Ireland has new mobile workforce, Citrix survey reveals

Seventy-eight per cent of Irish workers are now working outside the office each week, according to research carried out by Citrix Systems Ireland. Thirty-eight per cent say they are “much more” productive working outside of the office and 60pc are “just as” productive.

The shift to mobile working comes as the IT market offers an increasing array of devices to consumers. Fifty-six per cent of those surveyed said they use personal devices such as smartphones, laptops and iPads for work purposes. Furthermore, 97pc of Irish workers are already using devices to perform everyday tasks, such as banking, shopping and making restaurant reservations, as opposed to carrying out such tasks in person.

Ireland is no longer a one-device society relying on a PC or laptop for all tasks. In fact, 46pc of workers reported using three or more devices on a daily basis. When travelling, 74pc of Irish workers still travel with a laptop but 57pc now also travel with a smartphone. Ten per cent said they travel with tablets, a number which is anticipated to increase in the next year.

DIY-ers

Irish workers are increasingly ‘tech savvy’, with 80pc of those who use personal devices for work purposes saying they are “do it yourself-ers”. This means they take care of their own IT needs rather than relying on IT to manage the device or install new applications. The majority are also progressive when it comes to their IT requirements – 51pc of respondents see the value in cloud computing, with 28pc of this group accessing applications every day.

Niall Gilmore, Country Manager, Citrix Systems, Ireland, said: “As companies look to do more with their available time and resources, the practice of allowing employees to work from various locations is becoming critical to business performance.

“The ability to work from anywhere can make a huge difference to individual and organisational productivity and to employees’ work-life balance. What we are seeing in Ireland is that workers are tech savvy and they’re not afraid to use this knowledge to benefit their work ‘experience’. In turn, organisations are recognising the benefits of a mobile workforce in terms of productivity, efficiency and cost saving.”

Francis O’Haire, Technical Director, DataSolutions, said: “These latest findings demonstrate the demand for the ‘bring your own’ concept by workers, which in turn is encouraging companies to facilitate this multi-device workforce. Our customers are realising that they can centralise data, desktops and applications securely while also delivering this information to any device using virtualisation technology. The result is that employees are connected to the corporate network, no matter what device they are using.”