, upgrade, diagnose, support) people and devices no matter where they are. Consider how much more common it’s becoming for some employees to rarely, or even never, come into the office. How can you ensure that these employees still get the same level of support as employees who are physically in the office? And how can you make sure their devices are still updated for security and remain supported by the vendor? By having management tools that can service devices from anywhere.

  1. Automating your digital workspace

Technology is an incredible thing – it can enable new ways of working, increase productivity, help create a great employee experience, and impact significantly on the bottom line. And perhaps one of the biggest things contributing to those impacts is automation. As you look to transform your digital workspace, consider how you can tap into automation to make life easier for both IT and the end users. As you innovate and evolve your systems for the future, look at automating device provisioning, common maintenance tasks, common support requests, and enable self-service tools for password resets and app requests.

  1. Managing the digital experience

If your IT team isn’t actively managing the digital experience, they’re flying blind. Are your IT team waiting for people to call and tell them when their experience is sub-par? That’s bad enough when it happens, but how many people actually bother to log an incident with the service desk? As today’s rapid digital transformation takes place, our reliance on – and the importance of – technology continues to grow. Performance degradation, service outages, and general technological annoyances impact significantly on employees’ ability to work – and ultimately the success and profitability of your organisation. The digital experience is best managed when you deploy the right tools to track and trend end-user experience metrics, and when you actively seek user feedback. With just these two data streams, you and your IT team will be armed with the intelligence they need to make informed decisions which improve the digital experience.

At Deptive, we’re incredibly passionate about creating digital workspaces that work for both employees and IT. By focusing on the key tenets we’ve discussed above, we firmly believe that your digital workspace initiative will thrive.

Want to know more? Contact us for a chat about how we can help you create a successful digital workspace for your organisation.

Or to learn more about creating an awesome employee experience, grab a copy of our free ebook: Your Digital Workspace: The Ultimate Guide to Creating Digital Experiences Your Employees Will Love.

 

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