Focus on the short term, plan for the long term – Your technology roadmap should cover several years, not just the next six months. Plan for both by selecting solutions that will also serve your long-term needs.
Adapting your workplace to the new needs of your employees is not a task to be taken lightly as it’ll require much planning and smart investment.
When we return to our physical workplaces, we need to rethink how we introduce interfaces that aren’t just frictionless, but also touch free. We should start by looking strategically at the various technologies already available to us.
As experience designers, we think of friction as any moment that prevents an uninterrupted flow through the built environment, and we try to come up with solutions that can create “frictionless experiences.”
In the workplace, digital solutions and platforms have eliminated some of the noise by improving guest check-in, conference room booking, company communications, wayfinding, food and beverage service, and more.
Now, the corona virus has us evolving our perspective of the friction less workplace because many of the solutions we’ve put in place so far have been reliant on touch technology – kiosks that require navigation via touch, conference room booking screens outside of the door, sign-in tablets, or even bio metric fingerprint scans. All of these conveniences start to look like health risks in light of the recent pandemic and other viral threats.
Shift from shared to personal devices One idea is to reduce the dependence on shared devices and shift control of the workplace environment to each person’s smart device. This may not have the “cutting-edge” appeal of other technologies, but it greatly reduces the chance that a virus can spread via touch. Plus, it eases the cognitive load for employees — they already understand the interaction patterns on their mobile devices and it’s much easier to learn how to control the environment around them