Ostratto - Blog | Ostratto #hotdesk

4 old practices that won’t work after COVID

Tue, 10 Nov 2020 13:15:10 +0000

It’s not news that COVID-19 suddenly, unexpectedly, and dramatically turned the business world on its head. Business-as-usual changed all at once, without the benefit of robust planning we’re (hopefully) accustomed to in business. Those changes happened to keep employees safe while making sure work continued.

What’s also clear is that when the pandemic is under control and we find our “new normal,” it won’t look like what we had before. Businesses have adapted, employees have changed, and attitudes about working are different. We’ve found new ways to do business successfully, and in many areas, there’ll be no turning back.

Here are four old business practices that won’t work anymore post-COVID-19.

1. Employees working onsite only

Before COVID, the vast majority of businesses were uncomfortable with employees working remotely. In fact, 80% of US companies had no remote work program at all.

Employers pretty much suffered from inertia—after all, workers always came into the office to work. Without ever trying remote work, most leaders lacked the imagination to understand the potential of working from home. They worried that employees working away from the office wouldn’t be as productive. They claimed many jobs were “impossible to do remotely.”

Then COVID-19 came around, however, and jobs that were previously “impossible to do remotely” suddenly found their remote possibilities. What’s more, they achieved good results too. A study by Harvard Business School and New York University found that people who work remotely spend 48.5 more minutes per day than they did pre-virus. And this makes sense - when a long commute is off the table employees don't mind staying on to get jobs finished.

Other surveys found that:

44% of executives today feel employees have become more productive working remotely
41% of employees feel the same way

While many jobs require employees to work onsite, many others can support a remote workforce. Businesses will still need those work-from-home employees post-COVID-19, and they will be forced to continue supporting remote work.

2. Micromanaging as a management style

With many employees working remotely, management styles need to adjust. Monitoring employees that work in another location requires shifting your methods as well as your expectations.

It's not realistic to assume an employee is working based on how much time they spend at their desk. Even when you’re at the same location and can see an employee sitting across the room, you don’t know how productive they’re being.

Evaluate their performance, instead, based on the outcome. How is their work? Are they meeting their goals? What’s the quality of their work? These are the real measurements of productivity output that remote working highlights perfectly.

3. Using too many collaboration apps

It’s easy to see how it happened. CV-19 struck and companies quickly sent their employees home to safety. They hurriedly adopted remote work solutions for messaging, video, and calling—all the tools they needed to keep communication open so that work would continue to get done.

In rushing to choose new solutions, many businesses ended up with multiple overlapping apps. Having two or more apps that provide video calling, for instance, is not sustainable long term and can become confusing for the average user. App overload causes employee fatigue and wastes a significant amount of time.

Seventy percent of workers say having disparate work apps makes it challenging to get their work done. More than two-thirds report wasting up to an hour of work time per day just navigating between various apps. Sixty-eight percent of workers find themselves toggling between different apps up to 10 times in a single hour.

Too many apps can also mean running the risk of employees switching to other unauthorized tools that can pose a security risk. We've written about the risks of 'shadow IT' before.

Employees will only willingly utilise technology that’s easy to use, it’s more efficient to provide them with one platform they understand well and are comfortable with.

4. Keeping employees in the dark

It's key to remember that teams appreciate transparency, especially during uncertain times. They want to understand what’s going on with the business, management expectations, and their position. They want to be confident that the strong company culture they know isn’t changing.

No longer are employees in the office to hear news around the water cooler, chat casually with the boss, or celebrate wins in real time. But these are still valid communications needs, and employers must make sure they still happen in some form.

Communication and transparency are critical—even more so now with COVID-19.

Post-COVID tools to support remote work

When we (eventually) shift into a post-pandemic period, businesses will face a new work-life paradigm that looks nothing like before. From remote and hybrid work arrangements to new forms of communication, leaders will need to rethink those practices to stay competitive.

Having the right tools to support remote work will be one of the key differentiators. As work moves beyond the walls of the traditional office, employees everywhere will need technology that facilitates collaboration and drives teamwork. Tools like unified communications make collaboration effortless by combining team messaging, video conferencing, and cloud phone into a single platform, allowing employees to choose how they want to collaborate and when.

By supporting tomorrow’s work-from-anywhere workplace—and shedding old, archaic practices that no longer make business sense—businesses will be ready to drive success far beyond the pandemic.

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Written in collaboration with RingCentral©.

Jargon Busting: VoIP

Wed, 05 Feb 2020 21:25:19 +0000

If you do look to update your communications system, you’ll be faced with a mountain of jargon. Telecoms is a technical field, and as such it has its own lexicon. You might even have spotted a few technical terms in this guide already. To make sure you know where you stand, let’s define and explain as many as we can.

The following glossary covers the most common words, acronyms, and phrases you may come across. It is related both to VoIP and to the traditional alternatives which it can replace. As ever, if you have any questions please reach out.

Bandwidth

The capacity of a network to transmit data from one point to another in a given time period. It is often measured in 1000 bits per second (kbps). The higher the amount of available bandwidth, the more VoIP calls a network can support. If your internet connection has very limited bandwidth, the quality of a call will be lower.

Codecs

Codecs can be either hardware devices or software-based processes. They’re used to compress, encode and decompress data. In the case of VoIP, codecs convert audio voice signals into digital data packets. They then compress the data for transmission and re-convert it at the ‘other end’ of a call.

DSL

DSL stands for ‘Digital Subscriber Line’. It refers to the traditional phone technology that lets a broadband connection be carried over existing phone lines. All the while still allowing analogue phone signals to travel along the same copper lines.

IVR

IVR or Interactive Voice Response is a feature of traditional telephony. It’s the interactive service that lets callers use menus and handles call transfers. Think ‘press one for the accounts department’ etc.

Latency

The time taken for the transmission of data. The higher the latency, the greater the delay between the start of a transmission and data being received at the other end. High latency can be an issue for VoIP. Voice delay is noticeable with a latency above around 150 milliseconds. Considerably more than that and a conversation will be difficult.

PBX

PBX stands for Private Branch Exchange. It’s the name given to a private telephone network used within a business or organisation. It’s your PBX which lets you press a button on a desk phone to reach someone else in your office.

RTP

The Real Time Transport Protocol. An internet protocol that often transmits the data packets related to VoIP calls. It also carries audio or video streams for other forms of multimedia communication. Secure Real Time Transport Protocol – The encrypted (and so, secure) variant of the RTP.

SIP Trunking

A way of delivering voice communication over the internet. It’s in many ways an alternative to VoIP. It typically involves connecting a PBX to the internet. This gives added control to a user but does require a fair bit more equipment to get up and running than a VoIP phone system.

Softphone

The name given to software or apps used to make VoIP calls. In the case that you use your computer or tablet and not a VoIP phone. Most ‘softphones’ have an interface that looks like a phone handset when it appears on your screen. It will have a keypad, display and be workable via touchscreen or computer keyboard.

Get Started with VoIP

What is hot-desking?

Thu, 21 Nov 2019 16:13:22 +0000

When hot-desking was first muttered at the office water-cooler everything was thrown into disarray. As well as office walls (with the introduction of open offices), office workers now had to ditch their desks, take their personal items home and *gulp*... start to share spaces with their co-workers.

The premise of hot-desking is not as simple as asking co-workers to share desks. It is a delicate process that usually requires a solid strategy and expert guidance. If not approached correctly, the office ethos is at risk.

The benefits of hot-desking

Frees up space for other perks, like comfortable break-out areas, fitness spaces and games rooms.
Encourages cross-departmental communication and collaboration.
Encourages agile working - more movement between environments.
Less demand for staff to come in to the office, encouraging remote-working.
Cuts cost of permanent running workstations.
Stimulates health and productivity as staff are no longer rooted to the same spot every day.

How to do it right

Plan plan plan
As with any business decision, plan every move - the time it'll take, the resources needed and the budget you have. How will you communicate the change to staff? How will you support them and manage their needs? How will you redesign the space? What is your your time limit? What is your desired outcome and how will you measure its success?

Be open about things
We're all human, we're all creatures of habit and change can be unsettling. Hot-desking takes away the comfort and familiarity of an 'owned' workstation. This is why it's important to be transparent with your teams. They need to be in the know or rumors and negativity will spread. Hold a company-wide meeting, print posters, send emails with plans, ask for feedback and ideas. Getting staff involved creates a more inclusive, democratic culture.

Be equipped
As we are trying to introduce an idea that may face some initial resistance, it's important to remove any possible reasons for users to be unhappy. And what do business users love to complain about? Yes you guessed it - IT. Ensure the correct equipment is available at the desks, whether that's a plug-in monitor, power sockets, network sockets or even a nearby printer. Providing your users with everything they need to do their work is key to implementing a successful hot-desk policy.

Create a variety of spaces
If teams aren't sitting together on a daily basis then it's important to provide plenty of places to hold meetings. Break-out areas with a more relaxed lay-out can be effective. Sofas, armchairs - even swing chairs or hammocks can provide a change of environment that stimulates creativity and collaboration.

Make hot-desking part of an agile working strategy
Think about the bigger picture. Hot-desking is just one element of agile working. Have you prepared a home-working policy? Are you going to consider sit-stand desks and other physical activity initiatives? Hot-desking only works if you see it as a deeper, holistic change. It is about freeing your workforce, unshackling them from their desks and allowing them to use best judgement when it comes to the day's work environment.

Planning well, communicating clearly and using space intelligently is the key to effective hot-desking. We would love to hear about your experience with hot-desking.

Do you think it's a good idea? Are you thinking about making the transition? Get in touch with the team for a chat about how we can help you introduce a new way of working.