Intelligent Business Applications Allow More People To Work From Home

Working from home is becoming more popular, and the business case for it is becoming stronger. Hitachi Solutions explains why working from home makes great business sense, and how you can achieve this for your business.

Working From Home Or Shirking From Home?

7.1% of employees in the UK work mainly from home. That’s a big thumbs up for home-working which is on the increase. However, many business people still fear that working from home will reduce productivity and opens the door for a more lackadaisical approach to working. Will your staff really work effectively rather than be distracted by household tasks, parenting, or the latest box set?

The good news is that there are controlled studies which not only prove that homeworking is a reliable and good option, it may in fact be better. Yes that’s right – employees who work from home may be more productive and cost you less. This TED article explains more.

In fact, homeworking is believed to be so effective that the Civil Service have adopted it as a common way of working under their policy ‘The Way We Work’ (TW3).

How Does Working From Home Work?

The crucial element when allowing working from home, and incorporating it as a viable work method, is to very clearly focus on the outcomes, not the process. This means that it’s less important how many hours your staff put in and more important that they get the job done.

However, this all relies on one key enabler: technology. Working from home isn’t possible without smart technology and intelligent business applications.

Technology is a prerequisite to ensuring consistency across the organisation and collaboration with team members. Connectivity is the name of the game. Closely tied to this is ensuring that security is paramount. For example, in customer serving businesses you need to have ways and means of keeping customer data safe and secure when home-working.

Realistically though, working practices now in the digital age shouldn’t be so much about where you work, but how you work.

How To Make Home-Working Work For Your Business

If you are ready to embrace home-working for all the benefits and flexibility it will bring, as well as reduced overheads, then there are some important things to know. As you formulate your thoughts on whether homeworking could work for your business, you can begin to formulate a policy. This establishes clear goals and boundaries for everyone.

As you start, you need to consider whether individual roles, and their associated duties, allow for working from home. For example, someone who is in regular direct face-to-face contact with customers won’t be able to spend their working hours at home. However, if they are most often sat behind a computer screen to perform their tasks, they might be. To know if a role is suitable for homeworking you need to know if the technology is up to the task as well.

This is when it is important to consider a cloud-based software solution which embraces all elements of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) such as Microsoft Dynamics 365.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 – Ideal For Homeworking

Microsoft Dynamics 365 is an exceptional business solution – a by-product of which is that it facilitates homeworking. It truly allows telecommuting as being cloud-based; all that is required is decent internet access and an internet enabled device – two things most workers have anyway, or you can provide them.

Being cloud-based also solves a number of other typical business conundrums. For starters, your software will always be up-to-date. Automatic updates mean that you’re always working with the latest release without having to splash out again, or disrupt work whilst you update a system. It also solves any data storage problems. You won’t run out of space, and you have secure off-site back-ups should you need them.

In addition to being cloud-based, Microsoft Dynamics 365 offers some other valuable functionality for remote workers.

It is, of course, Microsoft. It therefore uses many of the familiar business applications you and your employees are familiar with – the Office suite for starters. It’s not complicated, but rather intuitive, whilst still being refined with templates and processes which are unique to your business. This brings the consistency you need across all tasks, whilst also being easy for telecommuters to use and access.

Then there’s security – a big issue when it comes to all types of remote working. With Microsoft Dynamics 365 crafted for your business you can be sure that both cybersecurity and privacy concerns are taken extremely seriously, and protected. Indeed, the security model of Microsoft Dynamics 365 is exceptional. It works on four key premises:

• Ensuring provision for users and homeworkers is at the appropriate level – employees can only see and access that data which they need in order to be able to do their job
• Categorization – users are categorized by role and different restrictions are put in place according to those categories
• Collaboration – data sharing is possible for collaboration with the relevant access rights when needed
• Users are prevented from accessing anything or any record which they don’t either own or share

This combination of role-based security, record-level security, and field-level security allows you to customize Microsoft Dynamics 365 to your business needs without compromising security.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 For Telecommuting

The reason that Microsoft Dynamics 365 is so ideal for homeworking and telecommuting is two-fold. It’s been designed with the premise that the outcome matters more than the process. Therefore it facilitates that. It’s a true CRM and ERP which allows both insight and productivity across the board.

Secondly, it doesn’t take a one size fits all approach. Instead, Microsoft Dynamics 365 is built for you by specialist developers such as Hitachi Solutions . This means you get exactly what you need and a truly intelligent business application which can be used wherever and whenever ensuring the goals of the business are seamlessly met. It’s also scalable according to need.

Microsoft Dynamics 365 is the intelligent business application which will enable your business to benefit from the increased productivity of homeworking.