The Digital Workplace concretized
If have previously discussed how do define the Digital Workplace. To be clear, it isn't about remote working, virtual teams, or mobility. It isn't about intranets, collaboration tools, or social media either. No, the Digital Workplace is about taking a business- and people-centric approach to providing information workers with the right capabilities in the right way so they can get their work done.
Another way to express it is that the Digital Workplace represents a shift from a technology-centric and product-oriented approach to supporting information workers to a people-centric and service-oriented approach. I’ve illustrated this shift in the below diagram, where I've also plotted some basic capabilities outside the circles.
Questions such as "What capabilities do we need to have?", "Which services should we provide to users?" and " How should those be designed?" cannot really be defined until we know the business needs and the needs of people in different situations.
The Digital Workplace is – deliberately – a vague and abstract concept; it is impossible to describe exactly what it is because it will be different from one organization to another. Yet, there is definitely a need to concretize what a Digital Workplace might look like and what capabilities it could provide. For this purpose I will describe and discuss a few such capabilities in my next article for CMS Wire early next week (earlier writings can be found here):
Another way to express it is that the Digital Workplace represents a shift from a technology-centric and product-oriented approach to supporting information workers to a people-centric and service-oriented approach. I’ve illustrated this shift in the below diagram, where I've also plotted some basic capabilities outside the circles.
- Task Coordination
- Finding People
- Networking
- Meetings
- Communication
- Sharing