Saying that the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has placed unprecedented pressure on a distributed workforce and businesses around the globe is a bit like saying that the South African public gets ever so slightly nervous every time a short-notice presidential address is announced in relation to lockdown measures. I.e. a complete and utter understatement.
With business leaders worrying about the health and wellbeing of their teams, as well as the capabilities of their HR tech ecosystems, we’re pretty sure the sales of industrial-strength deodorants and Rennies have skyrocketed in recent months.
Read more: Your quick guide to understanding the evolving HR tech ecosystem
Fortunately, there are silver linings to be enjoyed…
For one thing, we live in the wonderful time of SaaS (Software as a Service), which makes it a whole lot easier to work from home than it would have been in say, the 90s, when the only types of jobs you could feasibly do from home involved Tupperware parties and dodgy pyramid schemes.
Because SaaS solutions are built for and housed in the cloud, rather than on-premises ecosystems, they are uniquely suited to address the challenges that face distributed workforces. In fact, videoconferencing, real-time communication platforms and apps that automate tasks like email marketing and data analysis have completely changed the way we work. These days, remote teams can access tools via VPNs (virtual private networks), and stay connected with each other without too many interruptions in their day-to-day workflow.
As such, it’s no wonder that the SaaS-based HR market is projected to expand by 10.2% and reach an estimated USD 20.3 billion market share by 2023.
After all, due to the rapid spread of the COVID-19 virus more than one-fifth (1.5 billion) of the world’s population was ordered or urged to stay in their homes. This has changed the workplace landscape dramatically and is likely to affect it for many years to come.
The distributed workforce will continue to require SaaS-based support, and innovative developers are likely to deliver over and above what has already been achieved in this regard.
Here are three ways in which SaaS products have already helped to bring people together, even though they are working apart.
1. It streamlines project management and teamwork
The good kind of SaaS-based tools are accessible, cost-effective and increase operational efficiency from the word go. It’s always online, results in reduced IT spend and in-house maintenance costs, and weaves visibility into content, communication and overlapping workflows. It’s a little bit like magic, to be honest.
SaaS-based project management tools like Asana, Jira, Trello, and Monday.com can be used to simplify the way distributed teams manage workloads, communicate among one another and track projects from inception to completion.
It’s the ideal way to coordinate multiple complex projects with a remote team because it breaks it down into easily organised, trackable and manageable tasks that each employee can access from a user-friendly interface tailored to their needs.
Messaging tools like Slack, Microsoft Teams, and Google Hangouts likewise pave the way for frictionless teamwork. These platforms can be used to share documents, chat informally, set up meetings and collaborate in countless other ways.
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2. It promotes company culture and employee engagement
Employee engagement is one of the biggest challenges faced by HR professionals in charge of distributed teams. Facilitating cohesion among team members who work in completely different spaces (on opposite ends of the globe in certain cases) is a tall order at the best of times. Fortunately, SaaS-based employee recognition and reward platforms like bountiXP make all the difference.
The benefits of regular, timely and specific employee recognition have been proven time and again.
It’s relatively easy to leverage this type of engagement-boosting cultural approach when you run an SME and all of your employees fit around a single lunch table in the breakroom. Grow beyond this point, and you need to find recognition tools that are able to scale with the needs of your team.
bountiXP comes to the party with all the bells and whistles needed to keep a distributed workforce happily engaged. By combining the power of goal-based and values-based recognition, bountiXP aligns strategy and culture for improved people performance based on four recognition types. This includes ‘thanks’, ‘nominations’, ‘appreciation’ and ‘boosts’ on a highly visible platform where everyone can see when one of their co-workers receives some well-deserved props.
Research has shown that rewards amplify the impact of recognition. bountiXP ups the ante even further by making a range of rewards available that so employees can pick and choose from reward cards, virtual cards, digital vouchers, travel and experience rewards, as well as a range of products and prizes to find something they really want. And that’s just the tip of the awesomeness iceberg – there are surveys, gamified UX and a cloud-based learning management system to boot… Find out more by taking advantage of this FREE trial.
Read more: Digital employee recognition has never been easier than with bountiXP
3. It unifies HR data
SaaS-based HR enablement tools like DayForce unify HR data and makes the day-to-day work of managing a distributed workforce a whole lot easier. By providing human resources professionals with the means to access HR, payroll, benefits, workforce management and talent management information on sleek, user-friendly platforms, it reduces the overall administrative burden on these fine folks considerably.
There you have it – three ways in which SaaS supports the distributed workforce and the people who take care of their wellbeing.
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