The initial buzz around remote and hybrid working might be starting to ease but, if a business has decided to offer its employees flexible working, it still has a responsibility to ensure their teams are properly supported.
Online job adverts including terms related to ‘homeworking’ have increased at a faster rate than total adverts, with homeworking adverts in May 2021 three times above their February 2020 average, according to the ONS. Similarly, of working adults currently homeworking, 85% wanted to use a ‘hybrid’ home and office approach to working in future.
However, even towards the end of 2021, some businesses were uncertain about their long-term plans, with 32% not sure what proportion of the workforce would be working from their usual place of work, going forward.
With so many businesses now offering more flexible working arrangements, it’s important that the office product supplies industry also adapts to ensure it can attract and retain the best talent.
Adapting processes
To ensure staff can successfully undertake their role from any location, they need access to all key data; especially for those in a customer facing role, the ability to view all relevant information relating to each account in a timely manner is essential to ensure good customer service. With records stored in the cloud this process becomes seamless for both new and long-standing employees to navigate.
Sales teams are also able to browse customer profiles and order history to identify where products and services could be upsold, without having to trawl through endless paper records stored in filing cabinets. This has been a growing focus for many businesses, especially as they’ve expanded into new markets and diversified their product offerings.
By investing in a customer relationship management system, organisations can gain a better understanding of customer behaviour which, over time, can help to predict changing requirements, as well as tracking every interaction or piece of feedback.
Establishing open lines of communication
One of the biggest challenges of managing remote employees is communication. This was, arguably, the main hurdle businesses had to overcome in the early days of the pandemic; feelings of isolation and departments working in silos hindered efficiency and created additional work.
In the office, it’s far easier to communicate in-person if you need something – remote communication is different and requires a business to have multiple communication methods in place. Alongside digital messaging tools, teams also require an easy way to share files, data and view overarching business performance – something the majority of cloud-based business management solutions can offer.
Given the instability businesses have faced over the past two and a half years, it’s important they do everything they can to ensure teams feel supported and confident in their roles, as well as keeping clients up-to-date with new services or offers.
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