Before you leave work, you can use an app on your phone to check traffic conditions, view a video security feed of your front door, adjust the temperature inside your home and even order groceries to pick up on your way there. Technology helps us save time and money and, in many cases, enables us to live a better life. So why can’t it do more to help us reach our full potential at work?

GET SMART

Imagine if your workplace could use data to improve your day at work, the same way GPS improves your drive home. An app on your phone could tell you who is at work and what meeting rooms are available. A workstation with an integrated sensor would activate a light when you were using it, allowing you to focus without interruption. And, your organization could collect information on which rooms you and your colleagues used the most, so it could identify when spaces were no longer working for employees.

Gathering data has tremendous potential. But, data alone is not enough. In Connected Doesn’t Mean Smart, James Norman, UK public sector CIO at EMC, wrote in Internet of Business. “If you add millions of different ‘connected’ devices and massive amounts of data, you get lots of confusion, unless you first determine what you are trying to do with that wealth of data.”

Big data has the potential to overwhelm. At the same time, if a meaningful strategy is in place for how to use data to solve real human problems for people at work, organizations can get smart, creating a more agile workplace and realizing a true competitive advantage.

“Progressive organizations see possibilities,” says Scott Sadler, manager of integrated technologies at Steelcase. “We have a real opportunity to bring together technology and physical space to create a better work experience.”

To read this entire article by Steelcase’s Rebecca Charbauski, click here!