Organizations implement multiple and unique technologies and applications for the specialization they bring to the table to manage the various demands of their employees, partners, and customers. However, by increasingly deploying these diverse set of technologies, organizations will face:
- Increased technology silos
- Information Overload
- Reduced organizational agility
- Reduced productivity
- Inability to adapt to the changing market conditions
- Inconsistent digital experiences
- Integration challenges
Therefore, there is a need for a unified technological platform that is future proof, scalable and can address all the different needs of a digital workplace.
This is where a Modern Workplace Platform comes into the picture.
What is a Modern Workplace Platform?
Modern Workplace Platform acts as a common platform with an integrated set of technologies. It combines digital workplace features such as content management, search and navigation, workflow management, mobile accessibility, and analytics across multiple digital touchpoints and improves the organization’s overall digital dexterity.
With a Modern Workplace, you can build different digital experiences including portals, websites, and mobile apps based on a single platform and with a consistent user experience. It provides secure and personalized access to information and applications for a broad range of audiences.
At Acuvate, we’re helping clients solve the above-mentioned challenges through Mesh 3.0 – The World’s First Autonomous Digital Workplace Solution built using Office 365 and Microsoft AI technologies.
Mesh’s capabilities can be extended by integrating it with customer portals and extranets built upon the same Office 365 foundation – and thereby a true Modern Workplace Platform experience can be enabled.
6 Benefits Of A Modern Workplace Platform
1. Streamlined Technology System
In a traditional enterprise technology system, you find multiple products – CMS, enterprise portals, enterprise search, analytics, campaign management systems, DAM, etc. This not only complicates the enterprise technology architecture but also poses significant integration challenges – APIs and ESBs may not always work – especially in the case of legacy systems.
A Modern Workplace Platform acts as a unified pre-integrated platform which offers easy extensions for different enterprise needs. Some platforms also include functional-based solutions for finance, HR, customer service etc.
2. Eliminates Siloed Information Sharing
Organizations usually use a CMS to produce content on platforms like websites or intranets – but the same CMS usually creates silos within the organization. Different functions don’t share information with other functions, which leads to content duplication and reduced efficiency. As the organization grows, this becomes a bigger challenge.
A Modern Workplace Platform can break down this silo mentality and enable the employees to start working together. It does so by offering a smart CMS supported by knowledge management tools that allow for easy and real-time information sharing. It offers a fully-integrated digital experience that enhances workplace collaboration, communication, and efficiency.
3. Personalized User Experience
A Modern Workplace Platform enables your organization to take a user centric approach. You can create seamless digital experiences across all their interactions during the journey. It provides a 360-degree view of the user and suggests areas of improvement. Through self-service and increased collaboration, it enhances user engagement. You can also deliver personalized experiences based on customers’ past interactions, preferences, context among other factors.
4. Improved Employee Satisfaction
According to Deloitte, 80% of the surveyed workforce rate employee experience as a vital component of an organization’s success. In fact, organizations are trying to maximize this by implementing new and improved technologies and processes, and hiring key personnel, however, only 14% of the companies believe that their decisions are working well.
Modern Workplace Platform makes the professional life of the employees more rewarding by contributing to creating a better work culture and employee experience. Since it enables employees to communicate, network, collaborate and share information more easily and effectively, it increases productivity. So, the chances of any employee feeling undervalued and unrecognized get considerably lower. This powers up an organization’s culture and makes it easier to retain top talent.
5. Increased Security And Reduced Maintenance Costs
According to Cloud Security Alliance, the average enterprise has 464 custom applications deployed and IT security professionals are only aware of 38.4% of these applications. In other words, it’s 464 disparate digital experiences. This insecure environment not only diminishes the employee and customer experience but also is prone to threats and cybersecurity attacks.
Since a Modern Workplace Platform acts as the foundation of all your applications, IT and security teams can easily track and reduce threats, vulnerabilities and reduce risks. A Modern Workplace Platform also reduces maintenance costs and makes life easier for support teams. In addition, IT personnel will also have better visibility towards the usage of different apps.
6. Stay Competitive
A good Modern Workplace Platform helps an organization stay competitive – with it’s flexible integration options, it acts like an accelerator of your digital transformation journey and an evolution-enabler. It’s designed to work in tandem with all the teams and departments of an organization and provides a single powerful environment for productivity, efficiency, easy information sharing, communication, and collaboration.
7 Critical Capabilities Of A Modern Workplace Platform
1. Flexible Integrations
A Modern Workplace Platform should be flexible to effortlessly integrate with multiple technology tools and third-party apps utilized by the organization – such as Office 365, SAP, SalesForce, WorkDay, Service Now, Kronos, and PeopleSoft etc. – to act as a single-window access for the employees. Also, it should provide scalability by seamlessly connecting with your custom back-end systems. The number of digital touch points continue to emerge and increase and a Modern Workplace Platform should be able to integrate with each touch point.
2. Smart Search
As an organization grows, its wealth of knowledge increases. Whether it be finding references for a past project, identifying and connecting with relevant personnel, analyzing historical trends, or finding documents, access to that content within the shortest time is incredibly vital. Any information won’t be valuable if it isn’t easy to access. Poor access to that information leads to massive time wastage, loss of employee productivity, and decreased efficiency.
Hence, Modern Workplace Platform should have a unified and Google-like Search Engine, which connects all the numerous applications in an organization to enable easy, accurate, and fast access to the required information, and increasing productivity.
Moreover, Modern Workplace Platform such as the Mesh 3.0 intranet, also possess AI-powered Smart Suggestions and Search Result Prioritization capabilities (based on past behavior, user preferences, and user profile), which can further improve the efficacy of the search feature.
Learn More:
- Cognitive Enterprise Search In Mesh 3.0
- eBook: The Importance Of Upgrading From Enterprise Search To Cognitive Search
- Amazing Benefits Of Enabling Enterprise Search In Your Intranet
3. Enterprise Social Networking
Modern Workplace Platform should not only provide easy access to data but also enable powerful collaboration, networking and communication. This can be done through a set of interesting social features such as blogs, wikis, forums, chat and direct messaging, polls, comments, calendars, bookmarks, and tasks etc.
Forums display public discussions in a well-organized manner, enticing other employees to participate and share ideas, which can lead to better and faster solutions. Direct messaging and chats enable direct discussion and information sharing at an organization-wide scale, eliminating time spent waiting for emails and making it easier to reach out to people. Shareable calendars and tasks enhance transparency by improving activities tracking and better project assigning. It also helps the employees to stay updated on appointments, meetings, and events.
4. Personalization / Adoption
Modern Workplace Platforms are being powered by AI to learn the behavior, activities, and preferences etc. of users and recommend specific articles, opinions, insights, news and relevant subject-matter experts. This enhances the employee experience, increases engagements and collaboration, and lets information find users instead of vice versa.
Learn More: AI-Powered Personalized User Experiences in Mesh 3.0
5. Democratized Content Management
A web content management system is the backbone of your digital experience delivery, Modern Workplace Platform also enable organizations to create, manage, and share content from one single location. As with accessing the content, managing the content can also become a serious problem as the organization scales.
Modern Workplace Platform should possess categorization and ranking capabilities. This enables the employees to rank, categorize/tag, and bookmark content that is relevant to them, which helps improve the search capabilities over time and prevents duplication.
Acuvate’s Mesh 3.0 uses AI for auto tagging, automated metadata management and taxonomy recommendations and thereby reduces the need for a manual error-prone approach.
6. Mobile Functionality
Initially, smartphones and tablets were supplemental in nature – used when people weren’t near their laptops, but eventually, they became very advanced – We can’t imagine our lives without them. Today several complex business activities can be completed with your fingertips. For instance, retailers use tablets as cash registers, advertising firms use them for brainstorming, and restaurants use them for menu planning. Therefore, Modern Workplace Platform should be optimized to be accessible on the go, via mobile applications.
Mobile accessibility enhances employee productivity as employees can interact with colleagues and customers and get the job done, on the go, irrespective of their locations. Mobile functionality enables employees to connect while they travel.
7. Analytics
A good Modern Workplace Platform is equipped with a robust analytics dashboard which provides insights on your employees and customers’ platform usage related to navigation, page visits, downloads and more.
These insights can be leveraged to send personalized offers, contextual recommendations and improve overall engagement.
Learn More: Metrics To Consider When Measuring The Effectiveness Of An Intranet
A Digital Workplace Needs Modern Experience Platform
A Modern Workplace Platform eases your digital transformation efforts and accelerates your journey. Modern Workplace Platform act as the core of all your digital experiences and are needed to keep up with the ever changing customer and employee needs.
Think about it. New digital workplace technologies continue to emerge and each one will bring its own unique user experience and security considerations. Without a unified Modern Workplace Platform you’ll be swamped with technological silos and integration challenges. A Modern Workplace Platform is needed to provide consistent, secure and agile digital experiences to both your customers and employees.
Mesh 3.0 – World’s First Autonomous Digital Workplace Solution
Acuvate’s autonomous Modern Workplace Platform– Mesh 3.0 is empowering businesses to create powerful digital experiences for all their needs. Our autonomous digital workplace helps organizations in unlocking untapped knowledge, streamlining processes and creates a seamless yet effective global network – providing a central hub for breaking down silos.
Some popular capabilities of Mesh include:
- Content Personalizer
- Insights based Recommendations
- Knowledge Management with applied AI
- Cognitive Enterprise Search
- Flexible Integrations for all Enterprise Applications
- Easy and Efficient Content Management system
- Usage Analytics to enhance Adoption
If you’d like to learn more about this topic, please feel free to get in touch with one of our AI and digital workplace consultants for a personalized consultation.
