Framehawk Inc.

This is not a post about the death of the desktop/monitor.  I find that I still need one now and then.  When I need to stare at a screen for 2-3 straight hours, with Microsoft Office open, a permanent-style desktop of some sort (virtual, physical) with a big monitor is quite useful.  It keeps my focus in one area.  It lets me use a toolset designed for the job, similar to call center operators or any operator for that matter.  If you need to stare at a screen, make it a big one.

But then there are the other times.  I spend two-thirds of my week roaming around talking to people or in meeting rooms.  I don’t use a desktop anymore (I see hash tags on Twitter of #mobileonly increasing).  I zip in and out of mail, Yammer and Twitter for social, Dropbox for presentations, etc.  And I have talked to many companies who say their knowledge worker force is changing in these same ways:

• Their employees are spending more time in meeting rooms
• People are encouraged to look at each other in meetings – whiplash from noses stuck in laptops and phones
• Some are home based.  In return for 24×7 access to an employee, the employee is crafting a lifestyle that allows them to spread out interactions over time.
• A recent Wall Street Journal article describes how employees use restaurants and coffee shops as ad hoc meeting space.
• And, of course, the proliferation of cheap(er) devices are enabling employees to “snack” vs. dine (Mr. Templeton coined at Citrix Synergy 2011).  BYOD voila!

The knowledge worker is changing.  Regardless of BYOD, the existence of touch-screen devices with instant-on and cloud power at your fingertips means people will migrate to a more natural work style.  Desktop permanent-type environments will exist.  But reliance on them will lessen.

Humans are social.  We like to talk.  Even the introverted of us have a need to interact with others.  Being able to shove the ingestion of data/information into smaller chunks of time empowers us to flourish.  Innovate.  Talk.  Discuss.  And sneak in a quick high-fidelity peek at my email.

I want casual access to a desktop, but really, I want to choose my own interaction method most of the time.  I don’t want to be constrained.  I don’t want an 8-minute boot time.  I don’t want a piece of hardware for 3 years.  Please stop talking about desktops and massive VDI farms and asking when the ugly-looking business case will get better.

So, given all this, here’s what I want to say to IT:

These are not the knowledge workers you’re looking for.  They’ve adapted and evolved, and you must, too.

Let’s spend the effort giving the users full-fledged access to their high-fidelity productivity apps across their various devices.

Let’s help them be flexible.  Give them access to a pooled VDI farm on-demand, when needed.  Empower their tablet or hybrid touchscreen device.  Heck, offer your own corporate asset if you want.   Let them work on the corporate WAN or wild external networks.   Access a high-fidelity experience of my workspace aggregator.

Don’t do it?  Miss the boat, er, ship?  You’ll probably find yourself alone on Tatooine…

This post also appears on Stephen’s Getting a Grep blog.

About Stephen Vilke

Stephen is the co-founder and CTO of Framehawk. Stephen began his 20 years in technology as a physicist with NASA working on data reduction and graphic display software for spacecraft communications. He managed global IT operations for Clarify and, after the acquisition by Nortel Networks, became the CIO of the Alteon Websystems group. Most recently he was vice president of technology architecture for Barclays Global Investors and CIBC. Stephen has a B.S. in Physics from the University of California at Berkeley. Stephen also blogs at http://gettingagrep.posterous.com.

View all posts by Stephen Vilke