Organisations face significant challenges in making hybrid working a reality for the long-term. The challenges come across three dimensions – people, technology and spaces and each of these need to be carefully assessed and supported in order to deliver on the new working environments that employers and workers need to be happy and productive. 

While technology and room upgrades are relatively straightforward to achieve with the correct budget, a well-considered strategy and access to optimal technology, a greater challenge lies in aligning the new needs of people to the changing world of work. Significantly, a new whitepaper entitled ‘The Journey to Hybrid Working’ which has been published by Poly in partnership with the Worktech Academy uncovers 12 key issues facing organisations and their people on the path to hybrid working and each issue involves people, not just technology and space configuration. 

It turns out that people are even more demanding when it comes to their hybrid working equipment and location than they were in the traditional office era and this should be celebrated if all the benefits of hybrid working are to be maximised. The paper uncovers that, while hybrid working is a choice, it has now passed the point of no return and reports that Microsoft’s latest Work Trends Index has found that 38% of the workforce are now hybrid workers. Poly’s own research bears this out, finding that 60% of firms believe they will lose new and existing talent if they do not provide hybrid work opportunities. 

Yet this is complex to do well. There are significant issues to address from handling the differences in in-person versus to digital presence to ensuring there are firm boundaries in place to create a beneficial balance between being always-on or overworking. Within this, tools such as unified communications need to enable both formal and informal collaboration, taking into account the time and the place in which workers are collaborating. 

Further to this, systems that enable hybrid working need to conform to standards that enable meeting equality but also have the flexibility to offer highly personalised solutions to ensure users’ psychological and physical comfort. Some are happy to be alone for much of the time while others need the feeling of being together to a greater extent. Hybrid working platforms need to take account of these different requirements and understand they can exist in the same persona at different times. 

Efficiency cannot come at the expense of isolation and experience must be shared between senior and junior team members to enable learning in both directions. Awareness of the breadth and depth of the challenges that need to be addressed to enable optimised hybrid working for all is necessary to continue to keep employers and employees satisfied and engaged with hybrid working. 

John Goodwin, the Senior Vice President of Public Affairs at Poly, comments, “By identifying the 12 considerations of hybrid working, Poly is outlining some of the key themes and challenges organisations will face in the future as they start to implement hybrid working models. Key to this will be understanding how to make the most of your spaces, how best your people work, and where to best invest your money in technologies that will enable a seamless hybrid experience. Identifying the challenges and opportunities in hybrid working now, will pave the way for organisations to plot successful hybrid working strategies.” 

The Journey to Hybrid Working: Twelve Considerations report highlights the latest research and workplace surveys in the field, including Poly’s own study of more than 2,500 decision-makers from firms with over 100 employees, is available here. 

 

 



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