If we weren’t already careering into a future in which technology dictates the state of play in the workplace, the pandemic has certainly proven that’s the direction of travel. Now, we’re used to remote working, accessing files via the cloud. We’re familiar with automation technologies, and the primitive AI that helps answer our consumer queries. And we know that technology is only improving, with better software and more powerful machine learning driving change across sectors. In this guide, we’ll look at three key changes brought about by technology in the past two years.
Safety
Workplaces are required by law to be safe, secure and comfortable for employees. As we progress as a society to a more compassionate and understanding position on issues such as disability and mental health issues, safety is also spreading into the mental realm as well as the physical one. And all of this is enhanced by certain technologies, which help us to understand risks and mitigate them.
Workplace experts argue that safety enhancements are some of the key benefits of automation in the workplace, given that automation technology is all about accelerating decision-making, ruling out human error, and getting important information in the right hands as quickly as possible. That’s important when risks develop at pace, for instance, in the manufacturing sector.
Flexibility
We’ve already seen that remote working is perfectly sustainable for a wide variety of firms. Now, the final frontier for flexibility is dawning: the ability of employees to work when there want, where they want. A huge help for parents and those in care roles, extra flexibility is also a huge asset for firms that want to keep hold of diverse talent that’s based all over the world.
The problem, until recently, has been firms’ reluctance to offer flexibility on account of a lack of employee tracking. But with modern software that helps workers clock in and out and tracks the volume of their work, it’s now possible for managers and leaders to grant additional flexibility to their workers, trusting that their work won’t be compromised by that extra freedom.
Accessibility
Finally, the rise of AI and machine learning is an exciting moment for access – both in terms of access to job posts and the access consumers can enjoy to companies. In the first case, AI enables hiring professionals to hire on the basis of skills and experience, discounting the unconscious bias that has been shown to sometimes prevent women and minorities from being hired despite bearing the best credentials for the job post.
And on the other hand, technology that helps deal with customer queries and gets important information to consumers faster is also an access boon – it helps your customers feel closer to your brand. Here, you can think of automated chatbots and call assistants that help direct communications to the right asset within your company. So access is the last huge advancement we’re now seeing in the workplace that has been delivered by technology.
There you have it: three ways in which the workplace has changed and is changing in response to advances in technology.