“Before we can judge if productivity has improved, we need to get better at measuring it”
Q How is tech changing the way we work?
A The shift to hybrid working technology has allowed us to measure basic levels of productivity by seeing what meetings people are having, looking at people’s schedules, and when they log on and off. We can see if they’re at the keyboard. But within the physical office all we generally have is a badge swipe to indicate our presence. We say physical spaces are great for collaboration, but how do we measure that? And what happens as we develop richer digital collaboration tools?
Q What else is on the horizon?
A We’re also looking at holograms, which is really the next generation of video. That could be used for hybrid meetings, which are currently a particularly thorny issue. Typically the physical room dominates and the people in digital space get forgotten. Could you bring those people into the room as a hologram, or even create a fully immersive environment where you turn an entire room into an interactive space?
Q Will this change our workplace behaviours?
A On a behavioural level, humans tend to gravitate towards the same things. We communicate, we make friends, we network. These are unchanging fundamentals. The change comes in how we achieve these behaviours. My communication habits have changed depending on what technology is available to me, but as far as my habits are concerned, there’s not a lot of change. When it comes to adopting or rejecting technology, I usually summarise it with the three ‘U’s. Is it useful? Is it usable? And who else is using it?
Q Are senior leadership teams ready for the changes ahead?
A I was reading an article just the other day that argued that most leaders don’t really understand what their technology is doing for them. They see the outputs, but the outputs are usually so high level that they can’t see the influence of technologies on them. That also might be why we are at risk of toppling into a trough of disillusionment around generative AI. We went through the same thing in the 1990s with the internet. But if we rejig our data and measurement, and bring people with us, we’ll better understand a technology’s benefits.
Q Ultimately, is tech going to increase productivity?
A That’s a hot topic in the academic world. We still don’t really know how to measure productivity, particularly with knowledge workers. We tend to default back to things that are easy to measure – how many emails we sent or how many meetings we’ve got. On an individual level, productivity is more complex than that. Before we can judge if it has improved, we need to get better at measuring it.
Nicola Millard is principal innovation partner at BT Business.
This article is adapted from a feature first published in the autumn 2024 issue of Edge.