Last month, I participated on the second segment of the “Business Processes, the Ultimate Competitive Advantage” webinar series alongside Brittany Whitmore from Procurify.com. The segment titled “Time to Kill the Office” where we discuss what it takes to transition your company to a mobile workforce.
But before getting to a mobile workforce, we thought it would be good to discuss the 5 steps
1. Is a mobile workforce right for your organization?
Before starting, it is important to understand if a mobile workforce will fit in your type of organizations. Questions to ask are:
- Will our service or product be affected by the move?
- If not everyone, who in the company will be mobile?
- How will we manage our workforce and make sure productivity?
- Aside from operations costs, how else are we going to help from?
These questions will quickly answer whether your company is even ready for a mobile workforce.
2. Where and Who are your cloud champions?
Product champions are found from anywhere. For example, a social marketing co-ordinator who needs help may want to try Hootsuite to help manage the communities. Or perhaps, it can come from the IT Manager who needs a project management tool and simply tries a solution like Asana or Trello.
3. Rolling out
After the beta trial with the cloud champion. Whether it is a VoIP corporate solution or a support system, a project plan needs to be in place. Things to consider are:
- Proof of concept / Beta test with cloud champion
- Understand results, costs, and deployment
- Buy In, Top Down Approach
- Educate and Set Expectation with the rest of the company
- Roll out to the entire organization
- Continually gather feedback
4. Results
There are many benefits that come with a mobile workforce that include work-life balance for employees. Aside from the added technology and communication barriers that come, it is important to measure the results, whether it’s cost savings, efficiency through advanced analytics, and or customer satisfactions.
5. Challenges
Adding anything new to a business or system will create new stresses, including:
- Change Management
- New Management Style
- Understanding Personal Space
- Cultural Shift
Watch the full webinar and let me know what you think, agree, or disagree!