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The digital workplace is just how we work today — whether remote, hybrid or in an office. Yet most organizations haven't fully optimized their digital workplace (DW) technology.
For the past eight years, Reworked INSIGHTS has conducted the “State of the Digital Workplace” survey to provide an inside look into what companies are doing with their workplace technology. Since the survey started, a recurring theme has been the wide disconnect between the importance of tools (i.e., collaboration, communication and productivity solutions) and how well they work. Even though making these DW tools function at their fullest potential should be a priority, organizations still struggle to get the most out of them.
This trend can still be found in our 2024 report. Below we take a deeper look into why the DW gaps persist and what organizations can do to ensure that their digital workplace is truly making a difference.
Behind the Scenes: Why Digital Workplace Tools Don't Hold Up
Ross Cavanaugh, digital workplace consultant, said unrealistic expectations contribute to the gap found by Reworked INSIGHTS between organizations’ digital workplace expectations and reality.
“[Digital workplace technology] has been peddled like snake oil as the cure for everything, [including] employee engagement, loyalty, turnover, productivity, communication, task management, document management, efficiency, innovation, diversity and inclusion [and] transparency,” he said. “The list of what digital workplace tech doesn’t deliver is far shorter than what it supposedly does.”
It can therefore be difficult to execute plans to fix challenges in the digital workplace. Organizations often try to bite off more than they can chew, Cavanaugh said. They can start by focusing on a specific problem rather than the entire DW ecosystem. Once they set a clear goal, they can estimate, measure and track key ROI metrics to see how successful the strategy is working.
Another factor that makes DW technology less effective is the lack of a cohesive, enterprise-wide vision, said Dante Ragazzo, senior director of digital workplace at Tapestry. “Digital workplace solutions are part of a bigger ecosystem that gets overlooked in the necessary research and implementation phases,” he said.
He added that the duplication of features across different tools contributes to the lack of digital workplace effectiveness. This includes the duplication of features like chat and task management, as well as the duplication of content and comms channels. “[These] all threaten to undermine the initial goal(s) of DW technology,” Ragazzo said.
Matt Summers, founder of The Cognitive Learner and global head of leadership and culture at The NeuroLeadership Institute, highlighted the cognitive reasons why digital workplace technology may not work effectively. Poorly designed or overly complex user interfaces can increase employees’ cognitive load — defined as the amount of mental energy and resources required to complete a task. This essentially makes people use more mental energy than necessary to accomplish what could otherwise be a simpler task.
“Organizations should focus on user-centered design principles, simplifying interfaces and ensuring that navigation is intuitive,” Summers said.
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Document Management: Still Lacking After All These Years
When asked to rank the importance of 30 different workplace technologies, 70% of respondents ranked document management as “very important” — the highest percentage of all of the 30 tools listed and the tool cited as most important for the past six years.
This isn’t surprising given the role document management plays in organizations. A good document management solution helps teams realize better collaboration, better compliance and improved workflow. Even as AI has grown in importance from the 9th most important tool in 2021 to the second most important in 2024, it still hasn’t managed to upstage document management.
And still, the survey found only 30% of respondents saying their document management tools work well — with another 45% saying they work satisfactorily, and 25% saying they need improvement. This is a huge gap. Without well-executed document management, organizations won’t see the results they desire.
Document management is one of the most complex areas of the digital workplace, Cavanaugh said. It involves many challenges such as who gets access to certain files and how collaboration should be accomplished. Collaborating in an inferior document management environment can quickly lead to lower efficiency when employees are trying to collaborate.
“There’s a reason there are so many dedicated file management solutions on the market, and the plethora of options is dramatically clouded by all the systems NOT dedicated to document management that had bolted on file management functionality almost as a ‘side hustle,’” Cavanaugh said.
Related Article: Why Document Management Systems Are Still Key Enterprise Technologies
Progress With AI Adoption? Not So Much!
AI, machine learning and automation are becoming increasingly more important to organizations, the survey found. While fewer than half of respondents (42%) found it “very important” in 2020, that number has shot up to 64% in 2024.
Yet, organizations say they don’t find AI tools as effective as in previous years. In 2024, only 29% said these tools work well, compared to 35% in 2023 and 40% in 2022. Considering what a huge impact AI is expected to have in how the workplace will transform in coming years, the fact that the technology appears to not be performing to organizations' standards doesn’t bode well.
There is a huge opportunity for AI to simplify how the digital workplace operates, Cavanaugh said. But organizations should make sure to avoid the many AI solutions that make big promises but fail to deliver. “Beware flippant use of AI,” he said. “Just like DW technology, it will need to have a clear and relevant purpose toward a specific business problem or opportunity.”
Summers stressed the role of education to foster the effective use of AI. Employees will have to develop new skills and habits, and companies will have to ensure that they are implementing AI in a way that seriously takes into consideration how people become comfortable and confident with new technology.
“Humans drive tech interactions, not the other way around,” Summers said.
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Inside the Core Digital Workplace Tools
Email also tops the important technology list (63% ranked it as “very important”), as do group chat/team collaboration tools (61% “very important”) and knowledge management (61% “very important”). These staples of a functional digital workplace aren't going anywhere, even as newer innovations like generative AI ascend the ranks.
Cavanaugh stressed the importance of seeing through hyped up marketing language and focusing on the core uses of DW technology.
“Once we strip off all the bells and whistles and set aside the narratives that promise to make work fun for everyone, DW technology is, at its core, best positioned as an aggregator,” he said. “The leaders in this vertical are the ones doing the best work to integrate the many disparate software solutions required to get work done.”
These solutions include ticket management solutions, LMS platforms, benefits platforms and more.
Related Article: Communications Frameworks Are Vital Workplace Tools
Training Solutions to Address Ineffective Digital Workplace Technology
Organizations must focus on training to improve DW tech performance. One mistake they often make is expecting employees to adapt to a training program instead of using a training module that considers how humans learn as a key factor from the beginning. Once again, Summers advised, organizations must put humans at the center of technology, not the other way around.
“Human performance and skill adoption is not linear,” he said. Training employees isn’t as simple as giving them a training program and watching them progressively increase their performance at work.
There are neurological, human factors that influence how people learn, Summers said. For one, they generally have a bias for what they already know. This is called the “experience bias.”
Resistance to change is also a very human reaction to a new way of doing things at work. “Introducing DW technologies with a clear communication strategy, highlighting the benefits and involving users in the implementation process can reduce resistance and promote acceptance,” Summers said.
Especially as the digital workplace environment changes and grows, it’s important to remember that training does not have an end date.
“Ongoing training and support can enhance user competence and confidence, ensuring that tools are used to their full potential,” Summers said.
Read the 2024 State of DW Report here!
