As Australia begins to re-emerge from the grips of the COVID-19 pandemic, local government offices are preparing for their long-awaited return to the office. After such mass disruption, it’s clear that the notion of the ‘classic’ workplace has been left behind in 2020, paving the way for the ‘new normal’.For many industries, the shift to remote working served to highlight that solely office-based roles are now out of touch with a modern workforce.
According to PWC, 74% of Australians want a hybrid future. To best prepare for this, solutions to improve communication between teams, departments and other agencies will be the key to success.
For the public sector, a hybrid model needs to be built on a foundation of flexibility and cooperation. In fact, according to Smartsheet research, 79% of Australians believe greater collaboration is the best way to adjust to changes in the workplace over the coming years.
From budget constraints to training considerations, local governments have been historically slow on the uptake of technology and have come to rely on legacy systems long past their use-by dates. It’s time for the public sector to embrace digital tools to foster a culture of collaboration, improve communications and share data seamlessly to best serve their communities.
The modern workplace
The pandemic aside, the public sector is under huge pressure to deliver the best services to their citizens. The day-to-day involves dealing with complex issues due to an ageing population, escalating pressures in the health system and climate change, and everything in between. When coupled with the stress of living during a pandemic, the mass shift to remote work and ever-shrinking budgets, it’s no surprise that 71% of workers in Australia experienced signs of burnout in 2020.
This move to a hybrid workplace offers the chance to press the reset button, introducing processes or technologies to streamline operations for the better and relieve some of the load from already stretched teams. Introducing a strong foundation of collaborative software, such as Smartsheet, that can be updated in real-time, ensures government employees can work together seamlessly, no matter their location, and don’t fall out of the loop with siloed data.
A single source of truth
It’s no secret that local government staff are flooded with massive amounts of data from a wide variety of department stakeholders every day. In fact, according to KPMG, addressing disparate data sources and quality issues was noted to be the hardest element during the pandemic by 60% of Australian local government staff. Achieving 360-degree, real-time visibility across all departments is critical to avoiding disruption to services in a hybrid model.
To make this a reality, local governments need a system that is easily accessible, adaptable, and truly transparent. Implementing collaboration software, such as Smartsheet, can ensure consistency and allow local authority teams to operate confidently with a single source of truth. Smartsheet can unite multiple workflows and resources, across departments meaning employees can simply access documents, information, or data at a click of a button.
While the disruption brought by COVID-19 has presented many complex challenges for all industries, it is clear that the future of work is hybrid. The pandemic has accelerated the urgency for digital transformation and government agencies have been presented with an opportunity to create a modern workplace set up to deliver the best possible service to their communities. To maximise the potential hybrid work can bring, local governments must embrace digital collaboration tools to foster a culture of cooperation, increase productivity and share data seamlessly.
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