Microsoft recently announced new guidance for remote work, and it has potential to change how the company works for years to come.
On October 9th, Microsoft announced that they have issued new guidance for remote work. Microsoft has garnered a great deal of attention by going on record and stating that they want to offer employees “work schedule flexibility,” giving employees more freedom to choose the days and hours they choose to work. In addition, employees can choose when to start and end their workday.
Some organizations that have built their culture on in-person, office-based collaboration may find this statement a bit jarring, but some critics believe that Microsoft’s approach is well conceived and offering flexibility and options is important to getting the most out of their employees.
“Moving forward, it is our goal to offer as much flexibility as possible to support individual work styles, while balancing business needs and ensuring we live our culture.”
Microsoft
At Kiefer, we have also embraced the idea of remote work. We have standardized on tools that enable us to communicate and collaborate regardless of our work location. We have recognized that the pandemic has created new circumstances for our employees and have done our best to offer the flexibility to care for family members or support their children with distance learning. This was very unexpected for so many, however, Kiefer’s approach to the modern workplace and our enterprise investment in Microsoft 365 had prepared us for the sudden shift to people working away from our office.
Interestingly, Kiefer has found that we are now supporting more clients remotely and not only in northern California, but all over the US. We had always accepted that some clients needed us on-site working a alongside their teams, but COVID-19 has made off-site work and remote collaboration more acceptable, and has allowed us to work with more clients that would have likely selected a more “local” vendor if we were unable to support them in-person.
The tools of the modern workplace are allowing organizations to offer more flexibility and providing users with the freedom to stay connected and remain productive from anywhere. We wrote an eBook called the Indispensable Tools of the Modern Workplace that showcases the tools that are making transformation possible.
If your transition to mobile work has been a struggle or your distributed teams are not able to maintain the same level of productivity, you may be able to correct your course by providing your employees with the appropriate set of tools.
We have worked hard to maintain operations and a sense of normal during these crazy times. Now that it is becoming clear that the way we work may not look anything like it did prior to COVID-19, you might be looking for advice on how to modernize your workplace, implement tools that enable a remote workforce, or ideas on how to keep employees engaged. If so, please contact us for a free consultation. We can connect you with the experts and share our experience in helping organizations offer flexibility without compromise.