Source: https://www.worktechacademy.com/interactive-educational-experience-workplace/

The diverse classroom settings of education are well schooled in enabling digital teams to build and share knowledge easily, and in catering for the widest range of need. What lessons do they hold for interactive technology in the corporate workplace?

The corporate workplace can learn a great deal from education when it comes to digital collaboration and the demands of digital teams.

That is the message from Dutch company CTOUCH, which has been a pioneer in interactive technology in the education sector and is now launching a new offer in the UK’s smart office arena.

The diverse classroom settings found in schools, further education colleges and universities form the ideal training ground for development for a number of reasons, says CTOUCH.

There is engagement with the workforce of the future in an environment that has seen rapid adoption of touchscreen technology.

There is the challenge of finding a way to accommodate the widest range of devices and platforms quickly and seamlessly – a key feature of the educational experience.

And there is the practical learning curve of experimenting in an educational market that has been ahead of the curve in the knowledge economy in understanding how digital groups build and share knowledge.

Now CTOUCH is set to apply the lessons of developing interactive technology in education to the corporate office. It has developed a smart screen system called ‘Leddura 2 Meet’ that aims to tackle the core issues within the workplace through a versatile software-driven approach.

Working with the future workforce

Although this is not CTOUCH’s debut in the corporate workspace, its work in education is has enabled the company to study and understand the needs of the future workforce before they enter the workplace. Millennials will make up two-thirds of the workforce by 2030 according to Forbes Magazine. They have grown up learning and adapting to new technologies; as a result, they expect immediacy, seamless connectivity and ease of use.

However, the workforce does not just comprise millennials and digital natives. There are currently four generations in the workforce, and technology must respond ergonomically to each generation.

The ‘Leddura 2 Meet’ aims to be a swift and intuitive enabler of collaboration. While some may pick up the technology immediately, CTOUCH provides onsite training to ensure everyone in the company has the knowledge to use it.

Accommodating an agile workforce

Introduction of this new system is taking place at a time when the Activity-Based Working (ABW) model has taken the corporate world by storm, with many organisations making significant design and architectural changes to their workspaces to accommodate a shift in working style. This means that organisations are looking for technology that is easily adaptable and agile in its environment.

Traditionally, meeting rooms were in a fixed location in a corporate office. Now, buildings can collect data on space utilisation which can offer an organisation a better understanding of how the building should be designed. The layout of new workplaces is therefore featuring multiple collaboration spaces and meeting rooms.

CTOUCH has experience in developing adaptable technology to accommodate for high-agility classrooms. It has used this experience to create a simple plug-and-play hardware which can be moved around the building on wheels.

Supporting remote working

As technology develops and organisations have a better understanding of different styles of working, there is growing acceptance of the need to work remotely from the office. But in order for remote working to be successful, collaboration and innovation cannot be compromised by technology failings.

This solution from CTOUCH aims to support distributed working through immediate screen-sharing capabilities, note sharing, and integration with popular work tools such as Skype for Business.

There is no log-in to the system so anyone can use it, making this an appropriate solution for the increase in co-working spaces. Organisations are actively working with external partners in order to innovate more effectively. This system allows internal and external parties to screen share and annotate the screen together, which enhances the ease of remote collaboration.

Protecting data privacy

As data information becomes a valuable commodity for an organisation there is a greater emphasis on network and information security. CTOUCH has acknowledged this by making its solution privacy aware. When collaboration occurs in a meeting with an external party who isn’t connected to the business, they are provided with a USB key to connect to the shared session protect network security.

After the meeting is completed and notes and annotations have been shared and sent, the history of that meeting is automatically deleted from the software and hardware. This means no historic data can be accessed through the system, and instead only online via emails sent in the meeting.

Enhancing innovation and productivity

Companies have been searching for a way out of the post-financial crash productivity dip for almost a decade in the UK. Many solutions have been tried but there is no quick fix. As a result, companies are now looking to enhance employee experience and ease pressures on their workforce in a bid to create the conditions to harness innovation and productivity.

Innovation often comes to a halt when technical barriers disrupt creative flow. The solution developed by CTOUCH aims to alleviate daily stresses surrounding frustrating technical issues to create a product which enables innovation and productivity through ease of use and collaborative functions.

The educational market has proved to be an ideal training ground for CTOUCH to address the challenges of a diverse and demanding user group that wants to connect, collaborate and innovate in a seamless way and its own terms, respecting privacy and security. That is the workforce of the future and CTOUCH’s interactive technology is tailored to their needs.

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