For many occupiers, remote work is going to be an important, if not primary part of the employee experience forever. That doesn’t mean people won’t come to offices. In fact, current research shows that most workers want the flexibility to work at multiple locations: At home, a “hub” office, and other places like satellite offices, coworkings sites, or coffee shops. Fortunately, access control companies like Genea’s cloud-based platform makes this easy.
Enabling this hybrid model is going to be a challenge, particularly as working from home continues to predominate during the lingering COVID-19 pandemic. Companies are creating new ways to onboard, train, and mentor new employees. For most, this still includes granting them physical access to corporate workplaces when they are able and willing to come in for them. Fortunately, Genea’s cloud-based access control platform makes this process much easier and can be done remotely.
Here are a few reasons why:
- Automated user set up – Genea Security integrates directly with many common employee directory systems, like Okta, Microsoft Azure and G-Suite. This means when new employees are added to the company directory, they are automatically provisioned in the access control system as well. All it takes is some quick configuration, and new users are all set to come to the office. Similarly, access is deprovisioned (or removed) when employees are terminated, closing a potential security loophole.
- Integrated building and suite experience – Given the expectations of today’s tech-savvy workers, it’s hard to rationalize asking them to carry one access card to get into the building (or elevator bank) and another to get into the company suite. Genea Security solves this problem, enabling occupants to use the same key for both. For landlords, this represents another “turnkey” service to offer tenants, who can simply take advantage of a system that’s already in place.
- One key to unlock them all – Employees who work across multiple office locations often face a different multi-key problem – needing a separate key for each office. As occupiers explore “hub-and-spoke” workplace models, this will become an increasingly common circumstance. But with Genea Security, each employee’s single key (whether a physical card or mobile key) can be set up for access to one, some, or all company locations.
- Logging and tracing – As offices slowly increase their capacity, occupiers will need to monitor any possible outbreaks very closely. This means knowing who was in the office, when they were there, and who they may have come into contact with. Genea Security provides this kind of detailed reporting that can support contact tracing, allowing for quick action and appropriate notifications in the event that containment measures are required.
The future of the workplace with access control
The future of the workplace is going to be complicated enough without worrying about manual processes to get people where they need to be. With Genea, buildings and occupiers will be well prepared for a flexible future that supports more choice for employees about where to work.
If you have any further questions about cloud-based access control and visitor management, schedule a demo and we’ll be happy to provide you with more information.
