What is the ROI
of a Digital Workplace?

A Digital Workplace is a technology that brings together in one place the information, communication and applications that employees need to work.

This digital workspace facilitates internal communication, collaboration and knowledge management, including in remote work situations. It appears to be essential at a time of digital transition and the widespread use of teleworking and hybrid work.

Nevertheless, the implementation of a collaborative intranet can represent a significant cost for the company. Before adopting this technology, it is therefore necessary to estimate the return on investment associated with it.

In this article, Mozzaik365 tackles the question of Return On Investment (ROI) of a Digital Workplace and provides you with the keys to measure your organization's ROI. Feel free to save this resource and come back to it later.

1. ROI of a Digital Workplace: what are we talking about?

Before going any further, let's start by reminding ourselves what ROI is and what meaning it has when combined with the Digital Workplace.

1.1 ROI: definition

ROI is an acronym that means Return On Investment.

The ROI is an essential Key Performance Indicator (KPI), It allows you to measure the profitability of a project.

In practice, to determine a project's ROI, it is necessary to compare the cost of the project with the gains or losses it has generated.

In fine, the ROI is expressed as a percentage. Thus, the formula for calculating the ROI is as follows:

🧮 [(Amount of gains or losses associated with the project - amount of investment) ÷ amount of investment] x 100

If a project represents an investment of 50,000 euros and generates gains of 200,000 euros, its ROI is therefore [(200,000 - 50,000)/50,000] x 100 = 300%.

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1.2 What is the ROI of a Digital Workplace?

As you can see, the ROI of a Digital Workplace is the indicator that allows you to estimate the performance of a Digital Workplace project.

This metric weighs the benefits or savings generated by the technology against the expense of implementing it within the organization.

📌 If you want to find out how to choose and track your Digital Workplace KPIs, this article can help.

1.3. Why calculate the ROI of your Digital Workplace?

Measuring the ROI of the company's Digital Workplace allows to quantify the financial impact of this solution on the organization.

ROI is a decision support tool. Depending on the estimated or observed return, managers can choose to invest in the collaborative intranet project, make trade-offs and opt for a type of Digital Workplace adapted to the needs and resources of their structure.

As an example, according to a survey conducted by research firm Forrester for Microsoft in 2019, the Microsoft Teams communication and collaboration application - integrated with Digital Workplaces under Microsoft 365, such as Mozzaik365 - alone generates an ROI of 832% over 3 years for a typical company. So it's clearly a good investment.

2. The benefits of a Digital Workplace under the microscope

According to a 2017 study by VMware, the average return on investment for a Digital Workplace across all industries would be 150%.

This figure can be explained by the benefits of a digital workspace in terms of internal communication, collaboration and knowledge management.

2.1. Benefits in terms of internal communication

Thanks to the discussion forums, messaging, video conferencing and the integrated company directory, the Digital Work Environment facilitates contact and makes exchanges flow better, even between employees belonging to different teams.

This tool benefits both head office and field employees as it is accessible from different mobile devices: PC, Smartphone, tablet, etc.

By simplifying interactions in this way, communication intranets allow employees to save time and focus on higher value-added tasks, such as dealing with customers, designing new products or analyzing data.

According to the Forrester study, adoption of the Teams communications platform, a key component of Microsoft 365-integrated Digital Workplaces, could save millions on its own.

According to the survey, a typical company (5,000 users) could reduce its number of meetings by 18.9% using Teams. That's $6.9 million in time savings over 3 years.

And the financial impact of Teams in terms of communication does not stop there.

The Communication Hub replaces different communication solutions (cell phone, landline, web conferencing application, etc.). According to Forrester, it could save a typical organization $648,727 over 3 years.

Finally, thanks to Teams, employers can save on travel and hotel costs. Videoconferencing, chat and Co-Authoring guarantee the quality of live interactions. It is no longer necessary to travel to communicate.

As a result, the organization modeled by Forrester could save 150 overnight trips over 3 years, totaling $233,080.

🍿 To go further, discover 6 examples of internal communication strategies

2.2. Benefits in terms of internal collaboration

The benefits of the Digital Workplace in terms of internal collaboration are also numerous.

Collaborative intranets make it easier to work together, thanks to co-creation tools (Co-Authoring), document sharing and the creation of team sites.

The result, according to VMware, is that 48% of companies that have equipped themselves with a digital workplace say they have optimized their ability to respond to business opportunities, compared to 34% of other organizations.

Forrester finds that in a typical company that has adopted Teams, headquarters workers could save 4 hours a week through improved collaboration and information flow. That's a saving of $14.3 million over three years.

The same source also reports that field employees who use Teams to collaborate with their colleagues save an average of 45 minutes per week. This time saving could add up to more than half a million dollars in savings for a typical organization over three years.

And the benefits of the collaborative platform do not only concern operational staff. According to the research firm, Teams can reduce decision time by 17.7% for decision makers. The result: a profit of $451,273 over 3 years for a typical structure.

Finally, according to Forrester, Teams would be the source of a decrease in costs related to Turnover and onboarding. With a 0.4% reduction in turnover and a 17% reduction in onboarding costs, the collaborative platform could save a typical company $1.42 million over three years.

📌 To go further, discover How to optimize your project management with Teams & Microsoft 365?

2.3. Benefits in terms of knowledge sharing and management

The benefits of collaborative intranets are equally felt in terms of knowledge sharing and management.

A Digital Workplace such as Mozzaik365 allows to target the diffusion of information and to set up a real Electronic Document Management (EDM) in order to facilitate data retrieval and the contribution to a knowledge base.

This could save 8 hours of time per week per employee, the same amount of time that 95% of French employees waste searching for information, according to a study conducted in 2021 by ABBYY.

But that's not all. According to the Forrester survey, the provision of resources in Teams, via the Cloud also saves hours of work.

According to the research firm, improved document accessibility would lead to a 14.6% decrease in downtime. The result: a saving of $257,586 over three years for a typical facility.

💡 To learn more, discover Microsoft tools for knowledge management.

As you will have understood from these examples, the benefits of installing a Digital Workplace within an organization can be numerous and represent significant gains and savings for the company.

The only thing left to do is to compare them to the costs of adopting this technology in order to determine the ROI. To find out how to do this, read on.

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3. How to calculate the ROI of your Digital Workplace?

As we have seen, in order to calculate the return on investment of a digital workplace, it is necessary to weigh the gains generated by its implementation against the expenses incurred for its installation.

Here is what you need to know in order to perform this exercise:

3.1. Each project has its own constraints and costs

Each Digital Workplace project has its own constraints, and therefore its own costs.

Therefore, in order to estimate the cost of this transformation in your organization, it is necessary to take stock of the existing situation and to draw up the specifications of your Digital Workplace.

In general, the implementation of a digital workspace can incurcanincur costs related to:

definition of needs (research, surveys, etc.) and drafting of specifications;
Migration (of documents and applications) and infrastructure ;
the acquisition of ad hoc equipment (laptops, tablets, smartphones, etc.);
obtaining operating licenses (Microsoft365, Mozzaik365, etc.);
training of employees and support for change;
maintenance of the solution.

Please note that each of these cost items varies depending on the technology chosen and the existing system.

For example, change management may not be necessary in a young startup, while it will be recommended in an older company that is just starting its digital transformation.
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What kind of ROI for a Digital Workplace ?

Similarly, infrastructure and migration costs will likely be higher for a large organization with a large database stored on old servers than for a small to medium-sized business whose files are already hosted in the Cloud.

☝️ Good to know: you can drive down the costs associated with implementing your Digital Workplaceby dodging the 5 mistakes to avoid during a digital transformation.

3.2. The importance of KPIs in evaluating the benefits of a Digital Workplace

The price of a Digital Workplace can be relatively simple to calculate. Conversely, the savings and benefits generated by this type of project can be less clear.

To determine the gains associated with the implementation of a Digital Workplace within your company and to evaluate the success of this project, it is necessary to rely on indicators (KPI).

These metrics can be of various kinds:

employee productivity;
employee satisfaction with the quality of their communications;
satisfaction of new hires with their Onboarding process;
weekly time spent in meetings ;
weekly time spent doing research;
Staff Turnover Rate;
turnover rate of new talent ;
solution adoption rate;
etc.

To assess the impact of the Digital Workplace on your organization, you need to choose KPIs that match your organization's strategic objectives.

In practice, make sure you base your Digital Workplace on a solution that allows you to track your indicators.

As an example, the performance of the Mozzaik365 Digital Workplace, based on Microsoft 365, can be analyzed and tracked using Microsoft Power BI software.

Finally, consider collecting data before the launch of your new Digital Workplace. This way, you will be able to compare your previous situation with the one after the transformation and quantify the savings or gains.

For example, you can see a reduction in the amount of time employees spend in meetings or an increase in employee productivity.

🔎 Going further: discover how to define and track your Digital Workplace KPIs.

ROI of a Digital Workplace: what you need to remember

As we have seen, the benefits of a Digital Workplace are numerous. Better still, they can amount to several million euros and often lead to a positive ROI.

The return on investment of a collaborative intranet varies from one organization to another. This is why it is important to calculate the return on investment according to the constraints and objectives of your company.

To do this, list, quantify and add up the various costs and benefits associated with your project. So as to not forget anything and to obtain reliable data, think of establishing rigorous specifications and following indicators adapted to your objectives.

Finally, compare your total earnings to your total expenses and determine the ROI of your Digital Workplace.