Empowering Employees in a Hybrid Workplace

The last two and a half years have brought work environments–both physical and cultural–to the forefront of the employee experience. With COVID-19 restrictions quickly flipping workspaces back and forth between remote and in-person work, the idea of “hybrid work” has evolved and adapted from organization to organization. Companies have lost droves of employees in The Great Resignation, with workers quitting for a host of reasons, most notably changing expectations for workplace norms.

Now, 58% of the workforce spends at least one day of the week working remotely, making it clear that hybrid work is staying long past the waves of the pandemic. As expectations change, companies are facing a new challenge: optimizing their remote and hybrid workplaces for productivity, alignment, and employee experience. Building a culture that supports employees–regardless of where they are in their journeys–is difficult under normal circumstances, let alone those of the new decade. Now more than ever, an organization’s ability to streamline information and empower employees with the knowledge they need to be productive at work can make or break the employee experience.

So what is the key to success for organizations faced with these challenges? A technologically powerful intranet.

Empowerment versus pressure in a hybrid workplace

A high-power intranet can be a crucial tool in considering how to structure and develop your hybrid workplace. The pandemic has demonstrated the power of remote work. With 75% of remote workers reporting that they either maintained or increased their productivity while working from home, a remote or hybrid workforce can actually be in the interest of an organization.

Given these considerations, an organization's approach to planning a remote or hybrid workplace needs to consider how this increase in productivity can be sustainably maintained, so that employees feel empowered-rather than pressured-to work. This also enables organizations to avoid both individual and team-wide burnout, supporting employee retention efforts.

With that in mind, organizations need to strike a balance when they create a model for a hybrid workforce. They need data on employee engagement that enables People teams to build out programs that can adequately meet the needs of team-members. This information in turn can make or break return-to-work timelines and strategies, benefits programs, wellness stipends, and more.

Organizations need a comprehensive communications platform that can support the collection of employee engagement data, while enabling information sharing for all parties throughout the company. With this important knowledge in place, People teams and internal communications stakeholders can empower their employees to do their best work in an environment that they can thrive in, supporting both increasing productivity and employee retention rates.

Strategic alignment despite remote work companies

Remote culture presents challenges to organizational strategic alignment. Not only is information sharing more difficult in a remote and hybrid work environment, but so is clarifying information as well. Asking questions and seeking feedback are no longer tasks that simply involve walking over to a coworker or manager's desk-these actions now involve waiting for Slack message and email responses as well as setting up Zoom meetings days in advance. Onboarding, for example, can be a clunky and lengthy process because of the challenges that come with finding the information necessary to hit the ground running in a new role. Company cultures can be difficult to enter and understand as employees try to communicate with each other from all over the world without context or understanding. Speed and efficiency are at constant odds with alignment, putting undue pressure on managers and individual contributors to gain insight into executive goals and decisions without necessarily having the tools to do so.

A streamlined communication platform is key to making sure your employees are all on the same page, no matter what part of the employee journey they're in. An intranet that enables the timely exchange and access of relevant information, as well as providing people leaders and internal communications stakeholders to share and access content when and where they need to can support the creation of a remote or hybrid workplace that holistically supports employees.

The future of work needs a comms platform that can keep up with the growing and rapidly changing needs of the modern workforce. Empower employees to communicate and give them access to the information they need, when they need it, through a technologically powerful communications platform. Request a demo now.