Facing the impact of the pandemic as the world slowly opens up - keeping employees engaged, feeling safe and back at their professional best - is a top priority and challenge for business leaders and enterprises across the globe. 

Simply put, companies that struggle to provide accessible and easy to use tools that enable online collaboration and continuous communication among teams may see their employees disengaged and lose motivation. 

This article talks about driving employee engagement using technology. Read on for expert opinion on how can tech be used to achieve enhanced performance and productivity among employees. 

Popular research establishes that employee engagement is critical to any organization's success. While satisfaction and productivity are clear drivers of employee engagement, there is also growing evidence that an employee's emotional loyalty to the organization and its goals increases customer satisfaction and improves overall business outcomes. 

Technology plays a pivotal role in employee engagement strategies to get work done in the 'new normal'. 

Marriott Hotels makes a good example. Ahead of its time in implementation, this five star hotel chain has gamified its recruitment strategy on Facebook to evaluate the talents of prospective candidates through a virtual work environment.

At a time when we are forced by circumstances worldwide towards digital transformation, what does this mean for employee engagement? 

Employee engagement - Positive digital reinforcements

Research data says that on-job employee happiness is significantly impacted by how well their workplace technology performs. Software that is easier to use dramatically contributes to employee satisfaction by helping them to be more productive. 

It is also concluded, more than 75% of employees will switch and look for alternate options if their present job does not provide the tools or knowledge they need to do their job effectively. 

These results establish that the technology teams must focus on ease, usability, and the role technology plays within an organization - both people and business. 

Collaboration - Hybrid is the way forward

Companies need to recalibrate and focus on hybrid modes of team collaboration. While the face-to-face ways need to follow safe-distancing rules for some time now, technology will step in for all online interactions. 

Significant players like Zoom, Clubhouse, Microsoft Teams, Skype and Google Hangouts foster face-to-face interaction and collaboration, albeit through a camera. 

Workload management software like asana and monday.com are popular tools to manage multiple complex projects, while internal messaging systems like Slack empower businesses to keep employees talking remotely. 

These tools are reconstructing how teams can work together effectively from diverse locations.

Supporting IT teams

This sudden influx of multiple tools and technologies have put the IT teams under unprecedented pressure. Driving seamless adaptation all while working from home, IT team members across all businesses are swamped with service tickets and, in many instances, are stretched thin in terms of resources. 

It is the business leaders responsibility, specifically CIOs, to mitigate this burden and find ways to warrant self-sufficient employees. 

One way to do this is to move to an intelligent and efficient ticketing system that automatically enables internal IT teams to prioritize and categorize tickets based on historical data. 

Objective SLAs and reasonable response time further ease the long work hours. Activating support via multiple channels like email, self-service portals, mobile apps, phone, and chat services means IT service teams have a certain amount of flexibility and don't need to standby around the clock.

So, now the question is, how to boost employee engagement in your organization? 

The top-down approach always works. The senior leaders should converge on finding the right tools for their business that will help keep their workforce motivated and improve productivity. 

Demand for easy-to-use technology with intuitive UI has never been higher - this being an immediate response to the accelerated digital transformation projects that previously would have taken years to complete in the given pandemic. 

Implementing the right tools must be made a priority. Happy and motivated employees will be the most significant force for businesses to thrive and tide through the current climate. 

Chat us up on how to keep your employees engaged through this time.