FRONTLINE FUTURE OF WORK:

Digitization, Connected Workers,

and Building the Frontline
Workforce of the Future

Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
At Beekeeper, we’ve long been champions of Questions organizations need to ask
connecting and empowering the world’s two billion themselves include:
frontline workers. As these essential employees • Who are our frontline workers?
became more and more indispensable in keeping
• How do we help them equitably
our society functioning during a global pandemic,
and sustainably?
we felt it was time to take an in-depth look at the
reality of being a frontline worker and what they • How can we harness established and emerging
really need. platforms to ensure both their safety and success
with respect and dignity?
In this eBook, we’ll examine answers to
questions like: What Does the Term ‘Frontline Worker’ Mean?
• Who are frontline workers? Though it may seem easy to identify who a frontline
• What do essential employees need to be worker might be, it’s important to define our terms.
successful at work? Extrapolating from definitions provided by the
Department of Homeland Security definitions
• How has the technology landscape evolved to
and data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics,
meet their needs?
the Brookings Institution reports:
• How can companies leverage the power of
digital enablement to support their essential
employees?
“We have found 50 million
• What does this process of frontline worker people who qualify as frontline
digitization look like? workers—a majority of the 90
• What does the future of work look like for million people employed in
frontline employees?
America’s essential industries.”
The Reality of Being a Frontline Worker:
Who Are They and What Do They Need?
Every business is, at its core, a people business.
People, at every level, are at the heart of every
enterprise and what makes business happen.
Everyone is necessary and is part of an
interconnected and interdependent web of effort.

All too often, however, those whose efforts drive the

economy from the frontlines are ill-equipped and
under-supported when it comes to providing for
their safety, health, and well-being.

2  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Predictably, during a pandemic, those essential On a more granular level, however, frontline
industries include healthcare and public health workers represent a wide array of people who
according to the Department of Homeland Security. share similarities when it comes to their
Others include first responders in public safety and demographic makeup. The study found that
law enforcement, as well as the food and agriculture characteristically, frontline workers earn lower
industries. Energy, water, transportation and wages, tend to have less access to education, and
logistics, and public works are also deemed over a third of them are over 50.
essential as are communications and information
technology sectors. Like the general population, about half of all
frontline workers are women. However, when it
Rounding out the list are the critical manufacturing, comes to essential frontline workers, over 64%
hazardous materials industries, financial services, are women, according to the CEPR.
chemical workers, and the defense industrial base
— industries that support the needs of the military.
It’s not difficult to see that
In their recent profile of frontline workers in New frontline workers — those
York City, the city comptroller further broke down
the definition of frontline-first industries to include:
keeping the business world
• Grocery, Convenience, and Drug Stores
functioning — are among the
• General Merchandise Stores most vulnerable people on the
• Public Transit; Trucking, Warehouse, and Postal planet right now.
Service
Yet, day after day, beneath their masks, frontline
• Building Cleaning Services
workers put on a brave face and continue providing
• Health Care the essential services the nation needs to sustain
• Child Care and Social Services itself and its people. How are they rewarded? All
too often with inadequate support and safety
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was estimated measures, not to mention chronically low wages
that there were more than 30 million U.S. and the looming threat of losing those wages in
workers employed in these six essential the event that they are unable to work.
industries. “They include grocery store clerks,
nurses, cleaners, warehouse workers, and bus
drivers, among others. They were essential before
the pandemic hit, yet also overworked, underpaid,
under-protected, and underappreciated,” reads a
report entitled A Basic Demographic Profile of
Workers in Frontline Industries created by the
Washington, DC-based Center for Economic and
Policy Research (CEPR).

3  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Frontline Workers Deserve Better — They need to be supported in doing the work that
But Where Do We Start? supports entire nations. Where many companies
can start is through implementing better technology
Though the U.S. Congress passed a number of
and tools to enable their essential workers on the
COVID-19 bills, including various protections,
digital front. To that end, Beekeeper has invested
frontline workers still remain both woefully
tremendous effort and resources into helping
underprotected and under compensated. CEPR
organizations digitally enable their
offers several recommendations that are sweeping
frontline workforces.
and long overdue.

These recommendations include action on a variety

of fronts to ensure that all frontline workers have:
1.  Comprehensive health insurance that includes
free coverage of COVID-19 testing and treatment
2. Paid sick leave and paid family leave
3. Free child care
4. Student loan relief
5. Consumer and labor protections, including
hazard pay or other additional compensation
for essential workers
To that end, CEPR recommends that frontline
workers who are also immigrants receive protection
regardless of their current immigrant status.
Similarly, CEPR calls for the U.S. Occupational Safety According to a recent Harvard Business
and Health Administration to issue an Emergency Review report, 87% of survey respondents
Temporary Standard that requires employers to expressed that when their workers are
provide “specific and necessary protections for empowered to make important decisions
frontline workers.” in the moment, their organization is
inherently more successful

In short, frontline and essential

With real-time information made easily and readily
workers deserve better. accessible via a digital communications platform,
frontline employees can make better decisions that
are reflective of the organization’s policies,
procedures and increasingly, its data.

4  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Digital Enablement for Frontline Workers Is Frontline-centric collaboration tools should be
the Future (Because It’s Already the Present) developed for mobile-first use, Goger argues with
the added provision that frontline workers should
In 2020, mobile device usage experienced a 70%
always have the opportunity to access the full gamut
global spike and with that came a similar spike in
of collaboration tools using corporate or personal
the amount of mobile app spending. Currently
mobile devices.
96% of young workers in the United States are
smartphone owners and among those, for 22%
Provided they have a digital strategy, businesses
these devices are their only means of accessing
that can rapidly deploy communication tools
the Internet. Given this relative surge in mobile
and enable immediate access to necessary
connectivity, the place for integrating a unified
information will be best able to adapt to and
communications platform is already in your
overcome challenges.
workers’ pockets.
Moreover, occupations that require interacting and
Sandra Goger, a workplace collaboration expert
intersecting with the public-at-large, especially in
at global software development company
this present — and often fraught — moment, should
Itransition says,
use unified communication platforms to empower
employees to make decisions. They should also
“Today frontline workers ensure their safety while preserving their inherent
right to dignity in the workplace.
typically use the same
enterprise-wide collaboration This is not a tall order — it’s the right thing to
tools as other types of do, especially in the face of new challenges
that frontline workers probably never thought
employees. However, the they would face.
specifics of the frontline work
and the required speed of their
communication will be the
driving force in how frontline
collaboration tools evolve.”

5  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
The New Not-So-Normal Carpenter is the Director of Career Services at
Daggerfinn, a national strategic employer branding
We’ve all seen the viral videos in which an irate
consultancy. He’s seen firsthand the need for
customer publicly chastises a customer service
companies to push their unified communications
representative for some grievance. They are often
strategies forward…and fast.
difficult to watch. Throughout these videos runs a
common theme: that of a frontline worker who is
“Organizations that were planning on
dutifully and patiently informing customers of
standing up communication and
and enforcing a company policy.
collaboration tools in the next few years
now realize that there is an immediate need
These incidents serve as harrowing reminders that for these capabilities – and will have to
the pandemic and socio-political turmoil that is invest in moving quickly or else they will
defining this era have left some psychically frayed lose their standing in their respective
and unable to maintain their sense of civility at a industries,” says Carpenter.
moment in time when society needs it most.
Accomplishing this isn’t just the right thing to do — it
“An employer needs to demonstrate that they are
can also provide a competitive advantage that will
willing to defend an employee when dealing with an
help your organization thrive in the ever-shifting
irrationally hostile customer. We are seeing it
business environment.
first-hand that customers, who are new to the
nuances of shopping online, lose patience quickly
Ultimately, frontline employees are not only the
with our staff, and turn into hostile, unpleasant
public-facing employees of a business, they also
customers.” says Jeff Neal, who runs an online
guide the customer journey. They are the faces of
enterprise that saw an uptick in customers behaving
our businesses, as well as their backbone, and
badly during the pandemic.
deserve to be given the tools to succeed.

No matter what the situation, communication is

key. Organizations should strive to flatten their
communication curves by re-evaluating antiquated
communication hierarchies and creating, in their
place, a free-flowing communication network for
those who need it, when they need it.
Change Is Good…and Now It’s Also Necessary
As Kane Carpenter sagely observes,
“Frontline workers are the ones who work
out of their comfort zones and face the
dangers of coronavirus just to keep the
operations smooth-flowing. Companies
must invest in proper tools that can make
frontline work easy and safe.”
– Vipin Chahal,
founder of Return Policy Guide.

“Most companies will have been in the midst of

some form of digital transformation over the last few
years, but the ‘new normal’ as a result of factors
such as COVID-19 means that the future has been
brought forward by a decade or two.”

6  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Top-Down Internal Comms Is Not
Enough Anymore: The Rise of
Operational Communication
As any relationship expert will tell you, communication
is key to a healthy partnership. This holds true
beyond our personal lives. In fact, it’s part of the
foundation upon which successful companies build
their cultures.
As times change, however, so too do the ways we
communicate. In this unprecedented cultural
moment we’re all experiencing, the nature of how
we relate to each other and share information and
ideas has fundamentally shifted.
The Importance of Empowering
Frontline Workers
Frontline workers are being subjected to on-the-job
experiences that no job description could have
prepared them for. Often they’re asked to ramp up
productivity to meet market demands that were
unheard of in the days prior to the pandemic.
Throughout all this, frontline workers are also tasked
with being the face of the company. They’re asked to
interact with customers as de facto brand
ambassadors at a time when two social phenomena
are at play:
1. When working in spaces that require interaction
with the public, frontline workers are inherently
at greater risk for contagions like the coronavirus.
2. Tensions are high due to a number of social
issues, which can lead to frontline workers
being subjected to verbal abuse and occasional
acts of violence from customers.
7  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Social media is rife with videos of people projecting
their worst behavior onto frontline workers who are
asked to enforce company policies that provoke
these bad actors (such as wearing a mask while
shopping). Given the nature of frontline workers’
present experience, their employers have both an
opportunity (and responsibility) to engage and
empower their frontline staff.
“According to Gallup’s State
of the Global Workplace, only
15% of employees are engaged
in the workplace. In particular,
frontline workers are under
incredible pressure during
the coronavirus.”
– Marie Gettel-Gilmartin, Founder and Owner,
Fertile Ground Communications
Besides the physical stressors frontline workers face,
their occupations also take a mental toll according
to recent findings. Researcher Jianbo Lai of the First
Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang University School of
Medicine in Hangzhou, China, recently authored a
study for his university’s department of psychiatry
which found that frontline workers are 52% more
likely to experience depression.

Overall, Lai’s research indicated
that 50.4% of frontline workers
surveyed experienced
symptoms of depression. 44.6%
had symptoms of anxiety. 34%
reported symptoms of
insomnia, and 71.5% reported
“feelings of distress.”
Likewise, 18% of frontline healthcare workers
who experienced depression had a severe form
of the condition, compared with 12.9% of
second-line workers.
Given these daunting statistics, the more that can
be done to amplify the voices of frontline
workers and make sure they’re heard, the better.
“Companies must be creative and strategic in
engaging these critical workers. Innovative and
successful companies will find a way to engage these
frontline employees by listening to them, giving
them a chance to improve their work environment,
and allowing them a chance to interact with
company leadership,” says Gettel-Gilmartin.
These kinds of dynamic, interdepartmental
exchanges are more necessary than ever. They
speed up the exchange of information by
fundamentally challenging traditional notions
of corporate hierarchy.
The result is the rapid sharing of both qualitative and
quantitative information that can be implemented
across the company, from the warehouse floor to the
8  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
cloud-based, distributed workforce. This approach is
an essential part of a successful operational
communications plan.
What Is Operational Communication?
Tips and Tricks
Gartner highlights operational communication as a
lever for enabling a “more structured and purposeful
conversation around specific use cases and
outcomes such as field service, hospitality
operations and clinical administration.”
It’s important to follow a bottom-up approach to
maximize the operational benefits of your
communications. Solving problems quickly and
efficiently enables teams and individuals to get their
work done faster. This increases both productivity
and employee satisfaction.
“Operational communication functions to ensure an
operational process. This part of communication
helps to get work done,” says Ofri’s Greinacher.
“I think it helps to listen at first. Just ask people
what they think about the operational process,
its structures, and ask for ideas for
improvement.”
Rex Freiberger, CEO, Gadget Review, concurs with
Greinacher, further advocating for a “flatter”
communications environment.
“Operational communication involves bridging
communication gaps between the top-level
employees and those working boots on the
ground,” says Freibger. “It aims to establish ways for
communication to actually reach the people who
need it most and involve them in the process and
get their feedback from the position of being a
frontline worker.
It empowers frontline workers because they often — Why Operational Communication Is the Next
justifiably — feel as if their voices and experiences Step in Empowering Frontline Workers
don’t matter. Decisions are made from on high by
A former Dean and current professor of strategic
people who haven’t actually worked in the field for
communications at the Roy H. Park School of
decades, or in some cases never have at all. Getting
Communications at Ithaca College, Diane Gayeski,
feedback from frontline workers, passing information
Ph.D., advocates for setting measurable, realistic
successfully between channels allows frontline
performance goals that are aligned with
workers to make impacts where it matters most.”
organizational success AND empowers workers to
self-manage.
“Top-down communication channels like bulletin
boards and newsletters are only the tip of the
“Many employees don’t really understand how to
communication pyramid. For operational
best leverage their time and talent, and
communication that’s truly transformative,
inadvertently spend effort on activities that don’t
information must also flow from the bottom-up,
directly impact the bottom line or essential mission,”
across departments, between functions, and
says Gayeski.
diagonally into different teams,” says Andy G.
Schmidt, a Singapore-based partner of
Beekeeper AG. “The role of employee
communications is to develop a
Greinacher echoes this sentiment and also
emphasizes the need to empower workers to feel culture where individuals are
free to speak out about what they would improve informed, appreciated, and
and why.
empowered, where they are
Operational communications isn’t just a educated on their industry, how
program, it’s a process.
the company works, and how
they add value.”

9  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
To this end, feedback systems are key. Ideally,
feedback systems provide actionable data that leads
to better decisions and ultimately improves
workforce performance, retention, and morale.
Benefits of Operational Communication for
Frontline Workers
So what does it mean to digitally enable the
frontline workforce? Operational communication
goes beyond the benefits of employee
engagement. When implemented correctly,
it facilitates efficiency, agility, and shortens
time-to-market with essential information.
1) Reduce Friction Between Employees,
Processes, and Systems
We’ve seen first-hand the benefits of improving
the way that frontline employees work with
existing processes and systems within the
organization. From digitizing paper-based
processes, to making employee handbooks
readily available, reducing friction and
improving access to resources is key to
operational communication.
2) Streamline Business Agility
Reaching employees fast is essential to
maintain agility in fast-changing times. At the
management level, there are often too many
meetings, which detracts from their ability to
lead their teams. We’ve found that managers
can spend as much as 60% of their time
coordinating between company
headquarters and their teams.
Proper coordination is incredibly time-
consuming, but it’s necessary for a lean, agile
workplace. For frontline workers, information
is often hard to access, resulting in lost
10  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
productivity, frustration, and wasted time.
Operational communication improves access to
industry knowledge, resources, and the tools
your team needs to do their jobs quickly and
efficiently.
3) Improve Safety
In light of COVID-19, ensuring the safety of
frontline teams is a top priority for businesses.
Operational communication makes health and
safety information readily available to frontline
teams so they can stay up-to-date and informed
on the latest SOPs and safety guidelines.
Overcoming Common Challenges for
Reaching Frontline Workers
Looming over all of these considerations, of course,
are concerns about access. Are frontline workers
properly equipped to harness these communication
systems? Is there a technology gap or “digital divide”
that needs to be overcome with frontline workers to
enable operational communication?
The Digital Divide
“The biggest tech gap I see in communicating with
frontline workers is that unlike office workers who
are on their computers all day, frontline workers do
not access company information the same way,”
says Gettel-Gilmartin, a communications manager
with 30 years of experience in the architectural and
engineering industries.
“They don’t have time to hang out on the company
Intranet or Skype for Business or read a lot of emails.
If they are young, it’s even more difficult because
many young people are not as likely to read email.”
According to Gettel-Gilmartin, organizations need
to be much more intentional to implement
operational communications strategies that
reach frontline workers. The critical goal in
operational communications versus other types of
communication in a work environment, she advises,
is the opportunity for employees to respond,
engage, and get involved.
Avoiding the Pitfalls of Operational
Miscommunication
One of the dangers of not properly implementing an
operational communications program is
operational miscommunication. This often results
in considerable waste within the organization —
especially large ones. It happens when internal
communication essentially devolves into an epic
game of “Telephone.” This funny party game can
quickly devastate your company’s bottom line.
11  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Most frontline workers have experienced the
consequences of miscommunication on the job site.
Oftentimes they must deal with delays, duplication
of effort, and unnecessary expenditures as a result of
operational miscommunication. Of course, there’s
an easy way to remedy this common problem.
Choosing the Right Technology for
Operational Communication
The most effective way to maximize the business
benefits of operational communication is to use a
cloud-based, mobile-first platform that your
frontline workers can easily access. Platforms like
Beekeeper (hey that’s us) sidesteps the need for
individual, application-specific devices, which can
become cumbersome to manage, and tend to have
low adoption rates.
Moreover, the upfront investment is mitigated,
especially when using a “software as a service” or a
SaaS-based solution. A SaaS platform alleviates the
need to provide hardware to your team and instead
leverages your frontline workers’ existing devices.
This also reduces any associated costs like
operational and maintenance expenses while
creating a single, shared communications
environment accessible by all employees. This will
allow you to unify departments with a single source
of truth and a reliable service.
Creating the Future of Work for
Frontline Teams
Beekeeper has entered this space focused on
reaching frontline workers and enabling them
digitally with a platform that creates a single point
of contact for people, processes, and systems.
The result is a communications tool that improves
frontline workers’ productivity, agility, and
safety. Moreover, it eliminates language barriers and
cuts the time team leads spend coordinating with
employees in half. It also makes it easier for every
single team member to access the tools and
information they need — when they need it.

12  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
The Evolution of Workplace
Technology for Frontline Workers:
Essential Employees Deserve Better
Though technology solutions have always been Here’s how it works:
available to frontline employees, it’s time to
double-down on that investment. Why? Because
by digitally enabling them with new tools and means
of communication that meets them where they’re at,
organizations can greatly enhance both the employee
and the customer experience.

Frontline employees are exposed to an array of

experiences that impact not only how well they
can complete their essential duties, but their very
well-being — both physical and emotional.

From pathogens to unpredictable customer behavior

(good and bad — as Internet memes make abundantly
clear), frontline workers have been chronically
underserved when it comes to employer-provided
workplace technology.
Despite the number of complex issues facing
organizations during these strange times, an
opportune moment presents itself for us to give
frontline workers the same caliber of tools desk
workers have been afforded. A win-win for both the
head office and the frontlines as operations run
smoother and information is disseminated quicker.
To think of our frontline workers in real, human terms
consider this concept — Satisfied Customers Result
From Empowered Employees.
Create a Culture of Self-Empowerment
Concerns about personal safety are top of mind
for frontline workers. Beyond personal protection
equipment to prevent infection, there is the nature
of the work environment itself to consider.
Beyond increasing the safety and productivity of their
frontline workers, organizations should also actively
support their job satisfaction and give them easy
access to the information they need. Increasingly,
this element has taken on more significance since it
inherently fosters productivity and contributes to the
overall health of the employee (and by extension
their safety).

13  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
A key component of job satisfaction is the level of
convenience and enablement organizations offer
their employees. Most frontline teams are subject to
outdated and inefficient ways of staying informed like
bulletin boards or even being mailed forms. Cloud,
mobile, app-based solutions, and other forms of
digital enablement have proven paramount in
creating positive employment experiences for
frontline employees.
Prior to these developments, frontline workers were
hemmed in by systems that prevented their mobility.
It’s hard to imagine having to jog back to a desktop
computer for a simple customer service task or being
leashed by the cord of a landline telephone at work,
but these limitations are often part of the frontline
worker experience. Fortunately, a bevy of technological
innovations — namely laptops, tablets, and mobile
phones — have increased autonomy for these mission-
critical workers.
The tools themselves aren’t what
empower frontline workers so
much as the concepts
they facilitate.
There are a pair of main concepts to abide by when
empowering frontline workers: Communication
and Access.
This is how they break down:
Communication Is Key
Enabling communication is the secret ingredient in
most healthy relationships. This age-old wisdom rings
just as true when it comes to how frontline workers
function within an organization.
14  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Good communication — meaning the ability to share
and exchange information with every employee in an
organization — helps foster a healthy relationship
between the C-suite and the frontlines.
Given today’s distributed workforces, frontline workers
are not only interfacing with the public-at-large or their
colleagues on the frontline, they are just as likely to be
in communication with team members throughout the
organization, which is often global.
As Nick McQuire, Vice President Enterprise Research,
CCS Insight, observed in a Google Cloud report,
“According to our 2017 employee survey, 86% of
workers believe mobile technology has a positive
impact on their overall work performance, with
almost half stating it has a ‘substantially positive’
effect.” McQuire estimates that as much as 48% of
workers we presently refer to as “knowledge workers”
will eventually be reclassified as “mobile” or
“cloud” workers.
Though advances in technology such as AI and
digitization have gone a long way in streamlining
the flow of information, it does not replace authentic
communication between team members. Facilitating
interpersonal, internal exchanges with digital
solutions is an efficient and intuitive way to
keep frontline workers connected to the
broader organization.
Tools that unify communications will pave the way for
this sort of frontline worker enablement. By providing
access to real-time information for those on the
frontline, an organization can further their ability to
make smart, data-driven decisions.
When it comes to platforms that power digital
enablement, questions still loom:
• What is the end-user experience actually like?
• Is it truly navigable on a smartphone or tablet?
• Does it provide real access?
Access Is Everything
Granting frontline workers access to key information
not only when they need it (which, let’s face it, is always
“right now!”) but wherever they happen to be is critical
to a successful digital enablement program. Frontline
workers are some of the most dynamic contributors on
any staff, and they can often be found anywhere a
problem needs solving.
It’s clear that the future of the frontline workforce is
intertwined with the increasing proliferation of
mobile devices. As the need for instant information
access and cross-departmental communication
continues to grow, so too will mobile-first experiences
that actively shape the workplace of the future, which
is not only often remote but everywhere.
To that end, it’s important to consider the real and
intrinsic needs of frontline workers and their roles in
how these platforms develop.
Platforms such as Beekeeper have heeded the call to
provide new tools to frontline workers that both enable
and empower them digitally. By leapfrogging over
desk-based solutions and embracing the mobile
revolution, we’re able to finally bring frontline
workers into the conversation and deepen our
understanding of their needs. Because they deserve it.

Providing simple, instant, mobile

access to company-wide
information not only improves
their performance but the
satisfaction they can deliver to
your customers.

15  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Digital Enablement and the
Connected Worker
The majority of forward-thinking companies have
made it possible for frontline workers to operate safely
and effectively by implementing a number of digital
enablement strategies. Digital enablement platforms
can help both frontline workers and organizations
navigate a host of new and complex issues.
Among these issues are:
• New labor regulations that determine not only
how a frontline worker operates, but also when
and where.
• Enhancing and fostering interpersonal
communication with an increasingly diverse
workforce, who often speaks multiple languages.
• Staying compliant with updated public health
guidelines and rules.
• Making company knowledge and know-how both
readily available and consistent during disruptions
in the workforce.
In recent months, it’s been proven time and again how
effectively digital tools address the ever-evolving
complexities of our current era. Whether it’s facilitating
communication throughout an organization or helping
uncover new efficiencies on the ground floor, creating
a digital workplace is not merely a technological
change — it’s a complete cultural change.
The Acceleration of the Digital Workplace
Given the recent explosion in new digital tools and
communications solutions, it stands to reason that
companies are searching for a way to bring them
together into a single experience. The desire to
organize often disparate elements into a cohesive
whole is innately human.
16  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Einstein spent the latter half of his career in an ill-fated
search for a “unified field theory” to create a single
theoretical framework for physics. Fortunately,
companies with a large frontline workforce can already
access unified frameworks that bring together an array
of processes and communications channels.
The digital workplace is already here. So what is it?
Ideally, a digital workplace serves organizations,
particularly its frontliners, by supporting a variety
of task-specific needs. Chief among them is the need
for a unified communication platform that enables
frontline workers to connect at any time, anywhere
with the information they need — when they need it.
Digital enablement for frontline employees helps the
connected worker become both more productive and
autonomous, which empowers them to make valuable
contributions to organizations. Building a data-driven
organization that allows employees to access and use
data on-demand adds to a frontliner’s ability to make
informed decisions and effectively address issues while
enhancing their workflow.
Moreover, high-functioning digital workplaces support
many different needs from standard business
applications such as email, virtual meetings, and
instant messaging to workflow automation and task
management. In short, a digital workplace centralizes
communication — not just for frontline employees —
but for everyone in the organization.
As the nature of business evolves through the course of
the pandemic, our expectations and objectives for our
organizations will naturally evolve as well. How we
choose to adapt will determine our success.
Understanding the Complete Process
of Frontline Digitization
Let’s take an in-depth look at the nitty-gritty
details behind the process of digitization for
frontline workers.
How exactly do you take your organization from
communicating through printed memos, bulletin
boards, and chaotic WhatsApp groups to streamlined,
fully digitized, operational communication?
We’ll take you through the entire process, step by step.
The Four Stages of Frontline
Worker Digitization
In our experience, this process of digitizing your
frontline workforce happens in four distinct stages.
Usually, we can easily determine which stage a
company is in. It’s also not unusual to observe different
stages within the same company or group, where
buckets of employees jump ahead one or two
stages on their own, paving the way for the rest
of the organization.
Let’s dive into the four stages of digital enablement:.
1) The Status Quo: Traditional, Top-Down
Internal Communication
The first stage of digital enablement is where
many organizations still find themselves to this
very day. They likely have a robust tech stack of
tools for their office workers to collaborate with.
Typically these office workers will work on
presentations, documents, spreadsheets, and
information that needs to be shared with the
rest of the organization to take action through
different digital channels like email, intranets, or
company-wide presentations.
17  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
But when it comes to reaching their frontline,
organizations at this stage are still heavily reliant
on paper-based, unscalable solutions. The
primary channels to relay relevant information,
plans, work orders, and drive the business
forward are centered around unreliable,
untraceable methods like printouts on bulletin
boards and leaning on frontline managers to
orally convey information to their teams.
The most common traditional communication
channels we see companies using include:
• Bulletin boards
• Notes attached to paystubs
• Printed employee newsletters
• Word of mouth
• In-person meetings

There are a few problems with these top-down,
cascading communication channels:
1. Managers spend up to 60% of their time
relaying information
2. Frontline workers spend up to 3 hours
every week looking for information
3. The feedback loop from the frontline
workers to the corporate headquarters
is cumbersome. It’s also highly inefficient
and does not allow senior leadership to
gain insights into the effectiveness and
impact of their initiatives
 Understandably, both frontline workers and
managers are always looking for new ways to make
their lives easier and streamline communication.
When left to fend for themselves, many frontline
teams and managers rely on consumer chatting
apps like text messaging or WhatsApp for
workforce coordination.
But, the proliferation of consumer-grade
workplace collaboration platforms can be
extremely problematic for the organization
(especially IT). This is because these platforms
come with significant operational and IT security
risks that could pose a threat to your organization.
2) The First Light Bulb Goes On: Making the
Decision to Digitize
In 2020, the coronavirus accelerated the
digitization of the frontline workforce.
The sudden, urgent need to keep pace with
the rapidly changing updates brought on by a
global pandemic prompted organizations to fast
track their digitization efforts.

As the international spotlight on the importance
of our global frontline workforce grew brighter,
the need to properly equip these mission-critical
workers grew more urgent by the day.
Making the decision to digitize was an
important step we saw many companies
take in 2020.
18  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
Shaking Up the Status Quo
The first step in changing the status quo is
always driven by brave and innovative
leaders. Shaking up the status quo and
making a commitment to do things differently
is just the first step in your organization’s
journey towards digitization.
In our experience, senior leadership, HR,
and Operations teams are among the first
leaders in an organization to realize there is
a better way to reach their frontline teams.
Why them? Because they deal most directly
with the barriers of communicating with
frontline employees.
Those closest to the problem are often also
those who are closest to the solution.
In order to drive change, these brave leaders
embark on the daunting task of changing the
mindset around collaboration within their
organizations. Championing organizational
change within an established organization is
never easy, but John Baldino, 2020 HR
Consultant of the Year and President of
Humareso suggests that involving HR early
on in the process is vital.
“ When HR is involved in change management
within an organization, it must be both
overarching to the entire company, but also
specific to each contributor. That’s why
collaboration serves as a viable tool. Bring
together those who can identify an area for
improvement along with ideating for solutions.
HR can foster such a dynamic.”
– John Baldino, President of Humareso
Common Digitization Workarounds
Initially, to solve the problem of the disconnected
workforce, many organizations try to extend existing
collaboration systems to their frontline employees.
Some of the workaround approaches we have seen
across geographies and industries include:
2)  The Intranet Approach: Intranets are a
tried and true (albeit old school) internal
communication channel. For the most part,
they already contain documents, materials,
and knowledge your team needs. Why not
extend this to your frontline workers? Well,
when was the last time you visited and
enjoyed your company intranet?

 Typical outcome: Intranets are not built for

a mobile, dispersed workforce. Therefore
adoption rates among frontline workers is
notoriously low and engagement is
almost nonexistent.

3) 
The Social Intranet or Network Approach:
If the company already uses a social network
like Yammer, Jive, or another “social
networking-style tool,” why not try to bring
your frontline workers on board? Typically
social intranets or networks work great to
promote more organic collaboration within

the company. But, these options are quite
1)
The Email Approach: Companies creating
far removed from what frontline workers
an alternate email domain for frontline
really need in a tool.
employees in order to give them login
access via SSO to the rest of the IT
Typical outcome: Chaotic and difficult to
landscape. A great example of this are
manage, social networks often end up
bundles like the ones offered by Microsoft as
wasting more of your employees’ time in
the F1 license.
the long run.
Typical outcome: Employees struggle to

keep up with password policies, activation
of accounts, and they are often lost in the
complexity of a tech stack with too many
apps. This confusion creates more work for
IT teams as they scramble to support a team
who is trying to use a technology that wasn’t
built for them.

19  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
 4)
The Employee Magazine Approach: this is
one of the most common ways to inform
frontline employees about non-operational
topics. Why not digitize it? You save paper,
printing, distribution costs!
 Typical outcome: While digitizing your
employee newsletter can be a great first step
in the process, they are still expensive and
time-consuming to produce. And they don’t
deliver information in real-time, which is
what your frontline workers really need.
 While these are all admirable attempts
towards digitizing the frontline, they often
fall short on delivering true business value
that impacts the core of the organization.
20  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
 How do we truly empower the frontline
workers with information, tools, and
materials that they need every day, all day to
do their job and contribute to the success of
the business?
The proliferation of employee apps, “improved”
intranet software, clunky product bundles, and
social intranets has generated a lot of buzz — and
more often than not — to more noise in the space,
which can be confusing for proactive leaders
searching for solutions.
 3) The Rise of Operational Communication for
the Frontlines
When you take a hard look at the root
causes and problems we are trying to solve,
you ultimately end up focusing on two
core objectives:
1. How to drive business value and support
the business
2. Fulfill core needs of the end users,
(i.e. frontline workers)
The initial steps taken by organizations reveal
many of the hurdles that come with deploying
technology to the frontline workers.
The bottom line is that we are entering a
fundamentally different domain, playing an
entirely new game with different rules than the
ones which govern technology for desktop
workers. We must have a unique strategy when it
comes to technology for the frontlines.

Note that so far, in the first two stages, very little

to no thought has been given to the question
“What do frontline workers really need to be
efficient and excel at what they do?” An Office F1
license, a sophisticated intranet software, or a
social network cannot be the answers.

21  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
 4) T
 t a time when frontline
A Digital Transformation
workers are under more stress,
pressure, and hardships than
ever, they need clear,
customized solutions that
make their daily lives easier.
In this stage, companies and business leaders
begin to realize that the solution for reaching their
frontline workers goes beyond HR, and Internal
Communication and must involve other functions
and departments in order to truly make a
difference. The conversation then starts to shift to
business processes and how to support, simplify,
and accelerate them. Throughout this process, we
see other business functions like Operations,
Health, and Safety, and IT join the discussions
much more proactively.
The big question is, “If I already have so many
systems, processes: How do I leverage this and
expose them to the frontline without
overwhelming them?”
The answer? Keep your solution extremely
simple and streamlined for the frontlines.
This means that you should look for a tool that
is user friendly and has virtually no learning
curve. Ensure that anyone on your team can
pick it up and use it within minutes with little
to no training required. This will ensure high
adoption rates while maximizing value.
 COVID-19 was an extreme catalyst of rapid
At the same time, you can leverage the complexity
and power of integration workflows on the
back-end to offer a truly streamlined employee
experience that supports the core needs of
the business.
22  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
 he Journey of the Connected Worker:
As with any transformation in history, the
journey towards digital transformation is a
marathon, not a sprint. But it all starts with a
single step. The larger vision and long-term
benefits one aims to achieve with a connected
workforce need to be clear to business leaders
and the broader organization as a whole.
McKinsey estimates that
digital collaboration has
the potential to unlock
more than
$100 billion
in value
— thanks in part to productivity
boosts of 20 to 30% in
collaboration-intensive work
processes such as root cause
investigation, supplier
management, and
maintenance.
It’s a good idea to start with a list of potential
business processes you want to optimize, then
prioritize and build a framework to put it into
action. Having a clear plan will be key to the
success of your digitization program. Strong
technology partners can be a great way to
accelerate this process.
digitization that catapulted many companies
into this stage as they were forced to overcome
the numerous operational and safety challenges
of running a business in the midst of a
global pandemic.
 These challenges included:
Keeping furloughed
employees connected and
informed on job status,
resources, and more
Onboard and train new
employees in a shorter
period of time
Stagger breaks and shifts
to ensure social
distancing guidelines
Train employees on updated
safety protocols and
procedures around cleaning,
wearing masks, and
interacting with customers
Overcoming disruptions to
the global supply chain and
pivoting business operations
as needed
In this fourth and final stage of digitization,
businesses examine their core business
processes and determine how to make them
more resilient and agile in order to accomodate
operational curveballs and sudden, unexpected
changes. They then learn to leverage their
resources on-demand and as needed. This in
turn, decreases overhead and operating expenses
while empowering frontline employees to make
faster, better decisions.
Beekeeper’s 4-step process to digital transformation for frontline employees
23  Frontline Future of Work: Digitization, Connected Workers, and Building the Frontline Workforce of the Future
My Frontline Workforce Is Connected.
Now What?
Once your organization has made the decision to invest
in digitization and building a connected workforce,
what are the next steps? We’re so glad you asked.
At Beekeeper, we’ve identified four steps companies
must take in creating a digitally enabled workplace of
the future:
1. Adopt a digital channel to reach and connect
the entire front line
2. Digitize time-consuming, inefficient,
expensive paper-based processes
3. Establish an automation strategy that
harnesses the full knowledge and power of the
frontline workforce
4. Optimize organizational processes with
data-driven insights
Creating a digitally connected workforce — from factory
workers to retail associates — will be crucial in
completing the digital transformation process. Digital
workplace tools will remain vital in driving productivity,
operating more efficiently, and complying with evolving
health and safety regulations.
The digital revolution for frontline workers is here.
How will your business evolve, adapt, and change your
core strategies to stay competitive in a post-COVID
economic landscape? The frontline future of work is
now. It’s time to enable and empower our frontline
employees around the world. Will you join us?
About Beekeeper

Beekeeper is the mobile collaboration platform for frontline workers. With all communications and tools
in one place, Beekeeper empowers frontline employees to be more agile, more productive, and create a
safer workplace.

Deskless workers can check resources and share best practices in real time. Managers can resolve issues
quickly, handle non-routine work efficiently, and track team performance. Executives can increase
business resilience and agility in uncertain times.

Our secure platform offers a consumer-grade employee experience at the scale you need. Integrate
seamlessly with your existing systems to create the future, now.

Get Started

For more information, visit beekeeper.io or follow us on LinkedIn.