The Digital Workplace is a hot topic in many organizations. If they haven’t already done so, almost every company is looking to evolve their old intranet into a modern business tool. But the investment must improve the employee experience, add workplace flexibility and most importantly of all, translate into value-added to their profitability/strategic business goals.

Over the coming weeks, we will be asking industry experts and our customers for their thoughts on the trends that will shape the Digital Workplace in 2020 and beyond, and we will share our findings. At Beezy, we always seek to lead the way to create a technology experience that our customers love. In the meantime, here are 6 trends that we think will continue to shape the market:

1. Flexible working will be increasingly powered by smart technology.

Fuelled by global mobility, concerns about the environment and high real estate costs, the trend for remote working continues to rise. Digital workplaces will increasingly be accessible on any device in any location. The days of a tired intranet will be long gone! We can look forward to an era of an all intelligent digital assistant with voice-driven search, and like a good partner, your digital assistant will often know what you need even before you have a chance to ask it.

2. The Digital Workplace will become increasingly important throughout the employee lifecycle.

While the concept of the intelligent workplace initially was the remit of IT departments, Internal Communications teams soon began to join forces with Technology colleagues to realize the enormous impact the tool has on collaboration and communication. Now, HR and other business leaders are taking a growing interest in streamlining and positively influencing the moments that matter within the employee lifecycle. From recruitment and onboarding to professional development, training, career development, and wellbeing programs, the Digital Workplace is fast becoming the essential business tool.

3. Microsoft Teams and Digital Workplace technology will increasingly complement each other and work in harmony.

Microsoft Teams now has more than 20 million daily active users, influenced by the fact that it’s available at no additional cost to people working with Office 365. Beezy is currently the only vendor that can deliver its award-winning solution through Teams, helping to create a paradigm shift in the employee experience and to vastly simplify the user journey. You can find out more by listening to our webinar about Microsoft Teams.

4. Employees increasingly demand that the information they need to be successful finds them (not the other way around!).

Mental health continues to become a growing issue in the developed world, undoubtedly fuelled by the constant barrage of information everyone receives all the time. Health and wellbeing are now high on almost every corporate agenda! The era of information overload continues in the workplace, where employees increasingly complain that they can’t find the information they need to successfully undertake their role, and business priorities get lost in the ‘noise’. In response, the Digital Workplace is fast becoming more “intelligent”, driven by personalization, better search, improved Bots and significantly enhanced Artificial Intelligence.

5. The Digital Workplace will increasingly be used to leverage engaged employees as powerful brand advocates.

Positive employees who proactively share information about an organization's products, campaigns and culture via their online social networks are the most cost-effective, powerful and trusted form of marketing. The good news is that many employees want the ability to do this – we just need to make it easier for them. Digital workplaces will become better at enabling employees to share trusted information externally at the touch of a button.

6. Businesses can’t afford language barriers.

Globalization has enabled more organizations to expand and find opportunities to explore new marketplaces. The post-Brexit world will undoubtedly accelerate this. But for many, language barriers in the workplace are complicating international communication. Digital workplaces will increasingly have a critical role to enable seamless collaboration in different languages. At Beezy, we already offer some of the widest multilingual functionality available anywhere on the market. We are making sure that you are fully loaded with the tools and collaborative potential you need to truly take your workers to the next level of productivity.

We would love to hear your thoughts on this critical topic. If you would like to participate in our research or would simply like to learn more about how a Digital Workplace may be able to help you, please get in touch. You can reach us here.

Interested in what a design-oriented, user-centric Intelligent Workplace looks like and how it can help your organization with communication, collaboration and automating business processes?