In the last few days, citizens—families, workers, everyone—in Italy have been affected by emergency measures issued by the government to deal with and limit the contagion of COVID-19. One of these measures is Smart Working, a way of working that is already part of the cultural and business fabric of Doxee. Today, we will share the experience of Smart Working by Andrea Canalini, Application Delivery Manager at Doxee.
1. Even before this period, companies tried to involve employees in the value creation process with new methods and technologies. So can smart working be a new way to achieve this goal?
I can confirm that Smart Working experience is a way to create value. I don’t think it’s entirely new, because we’ve been using it in the company for some time now, in similar forms, even before it was made official a few months ago. My collaborators are all responsible people (I think this is a fundamental aspect), who have been working for the company for several years, and I found it natural to be able to allow, especially for those who are not lucky enough to have family or others available to take care of their children, employees to manage difficult family situations by adopting remote working. Now with the official adoption, I notice that it is used by practically everyone and the feedback is positive.
That’s why, even in this particular situation, I haven’t noticed any problems in having the team completely working from home. We communicate efficiently, we’re hitting our goals, and the team is calm. This is definitely valuable.
2. On a practical level, what are the tools and technologies that help you and your team to compensate for the distance between people?
The technologies that support remote work have already been widespread in the company for some time. Going a bit further back in time, we were using Skype, Slack, Whatsapp, and mobile to communicate. In this period, we took the opportunity to harmonize the tools we’re using, down to just one, Microsoft Teams. I must say that I find it fantastic for functionality and stability. In all, email remains a constant.
Technology is a key element that allows you to implement Smart Working that releases people from the office and makes it easy to communicate and collaborate with your team no matter where you are. Digital allows companies to expand and virtualize your workspace, creating a digital workplace where communication, collaboration, and socialization are independent from the physical workplace.
3. What are the three main benefits of smart work?
I’ll give you four:
- It reduces downtime. Because employees don’t have to come into the office, the stress of travel is greatly reduced
- It requires you to really plan your day well so that you can avoid interruptions. I think Smart Working helps both the organization as a whole and individuals become more efficient
- It improves our ability to synthesize and keep things like meetings on schedule
- It allows us to focus on our objectives. I think people take their responsibility seriously and in turn, this increases our overall productivity.
4. What effect does this different approach to work have on customers?
At the moment, our customers do not notice any difference. As I mentioned, we are used to carrying out projects completely remotely. Video conferences are our daily bread, and doing them from home or in the office makes no difference to the client. The only impact could be certain training sessions that, as they are structured, are recommended to be carried out on-site.