The workforce is going mobile. Actually, it’s been mobile for quite some time – deskless workers are not new, but with more corporate employees working remotely or on the go, the mobile workforce has grown exponentially. 80% of the global workforce is now deskless¹. 

Traditional deskless or mobile workers are those not anchored to a desk. Think of: field service technicians, independent contractors, home healthcare providers, field salespeople, delivery workers, and traveling consultants. 

As more people that once worked in the office have shifted to mobile work, the pain points that deskless workers have been experiencing for quite some time have become magnified. For organizations that had in-office workers primarily, these difficulties were out of sight out of mind. Now, teams are asking themselves, how do we support mobile and deskless team members?

There are 2.7 billion workers in industries like agriculture, education, healthcare, retail, hospitality, manufacturing, transportation, and construction that are deskless workers. These workers are counting on their organizations to offer the proper mobile workforce management.  

How you choose to connect and engage your mobile team members will directly impact your business. Here are some of the challenges and opportunities to improve these experiences for your on-the-go workers.

Problem: Poor Communication

56% of deskless or mobile workers feel disconnected from their organizations². When workers feel disconnected, their job satisfaction plummets. One of the biggest challenges organizations face with mobile workers is keeping them in the loop. 

Of workers polled, 45% said they don’t have access to the company intranet while on the go³. Truly, mobile workers need to be able to bring communications and technology with them. In the past, technology was not advanced enough to offer a mobile communications solution, that is no longer the case. Now it’s key that you find a solution that works best for your organization instead.

Solution: Employee app

The Appspace employee app makes it easy to reach workers on mobile and personal devices. In the past, sending messages to mobile employees was hit and miss because preferred communication methods or forgotten mediums caused messages to be missed. With Appspace, communications can be sent to the employee app, enterprise messaging platforms, and email. Senders just post using the admin console, and your content will push to multiple locations – digital signage too! 

This way, your in-office workers and mobile workers are all getting the same information at the same time. Making everyone on the same page and well informed, no matter where they are. 

Problem: Access to the right information

We’ve all had days when we aren’t working in the office, and we need to pull an important document and realize it’s nowhere to be found. We can’t peek over a cube wall and ask someone to send it, either. 

Solution: Intranet

Having an intranet is absolutely necessary for organizations of all sizes. Not only does it offer the option to be a communication hub, but it can also be a repository for all of your important documents, from sales collateral to process documents and everything in between. Building and maintaining an intranet with these valuable resources will make your team feel well equipped and ready to handle anything.

Problem: Disengagement

We can talk all day about communicating frequently and technology solutions to open the communication floodgates, but what about actually engaging your employees with your content?

Chances are if you have a deskless or mobile team, they have different types of information that would be of value to them. They might need more emphasis on an all-hands meeting since they won’t see multiple reminders throughout the office leading up to the meeting. In-office policies aren’t going to be of value to them, either, but company health policies while being in the field would be.

Solution: Custom content

Appspace offers a wide variety of customizable content cards and feeds that you can curate to fit a variety of audiences. Take the time to create a playlist for your mobile workforce of information that is relevant to them. Taking the time and care to craft engaging and relevant information for your mobile team will boost engagement, directly impacting employee satisfaction and experience. 

These are just a few of the high-level things you can do to improve your mobile and deskless team members. Curious what else Appspace can do to help your team? Contact our team today so we can help create a custom solution to fit your organization’s needs. 

1. Emergence, 2018, “The Rise of The Deskless Workforce”
2. Forbes, 2020, “Don’t Ignore the Deskless Workforce”
3. Smarp, 2021, “7 Challenges with Deskless Workers and how Technology can Help”