More than a year has passed since the pandemic started. The vaccines are slowly showing light at the end of the tunnel. However, the pandemic definitely left a mark on the entire world – the impact of which will not go away any time soon. Businesses are no exception to this change. The pandemic rose full or partial remote working to new highs, and it seems like it is here to stay. However, all this was only made possible through the use of some crucial remote working technologies, without which the world would have been left in an even worse economic crisis with millions of jobs at stake.
There is a simple reason for the exponential rise in remote work– it works! Research by Gartner shows that remote workers often go even above and beyond regular office-based employees in terms of their discretionary efforts (48% compared to office-based workers’ 35%) and enterprise contribution (41% compared to office-based workers’ 24%).
Gartner’s research brought about a critical question to light; businesses need to start considering what remote working technologies do they should provide their employees to take complete benefit of their employees working remotely.
If you are struggling to find the most useful tools, here is a list of the must-have remote working technologies for higher employee productivity:
Instant Messaging Applications
Instant communication is of utmost importance in ensuring that constant progress is taking place. For this purpose, instant messaging applications like Slack built exclusively for business use cases are very valuable. This is to ensure that there are no delays in communication caused by remote working. A survey revealed that 44% of workers believe real-time communication to be critical in keeping the team connected.
Video Content Management System
Communication without the use of video is almost non-existent now – from marketing content to large-scale conferences and even is part of user-generated content. With this growing amount of video content, video management has become a massive problem for businesses. Even more worrisome is the fact that videos contain so much potential in terms of increasing employee productivity and lead capturing – letting it all go to waste is a pity! Hence, a video content management system is one of the most preferred remote working technology used to centrally manage all your videos alongside your other digital assets.
If you are a business looking for a basic solution without much AI-powered automation and with minimal flexibility, you can opt for simple video content management systems like Vimeo. Otherwise, opt for a flexible AI-powered secure enterprise video content management system like VIDIZMOfor live and on-demand video streaming, storage, sharing, analysis, searching, and much more. Utilize this beneficial tool to create an organizational knowledge base and reduce the need for redundant online meetings.
Video Conferencing Solution
Instant messaging applications alone are not enough. Meetings are a crucial part of everyday work life, even when working remotely. Utilize video conferencing solutions like Zoom and MS Teams for real-time two-way communication. Employees globally can attend these from the comfort of their homes or wherever they are working. However, it is crucial not to overuse this tool. Having excessive, redundant meetings can also turn out to be counter-productive with not much output.
Time Tracking Application
Time is a commodity and, if left unchecked, can easily waste away. In an office space surrounded by the whole team, managers can easily help employees keep track of their time and limit distractions with the help of employee hours tracker. However, at home, it is hard to keep a check, and managers do not want to continuously pester employees with deadline reminders. This is where time management or tracking applications like Timely come in handy. These apps offer gentle reminders and help employees pace their work well. In addition, tools like google calendar can also be utilized to create meeting reminders.
Team Collaboration Suite
There is rarely any work in a department being done alone. Instead, multiple team members tend to review one document, some editing them, some commenting on them, and some approving them. Office productivity suites like Google Workspace and Microsoft’s Office 365allow for seamless online remote collaboration with tools like word processors, presentation makers, and spreadsheet producers. Hence, multiple team members can collaborate in real-time on a single document with auto-save functionality and version history to undo any errors.
Project Management Tools
For a project involving multiple team members with different tasks, productivity-enhancing project management tools like Asana and Bitrix24 help keep track of the work progress and provide simultaneous reminders to the whole team. These tools also assist in evaluating each team member’s task quality and provide transparency in terms of project evaluation.
Conclusion
There is no end to the list of such tools. Rather than bombarding your employees with every remote working technology present in the market, research well and choose the tools that work best with your company’s work requirements. However, selecting the tools is just the first step. Not all employees in your organization may be tech-savvy. With the digital transformation coming about in most workplaces, many such employees are being left behind in a lurch. It is critical to provide your employee’s training to ensure that each one of them knows how to use them productively.
