Our CEO Reto Meneghini writes about the past year in his blog post (German only):
"We had the opportunity this year to try out a lot of new things in the world of work. Using the learnings gained from this, the task now is to shape the 'future of work'."
ONE learning is being discussed very intensively at the moment: the downside of working from home. The blurring of the borders between work and private life and too much disconnection among work colleagues can have a negative impact on the well-being of employees as well as on the performance and innovation capacity of teams and organizations.
We have finally moved away from seeing remote working primarily as a feel-good issue for selected employees - and we are already learning about the limits of 'mass-scale working from home'.
The work model of the future is hybrid
Like so often, it's a matter of finding a middle ground. A combination of virtual and face-to-face collaboration, of home office and in the office - but with new rules (see blog post "Let's go hybrid") and with the help of the right tools. So that employees can work - and live - in a 'healthy' way. So that leaders can successfully manage their teams remotely and companies can make the best use of a hybrid work model.
We want to respond to the changing nature of modern collaboration: first and foremost by helping our clients to understand how the factor ‘time’ is dealt with. Based on this, it is important to set the right course for healthy modern working - in the hybrid model.
“Setting the course for healthy modern working - in the hybrid model.”
Workplace Analytics
For this purpose, two dimensions are important: that of the individual worker and that of the teams and the organization.
Employees should be able to access and use the right tools from anywhere to maintain healthy separation between work and private life. Microsoft has developed MyAnalytics for this purpose: With this tool, employees can better manage their working hours and increase their well-being at work based on individual data analysis. Among other things, MyAnalytics helps me to create important free spaces for my personal tasks in my tightly packed schedule.
Microsoft Workplace Analytics (WPA) extends the idea of MyAnalytics to the enterprise level, targeting decision makers rather than individual workers. Team leaders, department managers, and corporate CEOs can use WPA to more easily understand how the resource 'time' is generally used in the company:
Time for individual work versus cross-team and cross-company collaboration.
Time for innovation and creativity versus time for day-to-day tasks
Time for meetings versus focus work
Time for the team versus own work
Time for oneself versus time for the community
Microsoft Workplace Analytics provides data-driven insights into work patterns that impact well-being, productivity and business performance. With this understanding, challenges of various kinds can be addressed in a targeted or preventative manner: Work patterns that increase the risk of burnout, reduce efficiency, or impact team performance can be identified. Resource-intensive activities can be examined even more specifically in terms of cost/benefit.
The analytics app supports companies in developing a deeper understanding of their internal organization and deriving opportunities for improvement from this - which can be particularly helpful for healthy, modern work in the hybrid model.
No conclusions about individuals
Important to know: Protective measures such as anonymization, aggregation and 'differential privacy' are integrated in the tool by default to protect personal data. Thus, no conclusions can be drawn about individuals. WPA can be used in compliance with legal regulations such as the GDPR.
Where to start?
Microsoft Workplace Analytics opens up many new possibilities. The question that comes up is thus, which are the objectives to be pursued.
We recommend that companies start with small steps: gain initial experience in teams before taking a closer look at the organization as a whole. One example is the sales team: based on behavioral patterns, successful sales teams can be compared with less successful ones. Based on this comparison, data-driven action plans for optimization can be recommended and implemented. Changes in behavioral patterns can be made visible through regular measurement and analysis.
This is just one example of many. As a certified WPA Microsoft partner (see box), we can support companies in the use of WPA - from initial analysis, configuration and monitoring to evaluation and consulting for improvement programs.
Interested in what opportunities WPA offers your organization? We are happy to talk about it with you.
Andreas Hänni is Partner and COO at MondayCoffee AG.
