You can either read the article below, or if you prefer, just watch the video:
In this second blog in our series, we look at how the prevalence of a greater variety of IT equipment has created both pressures and opportunities in the realm of email management.
Our first two email management systems were created over 20 years ago when Q.A. was a new concept for many businesses. One of those systems became quite popular, as it solved a need to treat email with the same care as other documents.
This was at least 5 years before the first iPhone would come to market, so support for mobile working wasn’t even considered.
Indeed, back then most office staff used Outlook solely on desktop computers running Microsoft Windows. This was around the time that the BlackBerry 5810 appeared in some businesses, providing a select few with access to their emails whilst on the move. Dubbed the ‘crackberry’ because people were seemingly addicted to them, the ability to keep in touch with the office and get things done whilst travelling was liberating.
In today’s increasingly connected world, staff work from home from time to time, laptops are common, mobiles a ubiquitous, and many expect to be able to deal with most things via their mobiles. The variety of devices has become greater too with a vast array of Android and iOS based phones and tablets, and Macs are more common both at home and in the office.
So how does New Outlook address this mixed environment?
Whereas Microsoft’s previous direction has been to develop versions of Outlook for each platform, the adoption of the Progressive Web App (PWA) approach has enabled them to create a single application that is almost identical on all platforms, but most importantly is a single codebase.
This means fewer issues for your IT support people and greater choice for you.
Information is power. Without the right information at your fingertips you could be badly exposed. For example, if you are visiting a client, wouldn’t it be helpful if you could check see whether any of your staff had communicated with them recently, or before stepping into their office, to simply refresh your memory by reviewing all the most recent email exchanges that your business has had with them? This simple ability to quickly find relevant emails via a mobile device enables you to be more efficient, better informed, and more professional.
The flexibility that this provides is not only a huge benefit to staff who can work seamlessly on all devices, it also gives businesses greater choice and flexibility with both hardware and operating systems; the road warriors who really only need a phone and tablet may no longer need a laptop too, and the team that use Macs, can now file their messages in the same way as everyone else.
To embrace these opportunities, you will need your email management system to work with New Outlook too, and not just for filing, so if you are selecting a system, make sure you can search from any device too.
You may not be ready for New Outlook and it may not be ready for you, as it’s still evolving, but CloudFiler embraces both new and old Outlook for both filing and searching via any device, enabling you to choose how and when to make the move with no disruption.
For more details, take a look at our short videos or browse the CloudFiler web site.