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Cybersecurity is an ongoing, growing threat, and all businesses are a target. The conventional approach to protecting what’s behind your four walls is not aligned with the realities of today’s workplace, let alone what the future of work holds in store. Not only does hybrid work mean distributed teams, but also a lot of virtual interaction via an Internet connection. Data security and privacy risks become elevated well beyond what’s needed for a physical office environment, and this raises two sets of future of work challenges. First are the threats that IT must manage to protect the network and all the data running across it. The second challenge pertains to employees, whose personal privacy needs to be protected whether working at home or in the office. Both challenges must be addressed, not just to ensure business continuity, but to maintain employee trust as AI-driven applications become ever-more pervasive. Cybersecurity is more important than ever with future of work, and this panel will review leading technologies and best practices for IT.
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When it comes to deploying leading edge technology, the future of work will not be all that different from the world of gamers, where immersive experiences become an appealing proxy for in-person experiences, and for some, the preferred option. Many of these forms are already finding their way into the workplace; virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR), and even the metaverse. While these may be years away from being mainstream, immersive forms of interaction will be FOW-friendly, especially for businesses trying to improve employee engagement with hybrid work. Before going too far down this path, IT needs a clear sense of the use cases, as well as the technologies required to support these new modes. Only when those pieces are in place can virtual options become reality, and that’s where our panelists will bring their expertise to bear.
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Just as we were getting comfortable with first generation AI applications like chatbots, translation and transcription, along came ChatGPT in 2023. This took AI to a new level, and we’re still grappling with how it fits for future of work. Nothing stands still with AI, though, and the latest wave in the revolution is large language models (LLM). With each new breakthrough, AI becomes more strategic than tactical, and IT leaders need to think in terms of the organization-wide impact rather than point applications like speech-to-text. Just as Generative AI became part of the FOW lexicon last year, LLM is this year’s acronym, and you might be surprised at how it can drive new business value. Last year’s ChatGPT session was standing-room-only, and if LLM isn’t on your FOW roadmap yet, you won’t want to miss this one.
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Agility is the watchword for 2024, as organizations face continuous pressure to be competitive, to innovate, and nurture an engaged workforce. The work from home model remains fluid, and a top-down style of command-and-control management will no longer be effective. What’s needed instead is a flatter, less hierarchical structure where employees feel like stakeholders instead of interchangeable labor inputs that are on the cusp of being replaced by a chatbot. Technology has a key role to play, but this is more about taking a human-centric view of your workforce, and making flexibility central to organizational structure. This session will look beyond the technology being used to drive personal productivity, and focus more on the bigger picture for how organizations are adapting.
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Seamless connectivity for a distributed workforce is a must-have when planning for future of work. Not only is state-of-the art technology critical for driving anywhere, anytime productivity, but it must enable smart workplace capabilities for all settings – in office, at home or on the go. The implications for IT are foundational, as the rise of digital transformation is creating both new forms of data, and massive volumes of data that would overwhelm legacy-based networks. Each of these needs represent major challenges for IT, but also major opportunities to rethink how data networks can deliver new value. Just as networks had to adapt when shifting from hardware to software, future of work will dictate the need for enhanced connectivity and data management capabilities to harness all this data. New approaches need to be considered, such as SD WAN and private 5G, and this panel will assess the merits of each, along with how IT can become an agent of change for FOW.
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Workplace norms have become very fluid, not just with the rise of hybrid work, but the challenges of managing workloads that never seem to ease up. AI-based technologies are creating ever-expanding volumes of data that need to be managed, and without the right tools, workers can be easily overwhelmed. Knowledge management capabilities are essential for finding the right data for the task at hand, and applying it to improve performance. Without this, employee engagement will suffer, and some will even view AI as being on track to take their jobs. While AI is driving much of this new data creation, it can also be deployed for knowledge management to help workers navigate all this data. This will give workers a sense of agency, where human input still has value, and AI is viewed more as job enhancement than job replacement. The future of work will very much be technology-driven, but there will be no workers if everything is automated, and this session examines the nuanced approach that IT leaders must take with AI that does not erode employee engagement.
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For businesses that manage a contact center, these operations have long been viewed as a cost center that runs separately from everything else. This may still hold true to some extent, but the prevailing thinking for any business that aspires to being customer-centric is quite different. In today’s post-pandemic world, employee engagement is a key factor for hybrid work, and that applies to all employees, not just those in the office. Consider as well the strategic importance of providing great customer experiences, and how agent engagement is a key factor for CX. With agents being on the front lines with your customers, there is too much at stake for business leaders to view them as replaceable labor units in a cost center. Instead, they need to be viewed as valuable enablers for customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. That’s the lens through which this session will view contact center agents, and why they should be an integral part of your future of work strategy.
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Most businesses have long-stopped being solely office-based, and the pandemic accelerated that trend to the point where hybrid working has become the norm. Technology was the great enabler for this, especially Unified Communications, which provided workers with a consistent experience regardless of location, endpoint or network. These platforms have become even more effective for businesses that have adopted the cloud, and can now support UCaaS. As workforces become further distributed, UCaaS provides everything needed to collaborate, thus minimizing the challenges when most team members cannot meet in-person. However, there is much more to effective collaboration than video meetings, and this session will address the bigger picture for how UCaaS is making hybrid work work.
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According to a recent Cisco-sponsored a global hybrid work study, 98 percent of all meetings will have at least one remote participant. With hybrid work becoming the new norm, organizations are facing the challenge of redefining the future of work. This shift is revolutionizing employee retention, talent acquisition, and employee well-being. No longer can individual departments work in isolation; IT, HR, and Facilities must join forces to plan and execute a cohesive strategy. The future of work is all about enabling seamless experiences, whether at home, the office or anywhere in between.

Aruna will discuss the framework needed to create those experiences and make the office a magnet, not a mandate, including the important ingredients to facilitate highly productive collaborative hybrid work:

• Enabling end-to-end experiences that support how you work in an open and extensible technology ecosystem.
• Delivering smart connections and devices that support the needs of both office based and remote team members.
• Extending hybrid work technology with machine learning and artificial intelligence that uplifts and scales seamless experiences and productivity - and ensures that all employees feel included.
• Providing visibility, manageability, and insights no matter where employees work - with security built-in, not bolted on.
• Supporting customers through innovations to contact center in the cloud that help scale resources working from home or in the office.
• Ensuring interoperability without sacrificing user experience.
• Making hybrid work a reality regardless of employee presence – whether in the home, office, or automobile.

She will also showcase Cisco's experience with hybrid work, including a discussion about the unprecedented level of collaboration between IT, Human Resources and Facilities that made offices more engaging, and ultimately ensures that hybrid work, works.

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Artificial Intelligence isn’t just the dominant trend in tech, but also the most transformative force for future of work. Every aspect of work will be transformed by AI – how we work, where we work, why we work, etc. – but no operation inside a business is being impacted more right now than the contact center. The reason is simple – AI can address many of the shortcomings of legacy-based contact centers that are having ripple effects across the entire business. Today’s digital customers have adopted new technology faster than contact centers, and as their expectations keep rising, the business risk keeps rising as well. When agents don’t have the right tools, customer service suffers, along with their performance and morale. Business leaders cannot afford to wait for a years-long modernization program, and the contact center is a prime use case when considering the role of AI in your future of work plans. Great success stories are in the market right now, and we’ll be sharing some of them during this session.
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This panel, hosted by Dan Foster, features AI technology experts across cloud, contact center, cyber security, IOT, and MSP markets. Discussion will cover AI marketplace trends and how partners can monetize opportunities and businesses can enjoy new efficiencies by leveraging AI.  Topics include, among others:

• New feature sets like AI-powered conversation capture to help drive revenue for CCaaS customers.
• How AI is helping organizations augment their workforce productivity rather than replacing them.
• How AIOT (Artificial Intelligence of Things) advancements are helping to make our world safer and healthier.
• Can AI be the secret weapon in combating evolving cyber threats
• Embracing the reality of AI to drive explorative conversations and uncover opportunities within the IT framework that break down existing silos.

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Technology considerations for future of work are focused mainly on workers and what we will need as individuals to make us more productive. The environment in which our work gets done plays a critical role as well, and new thinking is emerging around the role of workspaces. Few businesses can be fully remote, but many are struggling with RTO, return to office. As employees become more comfortable working from home, office environments need to provide a better experience, and supporting both has become a core future of work challenge. Making the office a “magnet” requires more than free lunch, and with advances in areas like AI, 5G and biometrics, there are promising technology-based opportunities to consider. This may be the domain of IT, but a broader vision is needed to fully rethink the office, and this session will also look at the role facilities management and HR can play for the future of workspace.
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Always one of the most popular and best-attended events at the Future of Work Expo #TECHSUPERSHOW. Come hear from a group of hot startups and ICOs working hard to shake up and disrupt their industries. At IDEA Showcase, entrepreneurs focused on transforming markets - or creating entire new categories - give their best 5-minute pitches to a discerning panel of judges. Companies present their unique value proposition - then the audience and judging panel each determine who is the most disruptive. IDEA Showcase @ ITEXPO is an evening full of next-generation innovation, powerful networking and high energy!
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