New Flexible Working Models Need New Tools
Our working world is changing at a blinding pace. In particular, there are several pillars of traditional office jobs that are shifting:
- Working-hour models
- Employee/employer relationships
- Place of work
Working-hour models are becoming more flexible. First, the traditional “nine to five” gave way to models of core time and flexible hours. This has gone even further; job sharing and flexible working models like part-time can make it easier for employees to reconcile their individual lifestyle and personal situations with their jobs’ requirements. On the other side, such models can enable employers to retain valuable skilled workers who aren’t willing to fill a full-time job at a given time.
These types of employee/employer relationships form another of these pillars subject to change. A growing number of full-time, permanent employees want to enjoy more leeway and freedom of choice. Possible reasons are a greater preference for project work or more frequently changing coworkers. Those employees often use their permanent jobs as launchpads for self-employment and turn their prior employer into their first business client. Or they start their freelance activities while remaining on a part-time job. In those cases, employers need to be capable of adapting their organization to avoid employee expertise leaving the company abruptly.
Virtualization as an option for remote and part-time employees
The third pillar is place of work—and in almost all cases, employees are the ones asking for more flexibility. Commuting costs valuable time and energy (and there’s also the impact on climate protection), so businesses might question the need for their employees to be physically present. Whose presence is really indispensable at all times, and which tools or solutions could help reduce costly commuting? In the long run, flexible workplace models could help businesses cut costs as well. Vacation days, sick leave and home-office periods leave office desks less than 100% occupied at any time. Desk-sharing and smart office arrangements enable more efficient office-space usage and help save costs in the long term.
The very organization of work is subject to change as well. Agile working opens up traditional, static team structures and repeatedly forms new purpose-built teams around customers, projects or current challenges.
Virtualizing tools and applications play a major role in decoupling work from location and dedicated office desk. Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) solutions such as Parallels Remote Application Server (RAS) and Parallels Desktop™ for Mac Business Edition are important building blocks for granting external workers access to relevant tools while enabling IT departments to retain their authority over access control. This renders software and application systems independent from endpoint devices and location.
Learn more about all the features in Parallels Desktop for Mac Business Edition and test them for 14 days for free!
Learn more:
Forbes | New Work
Parallels Blog | 4 Major Reasons Why VDI Doesn’t Appeal To Small and Medium Enterprises
