Guest blog: Launching a digital workspace successfully – Case study

Big changes are coming. Although the speed at which these changes will happen is uncertain, it is clear that we will all have to face them. By now, everyone has heard of terms such as “Artificial Intelligence”, “Internet of Things” or “Big Data”. They are all technological advancements that will change the way people work, and in some measure, already is. Important components of these changes are the way people have access to information and can digitally execute tasks: the digital workspace.  

Investing in a new digital workspace, radical change? 

Many organisations are now choosing to invest in a new digital workspace. This does not mean that the existing workspace will radically be changed, but it will be altered so that it is prepared for future developments. Most importantly, the new workspace has to help people to do their work in a pleasant way.

In the beginning of this year, Axians started a project at one of their customers in manufacturing. This organisation possesses two ultra-modern production locations in the Netherlands and provide their products to retailers across the world through platforms such as Amazon and Alibaba. 300 employees in several roles with a variety of requirements and wishes get a new digital workspace based on Microsoft 365 and the adaptive workspace (Workspace 365).

How do you employ people for feedback? 

The first item on the agenda was: what is important to the people who are going to use it? Two consultants from Axians discussed this with representatives from the different departments in four one-hour sessions. These representatives were critical workspace users, not just in supervisory roles, but mostly employees from the operation. 

As a guideline for these conversations, the “Embracing Workspace Program” by Workspace 365 was used. This program gives structure and offers tools for mapping the customer and their organisation and people. Among other things, by working with personas. During these sessions, we searched for answers to questions such as: 

• What are the most important processes of my department and what part does IT play in them? 
• What are the current challenges of my department? 
• What requirements does the new workspace have to meet? 

One login, password resets and working from home 

The answers from the different departments to these questions did not vary much: with single sign-on access to all applications, reset your password yourself, working from home as you do in the office. These are several examples of requests that emerged during the sessions. 

“This is how we get to a digital workspace that actually helps people to work smarter and more pleasantly“

All answers were processed in the tool set by Workspace 365 and incorporated by Axians in the design of the digital workspace. Subsequently, it was shown to the focus group of the project: this is how we get to a digital workspace that actually helps people to work smarter and more pleasantly. During the testing phase, several participants of the sessions will be involved again, to test if the workspace meets the expectations and solves the mentioned problems. 

Continued development after the launch of the digital workspace

An important attribute of the new workspace is that it will constantly will be equipped with new functionalities. After the project, we’re on “GO”, as it were. Together with the workspace users (represented by a focus group), we will evaluate which elements can be improved and which features are valuable enough to be added. This way, the workspace contributes to the organisational goal to expedite innovation and conquer new (digital) markets. 

Who is Axians?

Technology changes the world faster than ever. Therefore, we do everything to guide our customers during their transformation to a flexible, digital organisation. Faster, smarter, safer! We invest in our relationships to get to know and understand them. This way, we develop the best ICT solution for today and tomorrow, for every unique situation.