Research Hub > Optimize Your Collaborative Hybrid Work Environment | CDW

August 05, 2024

White Paper
12 min

Optimize Your Collaboration Environment

Organizations that fine-tune their IT tools to support new ways of working help users prepare for the future.

Bruce Beals Bruce Beals

IN THIS ARTICLE

EVOLUTION OF WORK

HYBRID WORK CHALLENGES

COLLABORATION SOLUTIONS

OPTIMIZED DIGITAL EXPERIENCE

Collaboration technology has taken a huge leap forward. As video meetings have claimed a central role in most business environments, vendors are racing to add new features that improve the end-user experience and enable employees to communicate and collaborate effectively from the office, their homes and on the road.

Organizations seeking to optimize their collaboration environments face many challenges, including integrating disparate technologies, providing an equitable experience to onsite and remote workers, embracing automation, and protecting corporate systems and data from cyberthreats. An effective collaboration environment will give users access to multiple connected channels — including messaging, voice and video — as well as co-authoring and sharing features that offer all team members the opportunity to make their voices heard.

To keep up with the constant, rapid evolution in the collaboration space, many organizations turn to managed services from a trusted partner such as CDW. These services can help companies more quickly achieve their desired business outcomes, including increased productivity, lower software costs, better data access controls and a more streamlined IT management environment.

How can your organization leverage digital technologies to create a work environment where everyone is at their best?

Click to Find Out

Collaboration technology has taken a huge leap forward. As video meetings have claimed a central role in most business environments, vendors are racing to add new features that improve the end-user experience and enable employees to communicate and collaborate effectively from the office, their homes and on the road.

Organizations seeking to optimize their collaboration environments face many challenges, including integrating disparate technologies, providing an equitable experience to onsite and remote workers, embracing automation, and protecting corporate systems and data from cyberthreats. An effective collaboration environment will give users access to multiple connected channels — including messaging, voice and video — as well as co-authoring and sharing features that offer all team members the opportunity to make their voices heard.

To keep up with the constant, rapid evolution in the collaboration space, many organizations turn to managed services from a trusted partner such as CDW. These services can help companies more quickly achieve their desired business outcomes, including increased productivity, lower software costs, better data access controls and a more streamlined IT management environment.

How can your organization leverage digital technologies
to create a work environment where everyone is at their best?

Click to Find Out
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The Continuing Evolution of Work

Several years ago, the rise of remote work triggered a wholesale shift in the way employees communicate, collaborate and ultimately do their jobs. At the time, it may have seemed that the workforce would quickly shift back to business as usual once conditions allowed employees to return to the office. In reality, the transformation of the workplace was just getting started. 

Fierce competition among collaboration vendors, coupled with the swift rise of artificial intelligence, has led to rapid advancements in digital work tools. Rather than treating collaboration platforms as a stopgap, organizations and their employees have embraced these solutions as part of a new normal that incorporates remote and hybrid working styles on an ongoing basis. Today, these tools offer automated transcription, translation, summary and scheduling. They also provide teams with action items and offer easier access to the previously underused data stored in emails, chats, files and presentations.

64%

The percentage of employees who say they lose at least three hours of productivity per week due to poor collaboration workflows

Source: Corel, State of Collaboration Survey, June 2022

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The evolution of digital work presents an enormous opportunity for organizations, but it also creates pressure for companies to keep up with their competitors. To offer employees the best possible experience, organizations must implement and support not only videoconferencing but also solutions that enable integrated communication, project management and automated insights. Together, these features promote productivity and connectivity among teams, regardless of whether employees are working remotely or in the office.

As they fine-tune the right mix of in-office and remote work for their organizations, business leaders may find that return-to-office mandates represent a significant challenge in recruiting and retaining top talent. Leaders can mitigate employees’ reluctance to come back to the office by ensuring that in-office experiences are meaningful and necessary to achieve team goals. The optimization of existing technology investments is also crucial to building buy-in for any working style. Organizations must ensure interoperability between new and legacy systems, train employees to use tech tools effectively, and continuously assess the impact of their digital workplace solutions on employee productivity, engagement and overall satisfaction.

How can your organization elevate the digital experience
for users and enhance productivity in the modern workplace?

Click to Find Out

The Continuing Evolution of Work

Several years ago, the rise of remote work triggered a wholesale shift in the way employees communicate, collaborate and ultimately do their jobs. At the time, it may have seemed that the workforce would quickly shift back to business as usual once conditions allowed employees to return to the office. In reality, the transformation of the workplace was just getting started. 

Fierce competition among collaboration vendors, coupled with the swift rise of artificial intelligence, has led to rapid advancements in digital work tools. Rather than treating collaboration platforms as a stopgap, organizations and their employees have embraced these solutions as part of a new normal that incorporates remote and hybrid working styles on an ongoing basis. Today, these tools offer automated transcription, translation, summary and scheduling. They also provide teams with action items and offer easier access to the previously underused data stored in emails, chats, files and presentations.

The evolution of digital work presents an enormous opportunity for organizations, but it also creates pressure for companies to keep up with their competitors. To offer employees the best possible experience, organizations must implement and support not only videoconferencing but also solutions that enable integrated communication, project management and automated insights. Together, these features promote productivity and connectivity among teams, regardless of whether employees are working remotely or in the office.

As they fine-tune the right mix of in-office and remote work for their organizations, business leaders may find that return-to-office mandates represent a significant challenge in recruiting and retaining top talent. Leaders can mitigate employees’ reluctance to come back to the office by ensuring that in-office experiences are meaningful and necessary to achieve team goals. The optimization of existing technology investments is also crucial to building buy-in for any working style. Organizations must ensure interoperability between new and legacy systems, train employees to use tech tools effectively, and continuously assess the impact of their digital workplace solutions on employee productivity, engagement and overall satisfaction.

64%

The percentage of employees who say they lose at least three hours of productivity per week due to poor collaboration workflows

Source: Corel, State of Collaboration Survey, June 2022

How can your organization elevate the digital experience
for users and enhance productivity in the modern workplace?

Click to Find Out

The State of Modern Collaboration

71%

The percentage of business leaders who say they’ve seen a positive impact on employee happiness due to hybrid and remote work options

Source: Zoom, “Survey: Executives Want Flexible Work, Too,” August 2022

80%

The percentage of employees who think that remote collaboration is either just as effective or even better than in-person collaboration

Source: Corel, State of Collaboration Survey, 2022

23%

The potential increase in profitability resulting from higher levels of team collaboration

Source: gallup.com, “The Benefits of Employee Engagement,” Jan. 7, 2023

The State of Modern Collaboration

71%

The percentage of business leaders who say they’ve seen a positive impact on employee happiness due to hybrid and remote work options

Source: Zoom, “Survey: Executives Want Flexible Work, Too,” August 2022

80%

The percentage of employees who think that remote collaboration is either just as effective or even better than in-person collaboration

Source: Corel, State of Collaboration Survey, 2022

23%

The potential increase in profitability resulting from higher levels of team collaboration

Source: gallup.com, “The Benefits of Employee Engagement,” Jan. 7, 2023

cdw

  • COLLABORATION SOLUTIONS
  • OPTIMIZED DIGITAL EXPERIENCE

Common Challenges for Hybrid Work Setups

Some organizations have struggled to meet people’s elevated expectations for the digital experience. In-office technology can sometimes be incompatible with what users outside the office are running. Meanwhile, organizations must ensure that remote workers can contribute and participate in the same ways their in-office counterparts can.

SUBPAR OFFICE EXPERIENCE: If organizations believe that having workers in the office leads to more spontaneous collaboration and higher productivity, then the in-office technology experience needs to be better than what users can get at home. Because remote work gives employees flexibility and convenience, the in-office IT must be superior, not subpar.

INCOMPATIBLE SOFTWARE: If workers in the office are collaborating on one software platform but a conference room is set up to work best with another, that can cause IT headaches and delays in communication, potentially deterring employees from coming into the office.

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Looking to optimize your collaboration environment?
See how solutions and services from CDW can help.

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Bruce Beals

Bruce Beals

CDW Expert

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Bruce Beals is a highly experienced and trusted CDW expert.
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