What is a digital workplace and where did the term originate?

A quick look at Google trends shows the increasing interest in digital workplace solutions over the last couple of years. The term has started to go mainstream thanks to publications and books by industry experts such as Paul Miller (CEO of Digital Workplace Group) and Jane Mcconnell (a digital expert and researcher).

Miller popularised the term through his book “digital workplace: How technology is liberating work” published in 2012. The book is based on the premise that the physical office will slowly be less central following innovations in technology such as mobile devices, telecommunications services, social media and more.

The digital workplace is defined in the first chapter as “the technology-enabled space where work happens – the virtual, digital equivalent of the physical workplace”. Miller further explained that work shouldn’t be about the ‘where’ anymore, rather than the ‘how’. Employees nowadays have the tools to perform their jobs from any location and from any device (depending on the nature of the job of course) so they are not restricted to a physical location. This flexibility helps increase engagement and recruit better qualified individuals.

“If it’s no longer where you work but how you work, then this shift brings control, influence, empowerment and autonomy, to each of us” ~ Paul Miller

Jane Mcconnell, in her quest to stress the importance of the intranet and make it more appealing to top management, led a research study for the “digital workplace trends report” previously known as “the intranet trends report” – you see the growing importance of the term already.

In a blog post published in 2009, Mcconnell led a brainstorming session with over 300 members from an intranet group she managed on LinkedIn to replace ‘intranet’ with a new term. The session resulted in a number of terms ranging from the obvious ‘web office’, ‘online office’ and ‘web workplace’ to the more sophisticated “company information, news and collaboration portal’ and ‘my collective and personal workplace’.

Bizarrely enough, the list didn’t contain the term ‘digital workplace’. Instead, Mcconnell favoured ‘web workplace’ as it conveys the importance of providing solutions for on-site as well as remote and mobile teams and that the term is easily remembered and identifiable through its initials ‘WW’. The digital workplace won the naming rights and became the de facto standard.

However, in an article published earlier this year, Mcconnell stated that ‘web workplace’ – even though it is not in use today – is more comprehensive and accurate than ‘digital workplace’ and doesn’t sound technical, which resonates well with HR and communication specialists.