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23 February 2023
During the health crisis, we all felt a bit disconnected from the company. This made us realise the situation in which unconnected employees most often find themselves. The subject has been around since the moment IT was introduced into companies. However, the rise of the smartphone 15 years ago, the fall in equipment costs, the ease of access to services via the cloud and the increased awareness of the need to engage all employees is driving increased attention to the subject.
All sectors can be concerned. Whether they are gardeners in charge of green spaces in a municipality, professionals working on an a dangerous site, salespeople in a shop or medical visitors in a laboratory, all these profiles are confronted with the subject of remote connection. This list is of course not exhaustive, but how do we get these 'unconnected' profiles on board? A few avenues for action are shared here.First and foremost, it is important to identify where these "front line workers" are, what their needs are and how to engage them..
The vast majority of connected employees are digitally literate, use equipment provided by the company, have an email address, need regular access to the company's business applications and often work on large screens.
At the other end of the spectrum, we find teams whose level of digital acculturation in a professional situation is not always developed.Access to business applications is infrequent, the tasks of these teams can be repetitive and require a high speed of action "in the field" resulting in little time available for logging on - when logging on during working hours is not simply forbidden.
For these staff who do not interact regularly with the rest of the organisation, there is a gap in terms of speed of adaptation to organisational changes and understanding of changes. To this can be added illiteracy and disability problems which naturally require a fine-tuning of connection problems, in order to adapt the response as well as possible and find, by choosing the right media, the right messages and the right apps or services.
The various communication media fall into 3 categories.
The smartphones, whether personal or company-provided (BYOD vs. COPE), screens hat can be interfaced with a selection of content from intranets or information dedicated to the geographical site, and finally the kiosks or shared screens by several users.
The smartphones make it possible to develop specific uses for each population via apps or communities, but when the equipment is personal, the company cannot force its use and it is rather the ease, the time saving and the discovery of new services that can encourage users to use this means of connection.
The use of display screens is interesting because they can be usedto provide information on substantive subjects, raise awareness of security issues, but this is top-down information that does not generate real-time interaction, unlike the smartphone. Most often, the deployment of these screens requires the implementation of a complementary solution to the CMS, and it also requires an investment in equipment.
Finally kiosks enable access to internal digital content or services to be shared.But this solution requires personal connection profiles. In addition, sharing equipment may require particular attention in terms of maintenance.
No single solution covers all needs and it is often a combination of means that should be considered. In addition to the hardware, change management is essential to develop usage and ensure the adoption of these channels.
Several issues need to be addressed: the the reluctance of management bodies to allocate a specific budget to the equipment and training of non-connected staff,on the one hand , and the specific needs to be addressed for each non-connected population, on the other
Theaudit of the situation will provide valuable information to justify the interest of these investments and and to define the change management plan with finesse.It will cover the choice of tools, content and services offered as well as training and governance: with the animation of communities of needs to make the tools evolve in a way adapted to each population
It is important to review the different realities of the teams in the company.By using « personas » we can project ourselves into the daily life of the different profiles. This approach requires field work to understand precisely the types of problems encountered.
It is by considering these populations competitive advantages, by ensuring better listening, we can hope for a reinforced commitment. These teams are essential to the smooth running of economic activity, let's not forget that.
Are you interested in the topic of unconnected populations? Let's talk about your current or future projects!
Founder of Arctus, Partner
Founder and director of Arctus, Isabelle is also an author and speaker. Since 2007, she has shared her perspective and sheds light on the internal transformations that organizations are going through through studies and observatories such as the Hybrid Work and Digital Management Observatory, the Intranet & Digital Working Observatory or the creativity. She is also an administrator and an active member of AFCI, the French Association of Internal Communication Professionals.
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