It started with Wi-Fi access and boomed! Then the work life balance generation came on strong, and now COVID-19. Working remotely, although not a new concept for some of us who's role requires travel, has exploded and is now a necessity due to the recent pandemic. Companies went from an average of 80% of their workforce required to operate in an office environment (on-prem), to 100% remote in an instant. IT teams should be commended for facilitating the process so quickly with some having limited resources at their disposal. Nonetheless, the biggest challenge now is that what, companies thought would be a temporary setup is not going away anytime soon. Some Silicon Valley organizations are instructing their workers to work remotely until at least the late Fall timeframe; Google plans on keeping workers remote until as late as October of 2021 and potentially longer.
I just returned from Microsoft Inspire which was held in Las Vegas again this year. Microsoft Inspire is the namesake's annual partner conference, previously known as the Worldwide Partner Conference that has occurred every year since 2002. Microsoft Inspire has become a harbinger of news that will logically be accentuated at Microsoft Ignite, the company's end-user conference and event that follows in Orlando in November this year.