The Main Benefits to Look for in a Good Workplace Management Solution

But what if you don’t already have workplace management software? In that case, you’ll have to sift through the dozens of available solutions from various suppliers. How can you tell which workplace management software you should pick?

In this guide, we’ll go through the five main benefits you should look for in a good workplace management solution for your company. Let’s get started.

How can workplace management software help your business?

Workplace management, in a nutshell, is a branch of facility management that focuses on optimizing a workplace’s physical resources, like office space. It makes sense for medium to large size enterprises to improve how well they use existing office space so they can cut costs and to maximize available resources.

For example, any given office building only has a set amount of office space for all the workers in a company, as well as any freelancers, contractors, and guests or customers. Through workplace management software, the business in that office building can:

• Make sure that everyone has enough space for their needs
• Ensure that customers are taken care of promptly and don’t have to stand around while waiting
• Lower the costs of unused real estate or electricity
• Take advantage of flexible seating areas, such as those used by remote workers
• And more

As you can imagine, keeping track of office space and monitoring how all available seating is used can be difficult if you try to do it by hand. Workplace management software can do all the tracking and recording for you, along with provide valuable insight and analysis to make better use of limited resources.

Other benefits of workplace management software include:

• Easier employee scheduling, particularly when it comes to freelance or part-time remote workers. More people than ever before are working from home, so they don’t always need permanent seating at an office. With workplace management software, you can schedule employees as needed and maximize available space even if you wouldn’t technically have enough seats for every employee if were they to come in at once
• More accurate payroll. Workplace management software can record who is in the office at a particular time and make sure that hours worked are accurately recorded. This saves you money by preventing you from overpaying employees who aren’t at their desks and ensures that employees feel fairly compensated for their work
• Better management of a mobile workforce. Modern businesses are increasingly relying on off-site employees or remote workers. Workforce management software can make scheduling employee time in the office and recording it on the payroll much easier. Some systems even allow remote employees to clock in from any location
• Prevent customers from being left for too long. It’s all too easy to accidentally over-schedule customer or client meetings if you don’t have workplace management software. But the right software can make sure that customers and clients are never kept waiting for too long, which may impact their overall experience or satisfaction

With all this in mind, it’s important to remember that no two workplace management solutions are alike. It helps to focus on the benefits or features included with a particular software before making a purchase.

Let’s break down the five main benefits you should look for in good workplace management software for your company.

Determine what your office needs in workplace management software

For starters, make sure that any workplace management software you plan to purchase has what your company needs overall. You may need to take stock of your current organizational needs or pain points in order to identify whether a certain software brand is right for you.

Workplace management software can focus on a few major aspects:

• Office hoteling or desk booking. This is a relatively new concept that involves allowing both employees or clients to book desk or office space as needed. This provides a few major benefits, such as increasing office space demand, improving intra-office networking, and facilitating better co-working performance. Office hoteling allows both companies and office managers to maximize available space without having to purchase extra real estate
• Visitor management. Cloud based visitor management system that includes visitor management functionality will allow you to control every major aspect of a client or customer’s visit to your company, including booking, appointment time, surveys, and more. It’s also easier to connect clients with appropriate employees or specialists through dedicated software
• Meeting room booking, which is similar to the office hoteling practice mentioned above
• Safe social distancing and scheduling aspects in light of COVID-19. Many of the best workplace management software solutions now offer functions to help ensure that everyone in your workplace is safe and socially distances properly
• Workplace analytics. Software that includes workplace analytics suites will gather data on things like employee time worked, how popular certain desks or office spaces are relative to their competitors, track employee habits or booking routines, and more. It can help any office manager become more effective at their job

Chances are that your business could use help with at least one of the above aspects. So you should look for workplace management software that includes an emphasis on your unique needs.

But don’t think this means you need to compromise. Many of the best workplace management software solutions include tools or functions for all of the above needs. Do a lot of research before purchasing a new software solution, especially since it’ll take time to integrate it into your business.

Ensure system integration with important workplace systems

Speaking of system integration, you should make sure that any future workplace management solution you purchase will be able to integrate with existing office systems you know and rely on every day.

After all, many businesses are hesitant to upgrade their existing software systems and other technology since it’s often time-consuming and not very cost-effective. Great workplace management software will make it easy for you to upgrade and integrate any existing software or digital tools your company uses.

Furthermore, some workplace management solutions include tools to help you seamlessly integrate any other tools you or your managers might be currently using. By connecting various tools like Microsoft Outlook, Google Calendar, and more to your workplace management software suite, you’ll be able to make both employees and customers more comfortable and gather much more data for more accurate assignments and desk booking.

In fact, plenty of top workplace management systems are known for how they work with hundreds of top global brands, ranging from Google to Zoom to Microsoft and more. Bottom line: any good software solution for your company should synch well with other software picks.

The software should have an excellent UX design

Another major benefit you should look for in workplace management software is a streamlined UX or user experience. This includes but is not limited to the UI or user interface.

In a nutshell, the UX includes:

• The user interface, which dictates how people can interact with the software and control its tools
• The overall design and layout of the management software
• How intuitive and easy to understand the software is – does it require a ton of tutorials for even basic functionality?
• How effective it is at its advertised benefits

But it can be tough to know what the full user experience of new workplace management software will be if you haven’t used it before. Check if a particular solution’s company offers a free trial – many of them do precisely for this reason. A free trial allows you to try out the software for yourself and see how it feels to use physically before buying.

But you can also check out reviews from previous customers or clients. Former customers are usually more than happy to explain any positives or negatives they might have experienced with the software.

Workplace management software with a poor UX or UI will be difficult to use, frustrating to your employees and customers, and may even cause you to make mistakes when booking office space or managing existing infrastructure for your company. All of this can eat into the bottom line and quickly derail your management efforts.

Workplace management software improves employee health and well being

Many businesses are transitioning their existing offices to co-working spaces, leveraging shared desk space, and using other practices to make remote work more appealing and possible for their employees. This is a great thing, as increased flexibility and the potential to work from home are positively correlated with better employee health and morale.

Therefore, any workplace management software you purchase should also play a big role in boosting your employees’ health and well-being. To that end, it should include plenty of tutorials so your employees can use the software quickly and easily, especially if they’re expected to clock in and out using it.

But it should also include plenty of tools so your employees can quickly and easily book desk or office space when needed. Flexible and effective workplace management software should allow your employees to get their work done whether they’re at the office or at home and make use of your company’s new office hoteling policies.

Furthermore, many modern employees are rightfully concerned about social distancing and sickness transmission. This new trend of social responsibility is likely to continue even after COVID-19 runs its course. Good workplace management software should include COVID-19-specific tools so employees can feel safe at their workplace and not feel as though they are placing their or their families’ health at risk just by showing up for work.

Suppliers should understand your ROI needs

Good workplace management software will be cloud-based and easy to install on any of your company’s devices or infrastructure. But that means you’ll need to have a good working relationship with your software’s supplier or producer.

Any supplier you decide to partner with should understand your business’s overall ROI or return on investment needs. They’ll be able to tailor your software package according to what works best for your company, not give you a standard spread of options or tools that just work for most organizations.

Additionally, any supplier you choose to work with should be able to provide technical support and other assistance when possible. Cloud technology is truly great for the majority of businesses these days, but it comes with increased reliance on the people controlling those cloud servers.

With that in mind, you need to be able to count on your suppliers to assist you when times get tough or give you rapid information in the event of a security breach or a sudden crash. Overall, you should take the time to communicate with a future supplier and make sure they’re on the same page when it comes to:

• The long-term working relationship goals between your two companies
• What you need from workplace management software and whether they can accommodate you
• How their software will be able to help with your needs
• And more

Not sure whether a good supplier can help with your ROI needs? In that case, check out the reviews from previous customers and clients and see what they have to say about the people behind workplace management software.

Wrap up

As you can see, there are a lot of factors to keep in mind when choosing top workplace management software for your company. But even though there are hundreds of different options to choose from, focusing on these five benefits will help you narrow down your options until you find the perfect cloud software solution for your needs.

Remember to emphasize:

• Employee benefits and social distancing tools
• A great user experience and interface
• Finding a supplier that understands your business’s needs and is willing to help with every step of the process
• Easy integration with existing office systems, such as calendars, mail systems, time clock systems, and more
• Finding software with the perfect features for your office’s unique requirements

Good luck!