HB Blog

Insights from the leadership at HB on technology and culture

How Workplace Communication is Evolving

on April 09, 2021

Communication in the workplace has taken on a greater and wider role as organizations diversify and disperse their employees. With a real need for greater connectivity within organizations with geographically dispersed workforces, the digital workplace offers an ideal solution.

As organizations move toward a hybrid workforce, the productivity of remote employees is a frequent topic of conversation. However, just 13% of business leaders voiced concerns over sustaining productivity. While 61% of business leaders surveyed by Gartner have implemented more frequent manager-employee check-ins, 29% report not taking any measures to track productivity remotely.

Among the challenges of managing a hybrid workforce, 30% of business leaders from the same Gartner survey are most concerned with maintaining corporate culture. 13% of respondents reported concern over creating parity between the remote and in-office experience and 13% also are concerned about providing a seamless employee experience.

These concerns can be allied through more and varied ways of communicating. Communication has come to mean more than the ability of a manager to speak to their employee. Instead, communication means sharing relevant knowledge internally for faster problem-solving, facilitating innovation by enabling employees to network with each other across different teams and locations, building a problem-solving culture, advising on internal communications technology platforms, and encouraging better communication from management to boost employee engagement. Communicating information has grown to also include health information, wayfinding, data visualization, employee highlights, and much more.

Digital communication can increase internal cooperation, create cost reduction, and streamline processes. Here are other forms of communication in the workplace that aren’t just video chats between colleagues or management:

• Communication/ messaging apps
• Cloud storage apps
• Content portal apps
• Knowledge management system
• Internal wiki
• Document editors
• Content management system
• Document management system
• File sharing apps
• Social media
• Prerecorded video
• Productivity applications
• Support services

It’s important to take these tools one step further. In order to make sure that the technology you deploy is used and is capable of helping your employees, you must ensure remote workers are receiving the same brand experience, engagement, and technology as in-office workers by integrating digital signage platforms with collaboration platforms and content portal apps. This will allow remote workers to receive the same content as you would in the hallways of your office.

And lastly, make sure that your communication tools are easy-to-use. Kayla Baltunis, Creative Strategist at HB noted, “Digital signage is constantly evolving, and it is no longer restricted to physical displays. Now, you can see the same message on your organization’s video wall, in a Microsoft Teams space, on your company’s intranet homepage, or in a content portal app on your phone—and content contributors only have to post their message once.” Communication in the workplace is more important than ever, by utilizing technology, the workplace can mean reaching anyone, anywhere, and your organization will be more communicative for it.