The work-from-home (WFH) setup effectively allowed businesses in many industries to continue operations during the Covid19 pandemic. It didn’t just prevent companies from folding up. More importantly, it also revolutionised working conditions by giving room for more flexibility among others. However, it’s not exempt from challenges and difficulties.
Right now, many companies have reverted to requiring their staff to come to the office. Yet there are others who adopted a hybrid working setup. In other words, there are days when staff can work at home and there are days when they must report onsite.
And one such challenge to those with staff working under a hybrid setup is collaborating effectively with each other.
What does hybrid collaboration mean?
Simply put, hybrid collaboration means working from different locations globally. That being said, the hybrid collaboration also gives room for working across varying time zones.
imagine how different working with a team is without the convenience of talking to someone face-to-face. The lack of interaction afforded by being physically present in the workplace can affect a team in various ways. Response time is compromised and learning from non-verbal cues can be extremely difficult if not totally impossible.
Where We Are Right Now
The Guardian reports, “A survey of employees in 27 countries found that working from home is becoming much more of a norm. Employees in this sample spent an average of 1.5 days working from home. The UK average was 2 days.”
It seems that what was thought of as just a temporary setup is here to stay. If hybrid working in for the long haul, effectively collaborating with teammates who are at a different locations is essential to an organisation’s success.
Currently, there are tons of tools, platforms, and apps that aid workers in a hybrid setup in many facets of their job. Companies have utilised such tools to optimise workflows within and among their teams. But, there’s still a collaboration gap between those at the office and those employed remotely. How so?
The Problem
Despite existing tools for hybrid working, collaboration gaps appear in terms of a lack of real-time updates and feedback.
Teams depend on group chat messaging systems, online video meetings, and email for internal communication. Even so, timely response suffers, and its effects ripple on productivity and clarity of communication.
How about time efficiency?
Sifting through dozens of messages and availability statuses can dampen productivity. Without us realising, a couple of back and forths over tasks between a colleague may cost us minutes worth of productivity.
Again, this can be seen as a result of the gaps in collaborating and communicating among staff members in different locations other than the company office.
If only there was a way to bring everyone in one place while they work at home, in the office, or virtually anywhere in the world.
This is where the Focos Hybrid Office Visualiser (Focos-HOV) comes into play.
No need for guessing games when there’s AI
The Focos HOV will be offering the efficiency, integration, and convenience of Focos, and with an intuitive AI, the ability to see and interact with your teammates in one virtual location. Like Focos’s offering of bringing your favourite apps in one place, the Focos HOV will bring teams together at your company’s own virtual office space.
You will be able to tell whether your coworker is away, on vacation, available for a one-on-one, and more! You don’t need to guess. Spontaneous collaboration thrives again like it did in the office. Thanks to Focos HOV, you will easily see where your teammate is at any given time.
Not only that, the HOV will give users four levels to view someone’s availability.
· Building Level – In instances where there are multiple office locations being used by employees in an organisation, a building-level view of the office will be provided for users
· Office Level – Aside from visualisation, users will see:
o Each desk’s identifier, which can be a letter, number, or word
o How many people are ‘sat’ at each desk.
o Chair colour and desk shape, colour, size and will be customisable.
o Each user’s avatar/photo
o The availability status of each user, indicated by the colour behind their avatar
· Desk Level – Some of the details users can see are:
o Avatar (photo) for each staff member
o Name of staff member under the avatar
o Staff member information (e.g. job title, timezone, team)
o Colour-coded user availability status
· Staff Level – When you drill down to an individual staff member, the options available depend on the user’s availability and the organisation’s rules.
Enquiring Availability, Deflecting Interruptions
This is one of Focos HOV’s key features. Thanks to Artificial Intelligence, collaborating with team members will be more efficient. Aside from saving time, AI can tell users when’s the time best to contact a teammate.
More importantly, users can focus on their report, their meeting, or any task they have because Focos HOV’s AI will prevent interruptions for you.
AI Minimising Distractions
Based on your current and previous activities, the AI will decide if you’re busy finishing a task. Focos HOV’s AI will filter, and even prevent incoming interactions–potential distractions–from teammates. The AI decides if it will let those messages through depending on how the AI views your availability.
If you’re in the middle of a meeting or writing a report, Focos HOV’s AI will see that you’re unavailable. How does it do that?
Aside from changing your status on the visualiser, the AI will gather information from your activities such as: If you’re actively switching apps, or typing on your keyboard. In the same way, if you’ve been idle for a while, say taking a short break, the intuitive AI can then determine if you’re available to interact with.
AI Prioritising Tasks
With Focos HOV’s powerful AI computing, teammates will be able to
- Send a note/message to their colleague – this message may or may not be shown instantly to their colleague
- See suggested times at which they and their colleague should both be available
- Request to be notified/reminded when their colleague is available
- Leave a reminder that their colleague contacts them back
- Flag notes/messages and ‘contact me back’ requests as ‘time sensitive’.
With the AI performing these tasks of filtering messages, flagging requests, and generally preventing interruptions, team members and your organisation, via Focos HOV, can benefit tremendously.
- Complete tasks at hand
- Differentiate pressing tasks from least important ones
- Limit interactions with team members to significant collaborations
- Increase productivity by promoting meaningful exchanges with teammates
The Future is Definitely Bright for Hybrid Working
Focos HOV will definitely be a game changer with the way people work in remote and office locations. AI-powered virtual office space for team members to interact with each other.
As a platform for smart, efficient interactions among team members, Focos HOV will streamline processes to generate better results than ever.
We would like for you to take part and dive deep into an environment of hybrid working supported by intuitive AI technology into creating meaningful collaborations and limiting unproductive chatter within the virtual workplace.
Let us show you how to ease into a new way of working wherever you are in the world.