Stefan Eriksson, 2021-03-25
Are you ready for the office return?
Offices are set to burst back to life, but rapid transformation needs to take place to deliver safe working conditions. Are you ready?
Across many parts of the world, offices are being reorganised to create more space, more meeting rooms and more video conferencing.
It’s important to fully prepare for the next phase of Covid recovery, combining a mix of home working and phased office life – the hybrid workplace.
Independent Research
Backed by the latest independent research, we estimate more than half of businesses are planning to accelerate IT budgets this year, with video meeting room technologies one of their top priorities.
What we are finding is more companies are reorganizing their offices and preparing to facilitate increased video meetings. Our views have been reinforced by new research from strategic advisory analysts, Metrigy, and discussions with distributors and resellers across the globe.
The traditional office is already going through rapid transformation, spearheaded by conferencing and collaboration. It’s clear many successful companies are already experiencing a rapid return on investment and are planning to invest more in meeting room technologies and hardware for remote workers.
Versatile, cost effective and ‘climate neutral’ solutions (with no net impact on the planet) will be key. Many business critical meetings will continue to be conducted online, both now and in the future.
To support a safe office return, we recommend:
- Limiting capacity of office spaces to ensure adequate social distancing
- Converting existing meeting rooms into video enabled conferencing
- Installation of touchless device technologies such as ‘contactless conferencing’
- Adding more enclosed work zones
- Increased general cleaning and sanitation
Future workgroups will likely consist of a mix of in-person and remote participants, with professional-quality video meetings becoming the benchmark for collaboration success, wherever people are working. Flexibility is key.
Be prepared
Clearly it is an evolving situation in all four corners of the world. But one thing is for sure, businesses need to prepare for greater numbers in the office, whilst also maintaining remote working too.
We’ve seen huge demand for flexible USB-based video kits, whilst early orders for our new Konftel Cam10 business webcam have exceeded expectations. A series of new products are in the pipeline, such as a high performance speakerphone and combined video cameras.
Safety and social distancing will be vital when more people return to offices. No-touch solutions will be increasingly popular. Our Konftel Unite app for example, switches the operation of audio-based meetings from the traditional keypad to the screen of a mobile phone or tablet, easily via Bluetooth.
The world of communication is set to enter a new phase. Be prepared. Be ready.
