The COVID-19 pandemic has changed workplace culture and made working from home the norm. Some companies considered the switch a success, and the trend looks set to continue, either through fully remote work or, more likely, a hybrid home-and-office split.
One of the chief enablers of ensuring the success of this remote work future is the technology that allows workers to remain fully productive from any location.
What do organisations and their employees want from hybrid work?
No matter what industries they operate in, most organisations will share several common needs.
Keep collaborating
Collaboration is at the heart of modern knowledge based working. Different departments, teams, and individuals across an organisation should be able to collaborate, both in real time and asynchronously, to achieve the organisation’s goals.
Maintain/build culture
Each organisation has its own unique culture that guides everyday operations, employee relations, and customer or client interactions. Before the age of remote work this culture flourished and was nurtured in a shared space. Technologies that promote remote work also need to simulate the same shared office atmosphere which enables an organisation to build and maintain its culture.
This includes practical steps, such as making policy documents available online and providing communication channels that ensure everyone hears about goals, plans, and important company announcements.
While remote work does not allow for coffee-machine or watercooler socialising, companies can open channels that allow employees to replace those communications.
Seamless experiences
For a remote team to operate effectively, distance, time and location can’t affect day-to-day operations. Team members should be able to be productive anywhere, regardless of device or network.
Work and security policies should be universal and synchronised, and team members should maintain their access privileges and experience no matter what devices they are using to interact with company resources.
Keep data secure
Remote work teams must rely on network technologies to operate effectively. For example, they need applications that can securely send data over different networks to both personal and work devices. This set-up will allow team members to complete their work regardless of where they are or what device they can access.
Cloud-based solutions
The more a company relies on technology and data, the more complex it’s tools and information systems are. Making sure everything is running properly while keeping data secure and managing user access privileges can get complicated and expensive. In-house IT management is too costly for all but the largest organisations. Most companies will require cloud-based solutions and the right providers so they can outsource the data hosting and work platforms.
Introducing Microsoft Intune – integrated MDM and MAM
Microsoft Intune is an MDM/MAM solution that allows companies to ensure they are addressing employee and organisational needs as they cater for a hybrid work future. As a cloud-based solution, it simplifies the management and access of device, application and data. Intune helps organisations by managing security and compliance requirements for organisations devices and applications part of MDM/MAM.
What is an MDM?
Mobile Device Management (MDM) is the practice of overseeing employee devices – mobiles, tablets, laptops or even desktops – to secure and manage the data that they can access, store, and transfer. An MDM system can include both company-issued and personal devices.
What is a MAM?
For devices that an organisation cannot directly manage, a complimentary service to MDM is Mobile Application Management (MAM). MAM works through an application rather than overseeing data at the device level. With this arrangement, companies can keep work applications, services and connectivity separate from other applications on an employee’s personal devices.
Microsoft Intune allows you to configure settings and rules on both company-owned and personal devices. You can also deploy apps directly to employee devices and authenticate them. Whatever your organisational security requirements, Intune helps you achieve them.
Microsoft Intune – built for productivity, security and manageability
Intune provides several features out of the box, which can benefit organisations in numerous ways.
Cloud-based set-up
Intune is a cloud-based solution. No servers or networks are needed on-premise, and software updates and security patches are automatically applied. This means that all your organisation has to care about is setting up the appropriate user and data policies for employees.
Access on any device
Intune works with mobiles, tablets, laptops, and desktops. It works with Windows, Android, iOS, and macOS operating systems, meaning it will work on almost any device in your organisation deploys or your employees wish to use.
Access over any network
Since Intune is cloud-based, the hard work of ensuring it runs on any network has already been done for you.
Manage app access
With Intune, companies can set up data access policies to ensure users can only access company apps with the correct permissions. The company can configure them to run based on different rules depending on their needs. Integrated by default with Azure Active Directory, Intune allows organisations to separate company data from personal data controlling what kind of data can be copied, pasted, saved, or viewed in the apps.
Data security
Microsoft handles Intune security. Companies can also add their own data security policies, such as the need to set up a lock-screen on phones, limited user access, anti-virus scans, and even wiping organisational data without touching personal data if the need arises.
Centralised management
Intune allows for centralised monitoring and management. Administrators can set policies on a single dashboard, where they can also see activity reports and connected devices. This centralised set-up allows your organisation to maintain control of data despite connections from all around the world.
Integrates with other Microsoft Enterprise Managed Security services and M365
As a Microsoft product, Intune already works with Microsoft Enterprise Managed Security (EMS) services and Microsoft 365 applications like the Office Apps, Outlook, and Teams.
If you are already using EMS, you can enjoy extra benefits, such as the ability to encrypt corporate data and require authentication before accessing it. With these tools, you can set up multi-factor authentication or single sign-on (SSO) and wipe corporate data remotely from any device.
Intune from blueAPACHE
blueAPACHE has over 23 years of experience supporting Microsoft solutions for Australian businesses. Our Australia-based support centre is available 24/7 and we are able to provide SLA based Microsoft Advanced support through our certified team of experts. Also, our robust network provides almost 100% uptime, relieving you of the burden of IT management and letting you focus on your business.
To find out more, please contact us directly at:
1800 248 749