Enabling workforce with technology links directly to customer experience and revenue performance; Independent study shows Indian organizations emphasize on improved employee experience
A recent research on Workforce Transformation has found that in Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ), only 6 in 10 (61%) business leaders felt that existing technology in their organization is sufficient to meet their business goals. In India, firms realize the value of technology and innovation and the importance of constantly improving customer experience better than other developing countries in the region, putting them in a unique position in APJ. The commissioned study, conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Dell, investigated how a workforce enablement approach can impact business performance. In the digital era, enabling the workforce with technology is a deliberate strategy to foster high performance and excellence. It begins with understanding that employee experience, customer experience, and revenue growth are decisively linked.
A key finding from the research carried out with 61 Indian organizations, was that most IT and business decision makers believe improving workforce experience and employee productivity, is a critical step in achieving business goals.
“Businesses find themselves at crossroads, between aiming to meet financial goals and creating and sustaining a niche in the new age digital economy. To establish a balance, IT and business leaders need to embark upon a workforce transformation strategy and provide employees, appropriate end user technology – the requisite devices and software – in order to attain the two-fold objective of increasing employee efficiency, as well as retaining talent. Dell is at the forefront of providing solutions aligned to these objectives.” said Indrajit Belgundi, Director & General Manager, Client Solutions Group, Dell India.
According to Forrester Consulting, “Business leaders know that to succeed, they need committed and driven employees who understand the value their work delivers to customers and have the right tools to boost their productivity. But attracting and retaining the best talent is a growing challenge, forcing many organizations to look to ideal technology partners that can help manage device life cycles and, more specifically, PC life cycles.”
36% of the business and IT leaders in India are of the opinion that investing in better employee-facing technologies will help enhance employee experience and ultimately productivity. In addition, 34% feel that removing barriers to productivity will help organizations to retain talent. Engaging employees and empowering them with the technology they need is critical to employee productivity and central to the bottom line. 43% of business and IT leaders in India (higher than the average 38% for APJ) said that they see employee experience as a critical aspect of achieving their business objectives. 62% of these feel that demand for a new device will be driven by better user experience.
To enable their workforces effectively, organizations need to better understand the unique requirements of employees and set employee experience benchmarks, but are falling short in their efforts. The study revealed that more than half of the organizations (52%) in APJ conducted periodic passive audits to measure employee experience, instead of using more active methods such as end user experience monitoring tools (34%) and conducting surveys (20%).
The complexity of the IT environment due to diverse devices, coupled with growing sophistication of security threats, outdated security policies and easy information access have made endpoint devices increasingly vulnerable. According to the survey, most security breaches that have occurred in the past 12 months are because of vulnerabilities at the device level: 43% of breaches in India occurred due to lost/stolen assets by an employee, while 39% occurred due to a security breach of an employee device.
As malware increases in sophistication and the number of new variants and methods of obfuscation rise, antivirus technologies have become less effective at stopping advanced threats to employee endpoints. 79% of business and IT leaders in India said that device malware is a major concern for device security, signifying the need for robust and secure antimalware solutions in endpoint strategies. Most security challenges could be addressed by updating workforce technology to the latest devices. 61% of the respondents across industries said that buying newer PCs would significantly reduce security challenges since newer PC hardware would be more secure. This will further help firms address the user authentication challenge. 61% of respondents mentioned user authentication is a critical challenge that leaves their devices vulnerable and 70% feel that data loss due to theft is a serious security challenge. 44% of the survey respondents, who are IT leaders in firms across industries in India, said that the inability to support a remote workforce is a top PC life-cycle management challenge, while 35% have found a lack of 24×7 IT support to be a key concern.
“Finding an equilibrium between managing budgetary constraints, delivering efficient IT support and enabling enhanced productivity and workforce experience will be key for organizations”, added Indrajit Belgundi, Director & General Manager, Client Solutions Group, Dell, India.
