Although keeping WFM capabilities on-premise still works well for some businesses, many are being hampered by ineffective legacy equipment and cumbersome practices, which are restricting growth and having a negative effect on long-term financial success. To help tackle these issues, it is important that managers and procurement leaders are made aware of the advantages of a cloud-based strategy and helped to break free of their fixation with on-premise infrastructure.
Colin Whelan, Principle Solutions Consultant at Aspect, said: “In our current economic climate of uncertainty and instability, it is becoming increasingly important to ensure all processes are managed and deployed appropriately. Given the crucial role that WFM plays in ensuring the smooth running of an organisation, it’s paramount that it can function in an agile manner.
“The prevalence of mobile devices and growing popularity of remote working has made WFM solutions a necessity to successfully manage staff working across different sites. The most effective solutions will incorporate features such as employee scheduling, analytics, reporting and enquiry resolution metrics in a way that caters to the needs of the flexible modern worker. Cloud has this flexibility at its heart but making its presence more widespread is about better extolling its virtues and making the financial benefits clear.”
To build this confidence in cloud, Whelan believes that IT and business leaders need to break free from the heavily ‘on-premise mindset’ that has permeated the early days of WFM technology and focus more heavily on how they can be more innovative when it comes to driving worker efficiency.
He added: “Hosting WFM on-premise was clearly the most viable option in the past, and there are reasons businesses may want to keep it this way – such as security concerns or a simple desire to keep data closer to home. However, any business hoping to remain ahead of its competitors should always be looking at how improvements can be made, as anything that increases workforce efficiencies will always have a long-term financial benefit. For example, one advantage of cloud hosted WFM is the speed of access to innovation and its ability to update immediately, which is being reported as a major benefit by early adopters.”
Whelan concluded: “Making the most of cloud from a WFM perspective is about being open to change and willingness to embrace new ways of working from the top. If leaders are willing and able to do this, the added flexibility and agility that cloud can offer will filter down throughout the organisation, leading to greater employee engagement and, ultimately, improved customer satisfaction.”