IDC Report: Driving business value with Google Workspace

At Google Workspace, we believe flexible, modern tools that put people at the center of the experience are critical to helping employees and teams innovate and get things done. We recently commissioned IDC to interview eight of our largest global customers and complete an in-depth analysis to better understand the business value they’re generating from their investment in Google Workspace. All organizations remained anonymous to us during the process. 

Now we’re delighted to share some of the high-level insights from the analysis, which can best be summed up by this quote: “Google Workspace gives us a single point of focus for transformation and enablement.” Across these customers, IDC learned that our integrated tools make digital experiences more accessible, help employees spend more time on meaningful activities, and enhance collaboration to have a “substantial impact” on how people work and power their organizations.

More time for what matters

By some estimates, employees spend 58% of their days doing “work about work” — administrative tasks, tracking down information and files, answering emails, and switching between apps and tools. And that percentage jumps to 62% for managers. With so much running in place, employees struggle to find time for truly impactful activities like strategy, innovation, and customer service. 

Organizations can free up valuable employee time and resources by giving them tools that help streamline tasks or automate repetitive workflows. That might be a retail associate using AppSheet, our no-code platform, to create a custom app that simplifies their daily inventory count. Or it might be turning to AI-generated summaries of long documents in team collaboration meetings.

Based on IDC’s analysis of our selected customers,“Employees using Google Workspace have 36% more time for creative work and spend 24% less time on routine or administrative tasks.” For example, an international airline explained that their pilots and cabin crew previously traveled to the airport for in-person briefings. Now that they create and share briefing documents in Google Docs and through Drive, they can prepare to take flight well in advance and easily track ongoing updates. 

Accessible digital experiences for all

Technology that doesn’t work for everyone ultimately works for no one. As the world of work settles into hybrid, people-first tools that enable every employee to contribute equally, from anywhere, are a must. Likewise, forward-thinking organizations should ensure that employees with unique job responsibilities, specific working conditions, or accessibility needs can use the same technologies as their other colleagues.

To that end, IDC observed that Google Workspace delivers benefits for all workers that “are so impactful that they fundamentally change how employees work.” One customer highlighted how their frontline employees working in cold temperatures add text with their voice to Google Docs, so they don’t have to remove their gloves to type. Another customer noted that Google Meet has transformed video conferencing for hard of hearing employees: “They’re able to participate in Google Meet meetings by seeing people’s videos and watching their lips…plus the closed captioning allows them to participate and understand what’s happening.”

Working together, wherever and whenever

Organizations need their employees to work together successfully from anywhere, and IDC reported that Google Workspace helps office, remote, and frontline workers alike facilitate cross-functional collaboration and improve communication to make decision-making more efficient. For one interviewed organization, “Collaboration is the most significant benefit, meaning the frequency of interaction enabled by Google Workspace through…a standardized, well-integrated toolset. When everyone on a project can work on the same document in real time across widely distributed geographies, that makes for a more productive team.”

To learn more about how Google Workspace helps enterprises address the needs of distributed workforces and drive business value, download the full IDC white paper.