Cloud technology could result in staff taking fewer ‘sickies’

Figures released by the TUC suggest there are now 3.7 million home workers in the UK. InTechnology, leading provider of cloud based managed services believes this number will continue to grow as more organisations embrace cloud technology.

Over the last 10 years significant investment has been made in developing the UK’s digital infrastructure, with many parts of the UK now boasting high-speed broadband connectivity. These technological advances, coupled with the introduction of flexible working policies, have fuelled and facilitated a significant spike in the number of employees working from home.

Richard Quine, divisional product director at InTechnology said: “Business culture has changed dramatically over recent years, adapting and evolving to be more in tune with modern realities. Business is no longer bound by ‘nine-to-five’ operating hours; workers now need around the clock access to documents, accounts and their colleagues. To meet these demands, more and more businesses are looking at alternative communication technologies and the role that the cloud can play in delivering them.

“Video calling, desktop sharing and conference tools like Microsoft Live Meeting offer businesses genuine advantages. They allow employees to work more efficiently which supports productivity, cuts business costs and can actually reduce employee sick-days in the long term.”

Despite the benefits of this new generation of technologies and the opportunities that the cloud presents for exploiting them, the migration to cloud delivery is proving slower than expected. Recent research[1] found just one in ten firms had embraced cloud services, 20% of those worried that their network infrastructure wasn’t reliable enough to support the transition.

Quine added: “Businesses shouldn’t fear the cloud but explore its possibilities and discover how it can benefit employees and overall business efficiencies. A fast, safe and reliable connection is easy to deploy and the pros far outweigh the cons if implemented in the right way working with a reliable cloud services provider.

“The trend for flexible, multi-locational working looks set to thrive in next few years, especially if fuel costs continue to spiral, and businesses have much to gain from cloud computing.”