Being a modern workplace is easier than you think. And it doesn’t mean buying brightly coloured art and a contemporary couch. A modern workplace means having the right staff, in the right environment, with the right technology all in a secure setting.  

There are benefits to everyone when a business is a modern workplace.  

• Employees are happier, more productive and enjoy a better work/life balance.
• Less overhead costs to the business.
• Staff are empowered to create their best work. 
• Your business practices will be as secure as possible. 

All this is within your reach, with the right focus and the right technology. It doesn’t mean you have to completely change, just update and adapt. To make your workplace as modern and competitive as possible we can help you work on four key areas: 

1. Allow flexible working: It’s understandable that so many employees are opting to work flexibly. Work/life balance is important to all workers and is a key indicator of a modern workplace. For your office to facilitate this you need to first have capabilities that allow your workers to gain access to your business operations through the cloud. Simply put, it is a system in which your employees can access what they need anywhere, anytime. This can be achieved by syncing your files to online cloud data storage systems such as Microsoft Teams or OneDrive. It is not only easy but a cost-effective and secure way for your employees to interact with the business on their terms.  
2. Promote collaboration: Open communication is key to the modern workplace. All employees no matter what level want to understand business priorities and decisions, even if it doesn’t affect them directly. Whilst there are a host of benefits for employee’s working from home such as greater productivity, it can have an impact on a business’s creativity and innovation output. To make sure that your workers never feel isolated no matter where they are working there is Microsoft Teams. This tool allows you and your business to create groups, that everyone can monitor and contribute to no matter where they are. It’s a simple way to keep great ideas flowing, manage workloads, share documents, and just generally keep in touch.
3. Moving your organisation online: With improvements to your communication and office flexibility, you will need to consider your Data Storage system. The International Data Corporation reported that by 2020, 1.7 megabytes of data will be created every second, for every person on Earth. In one day, that equals to about 14.5 million pages in Microsoft word for each person on earth. Considering that only 56% of the world’s population are regular internet users this is a staggering figure. This all means that your business is going to need a data storage solution to cope with the influx of data, and the most economical and secure option will be cloud storage.
4. Implementing Modern Tools: Keep in mind that creating a Modern Workplace is disparate from simply modernising your workplace. Your business needs to implement the right kind of tools and properly train your employees on how to best use them. Most businesses are concerned that providing extra training to employees will make them likely to leave, but the opposite is true. Your employees are more likely to leave if there is a lack of training and career development in the workplace. The type of tools you will need may change from business to business, so you should be getting professional advice to identify your best solutions. 

Prioritising these four areas will put your organisation in a better position to thrive from the perspective of not only enhancing how people use technology in the workplace, but how they are reciprocally allowed to interact with each other, in a further collaborative and engaged workplace environment. As always, the team at Centrered is here to support you in making the right transitions to help you establish the best Modern Workplace for you.