The remote workforce is on the rise and now is the crucial time for companies to adopt the resources necessary to support these workers.
According to the 2019 State of Collaboration Report of nearly 1000 U.S. office workers, 57% of Gen Z, 50% of millennials and 46% of Gen Xers are working from home at least once a week. It is clear that the demand for a better work-life balance and the rising costs of major cities is leading workers to prefer flexible work schedules and shorter commute times. Using collaboration tools such as Zoom and Asana can make it easy for companies to embrace a more distributed workforce.
Despite working from various areas of the world, 62% of respondents still said they prefer in-person communication, so companies should still make an effort to meet in real life to create a stronger connection among teams.
If meeting cannot be done face-to-face, office workers said they would collaborate more through visual communication. Using visuals can add context to textual based conversations and cut down long meetings.
One of the most significant findings of the survey was that 94% of office workers listed team collaboration as a top priority.
Furthermore, all generations prefer communicating over the phone when it comes to customer support, but Gen Z and millennials engage in live chat much more. Companies should learn from this and look to incorporate these findings to create a better experience for the younger generations.
