The Conversation We Need to Have for a Better Future of Work

We need to talk.

Those four little words often make people feel anxious and deeply uncomfortable. Heck, I didn’t even like typing them. But they’re also often followed by a conversation that needs to be had. And this time, the conversation is about the future of work.

We started Produce8 because we have a vision. We want to enable people to work how they work best—be that remotely, hybridly or just digital-first(ly?)—but still be as efficient as possible.

Flexibility without losing effectiveness. Who doesn’t want that?

To guide our process, we’re continually having great chats with different teams and individuals around the current digital work model. And the one thing people seem to agree on across the board is there’s a visibility problem.

It’s hard to be efficient and effective within a digital team when you can’t really see what everyone else is doing and accomplishing. And when we try to overcome this with near-constant notifications, pings and status updates, we endure digital distraction—something that’s not only impacting our time and ability to focus and produce our best work, but also our mental health.

These are all things modern digital workers can relate to and agree upon. We need a different digital work management model to support the future of work.

But, where the conversation begins to get uncomfortable is when we start talking about a solution.

The solution to teamwork transparency is an elephant in the room

We know we need to make digital teamwork more visible. But how?

In March 2020, at the onset of the pandemic, there was a huge boost in demand for employee monitoring software solutions. So clearly that’s the direction some companies are deciding to go in an attempt to solve this problem. But who does that really solve the problem for?

Employee monitoring creates an environment where managers or employers are watching their people to see—and most likely pass judgment—on their actions and interactions throughout the work day. This process creates some visibility, sure, but only for the people doing the watching. What about everyone else? And what about the impact on work culture?

“I knew if we were going to solve this problem for ourselves—and anyone else—we really needed to build something that could provide visibility without compromising on trust,” said Joel Abramson, Co-Founder and CEO of Produce8.

Our alternative to employee monitoring represents a new operating model that can make the digital workplace actually work for everyone.

If you think about what we’re building in relation to employee monitoring, we’re completely shifting the dynamic. Instead of one or a few select people watching everyone else and deciding what is and isn’t productive, we’re creating an environment in which each member of your team is sharing freely and openly. Everyone can see and understand the work getting done in real time. And the team can come to collective conclusions about what productivity looks like.

But there’s another key difference. In our model, teams only view actions and engagement happening in their work tech stack .

• Everyone knows exactly which apps are generating data and where the work is getting done.
• Everyone knows exactly who can see all the data.
• And the stuff that happens outside of work-related apps? Well, that’s not really anyone’s business, is it?

As long as the work gets done effectively, why should the hours you put in or the path you take to get there matter? This concept sits firmly at the heart of work flexibility and, we believe, the future of work.

Thinking about digital teamwork in a new way

“Interestingly, we revisited the employee monitoring subject a lot with some of our early alpha and beta testers,” said Ryan McGinnis, VP Marketing and Product for Produce8. “When we started describing what kind of tool we could build, the initial reaction we kept getting was, ‘that sounds like monitoring’.”

The frustration was really high on our team in those early days because we knew there was more than just a nuanced difference. Transparency is a fundamentally different concept than one person watching another. In our approach, everyone has to be open—even the team leaders. It’s about the complete democratization of work-related data.

“We know there’s going to be some discomfort with it, and our early users are helping shape the boundaries accordingly,” said McGinnis.

Greater visibility and transparency takes the stress and distraction out of digital work. And that sure sounds like a better future of work to us!

Is your team ready for a better future of work?

If you’re still trying to wrap your head around this concept, the best way to get it is just to try it.

It doesn’t have to be a huge undertaking to start moving your team toward a better future of work. Start simple. And start for free. Here’s how:

1. Try us out for yourself! You can join our beta and get early access. Play around with the platform and see what you think.
   
2. Add a common app your team uses to Produce8 and start gaining insight into a narrow subject. For example, how does your most important app punctuate your average work day? What about your average work week?
   
3. Run a time-constrained experiment across more tools. Start to understand how you use your apps, particularly those key to collaboration and communication. Are you getting value from those tools? How much time are you spending in meetings and reading/replying to Slack and Teams messages? That data can prompt some really interesting discussions in your team. It can also help you reduce the torrent of communication and give everyone the space they need to do work.
   
4. Build out your digital work environment for your whole team. Add the tools in your team’s tech stack where work gets done and start building a more comprehensive view into the work your team does. You might also start to identify work habits and patterns that can help you collaborate more effectively.
   
5. Mature your usage with the app and give your people a safe space for self improvement. Add more teams from within your company, and have them add their tech stacks as well. You can also start creating a more personal aspect to the app by enabling team members to include all the apps they use into a view that’s for their eyes only—though this is a part of the app we’re still conceptualizing and building on.

Working together to build the work of the future

Everyone wants to feel like they’re meeting their commitments, doing good work and contributing to the collective. When all of this happens within a strong healthy culture, work feels good.

But to achieve this, we need to really listen to the real problems in the way we’re currently working and figure out what will truly enable the flexible digital work model we all want for the future.

If we want to enable digital workers to own their own accountability and streamline both synchronous and asynchronous team collaboration, we need more transparency and operational awareness. That’s what Produce8 is all about.

Just like the future of work though, we’re a work in progress. We don’t have all the answers yet, and that’s okay. We’re passionate about working with teams like yours to continue building the best solution to support a strong and thriving future of work.

Thanks for ‘having the talk’ with us. And if you have comments, ideas or feedback on what we’re building, we’re all ears !