In the past 5 years, the way we communicate outside of work has changed dramatically. With 62% of the UK population now owning a smartphone and 30% owning a tablet, most of us have 24/7 access to the Internet.
But we aren't using our mobile devices to browse the web.
Earlier in 2014 Princeton University published a paper, based on Google search traffic, predicting that Facebook would lose 80% of it's web traffic by 2017. The news was publicly ridiculed by Facebook which pointed out that the majority of it users (83% in the UK) access the platform via mobile devices and apps.
Make no mistake, for most people the web search has already been replaced by one-touch mobile apps.
And what we do as consumers is impacting on how we like to work. Generation Y (people born in the 80s and 90s) are increasingly expecting and desiring to communicate with their colleagues, customers and clients through mobile devices. 20% of all employees now spend at least 10% of their time working remotely and 56% of Gen Ys say that increased mobile working would increase their productivity.
There's also good business sense behind this trend. 96% of senior executives cite a lack of effective communication for workplace failures and 39% of employees who use social business tools (including mobile apps) say they have experienced 'increased connectedness'.
In spite of this, most organisations are lagging behind in their adoption of internal mobile communications. 41% of employees say the mobile devices they are provided with are old and not fast enough, and only 11% of organisations say that creating mobile apps for internal communications is a digital priority for 2014.