Digital Workspace

Tech Innovations Enable a Seamless Remote Work Experience for Feds

Virtual collaboration platforms and artificial intelligence tools enhance the work-from-home experience for users.

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Walter Maikish is the operations director for federal civilian at Cisco. He leads a team dedicated to working with federal agencies on their strategic roadmaps and digital transformation planning.

For more than a year, traditional office life has seen a whirlwind of change. From the sudden shift to remote work and an uncharted virtual environment to an increase in the use of innovative collaboration platforms to connect with coworkers, constituents and customers, the future of work looks vastly different than it did before.

Federal agencies are no exception. Like their private sector counterparts, agencies have learned to rely on a host of new technologies in order to continue meeting their missions remotely.

But unlike the private sector, technologies used by agencies must comply with a set of authorizations and certifications, such as those from the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program, due to the sensitive and often private nature of their work.

So, what exactly does the future of work look like for federal agencies and how will that change as more federal employees return to the office?

Virtual Collaboration Is a Pillar of Federal Work Now

If there’s one aspect of remote work that took off during the pandemic, it’s the use of collaboration platforms.

With employees working from various remote locations, relying on an efficient and stable platform to connect them with each other and with customers is essential to getting the job done and continuing critical operations. Face-to-face contact is important, and collaboration platforms enable that among employees working remotely.

A recent survey from Cisco indicates that 27 percent of government employees globally anticipate working from home at least four to seven days a month once offices fully reopen, and another 21 percent anticipate doing so eight to 15 days per month. It’s clear that the integrated, day-to-day use of collaboration platforms is here to stay — and rightly so.

Highly secure collaboration is critical for the federal workforce. As a decent percentage of the workforce will remain remote at least part-time once offices reopen, agencies must rely on collaboration platforms that offer a suite of capabilities that fall in line with mission-critical authorizations and certifications.

Federal employees have spent countless hours using collaboration platforms for meetings, calls and messaging over the past year, allowing them to stay engaged and productive while remaining secure.

Across the federal government, teams are increasingly relying on these platforms with standards-based end-to-end encryption, real-time data loss prevention and security for mobile devices.

LEARN MORE: How can agencies secure data from shared documents after users leave?

Enabling a Hybrid Workforce with Key Insights

With part-time remote work within the federal workforce quickly becoming the standard, using the right tools to help employees thrive is necessary to meeting the mission. But what if these new tools could help us work smarter?

Understanding how employees spend their time, who they collaborate with most, what meetings they attend and the percentage of meetings that take place outside of a team’s preferred working hours are all valuable insights in building a productive and engaged workforce.

Through recent innovations in technology like machine learning and artificial intelligence, building a workforce that includes in-office and remote employees has never been easier.

Remote work technology has seen vast innovations over the past year that will change the workforce for the better. This includes personalizing collaboration platforms to help employees feel more connected in video meetings and enabling network visibility that delivers smart insights that show trends in meeting habits and schedules.

As vaccines roll out and offices slowly reopen in the summer and fall, the federal workforce will continue to evolve. Remote employees will make up a sizable portion of the workforce.

The use of innovative collaboration technologies will continue to accelerate, and the traditional office will be permanently changed. The future of work is here. Are you ready?

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