Some of us spend the month of October trying to figure out the best way to scare unsuspecting trick-or-treaters for Halloween. The scarier the better.
My goal for this blog is to NOT scare you.
Are you considering a transition to Citrix Workspace services (Citrix Cloud), there’s nothing to be afraid of. I promise.
If you’re an existing Citrix customer using your Citrix infrastructure for virtual app and desktop delivery only, all the new Workspace services and capabilities might seem overwhelming and somewhat scary. You may be asking yourself, “I love the Citrix Workspace vision, but where do I start?”
Here’s the good news: We’re not suggesting you adopt all our industry-leading workspace service layers on Day 1. Instead, we’re encouraging you to make a platform decision for Citrix Workspace that will help you to simplify the delivery of workspace services, save money, and improve employee experience over time.
The image above shows the benefit of taking a platform approach to Workspace delivery.
- On the left side you see the user benefits. A single, unified experience with SSO to all your apps, data, and workspace resources. Regardless of device choice or working location, the experience is always consistent.
- In the middle, static platform-level services for management, provisioning, analytics, identity, and tooling simplify IT while making it easier to turn on new services (Citrix Workspace solutions) over time.
- On the right side we have Citrix’s industry-leading Workspace App and Delivery solutions. Not only can Citrix deliver the workspace, we also can provide the “plumbing.” Integrated networking solutions ensure that Citrix is second to none in our ability to deliver a high-performing experience to both local and remote workers, through prioritized and optimized treatment of the app data.
Now let’s look at some of the new features and capabilities added to Citrix Workspace solutions in October.
New Workspace Intelligence Microapp Workflow Integrations for IT and HR
New Workspace intelligence capabilities continue to boost worker productivity by giving people time back in their day to focus on meaningful work. We’ve added new self-service and automated workflow capabilities for information technology (IT) and human resources (HR) use cases.
IT Self-Service workflows enable employees to quickly find the IT resources they need, when they need them. Leveraging a new portfolio of IT self-service microapps within the workspace, organizations can reduce time spent by employees on IT tasks, improve overall employee NPS for IT services, and reduce IT case volume.
Some examples of these IT workflows, which are available via our out-of-the-box template integrations include:
- ServiceNow: Submit Incident microapp and Incidents microapp
- Zendesk: Add Ticket microapp and Tickets microapp
- Jira: Create Ticket microapp and Tickets microapp
Let’s take a look at some of these IT microapp workflows in action.
HR Self-Service workflows — It is more essential than ever that businesses rethink their people strategies, placing new emphasis on delivering a best-in-class employee experience that differentiates and elevates the business. With a new portfolio of HR self-service microapps within Citrix Workspace, organizations can improve process efficiency, save time, and reduce HR case volume.
Some examples of these HR workflows which are available via our out-of-the-box template integrations include:
- Workday: Create PTO Request microapp and PTO Balance microapp
- SAP SuccessFactors: Directory microapp and Learning microapp
Let’s look at some of these HR microapp workflows in action.
New Citrix Microapp Integration and Partnership with Upwork for Streamlined Staffing Workflows
Upwork offers curated, on-demand proven talent solutions that give organizations rapid access to top talent to quickly fill critical skill gaps. We’re excited to announce Upwork microapps for Citrix Workspace. With these new microapp integrations, customers can easily access Upwork talent within their Workspace to simplify the hiring process and enable hiring managers to focus on doing what they do best: quickly engaging the talent needed to support business innovation and growth. The video below puts it all into perspective.
New Secure Workspace Access (formerly Citrix Access Control)
Security practitioners are used to change, but 2020 has brought an unprecedented amount. Prior to the global pandemic, many organizations were making long-term plans for zero trust architectures, VPN replacements, secure remote access, and securing access from unmanaged devices. But, as organizations experienced an instant shift of their entire employee base to remote work, with many using personal devices for their job, implementing those long-term plans immediately became critical to business continuity.
The new Citrix Secure Workspace Access, formerly Citrix Access Control, enables organizations to reach those goals with a single, trusted partner by delivering several key business outcomes:
- VPN-less access to corporate resources: Provide access to web and SaaS apps, virtual apps and desktops, and files employees need to do their job effectively and securely.
- Secure access from unmanaged devices: Defend against dangerous malware, ensuring your corporate resources stay secure, even when access from an unmanaged device. Citrix Secure Workspace Access implements various security layers, enabling organizations to trust users with unmanaged devices to access corporate applications and data.
- Contextual access: Require additional authentication and authorization, restrict access to resources, or apply added security controls based on various user signals. Continuous monitoring and identification of inconsistent and suspicious activities provide actionable insights into user behavior and usage.
- Added security controls for SaaS and web apps: Citrix Secure Workspace Access enables IT to apply added security controls to both SaaS and Web apps to prevent data exfiltration. This includes policies to restrict copying and pasting, printing, screen capture, keystroke logging, and downloads, enable watermarking, and more.
- Securing browsing policies and isolation: Enable unrestricted access to the web while preventing dangerous malware from introducing risk to the corporate environment.
New Content Collaboration Workflows: Add Digital Signature Functionality
With an increased number of remote workers, many of our customers are looking to add digital signature capabilities to their file sync/share solutions. This is a great example of how you can start adding new services and functionality to the Workspace experience you’re delivering to your end users. To make this easy and cost effective, Citrix is now offering Citrix Content Collaboration workflows, an add-on service that builds upon what you already have, enabling workers to be more productive and effective.
Digital signature capabilities, available with Content Collaboration workflows and Content Collaboration Premium service deliver a secure link to a single signer or group. Employees can quickly capture legally-binding electronic signature fast and never worry about losing a document. Take a deeper dive into the benefits of adding Citrix Content Collaboration services to your Citrix Workspace.
Moving to Citrix Workspace Is Now Easier . . . and Automated!
While a large portion of our Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops on-prem customers have already transitioned their Citrix control and management infrastructure to the cloud (Citrix Workspace), some customers have been reluctant because their current on-prem environment is dialed-in just the way they like. It’s the “if it’s not broken why fix it” mentality. While this concern is certainly understandable, you no longer need to be afraid.
Citrix has launched the Automated Configuration for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops. This new tool helps automates migration of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops configuration (policies, applications, catalogs, and more) from one or more on-premises site(s) to Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktop service on Citrix Cloud. Migrating your current Citrix infrastructure to the Citrix Workspace platform (Citrix Cloud) is easier than it has ever been. In addition to the automated configuration tool, Citrix will assign a dedicated customer success manager who will work with your team, ensuring a smooth, scare-free transition.
Once the transition is complete, you’re officially on the Citrix Workspace platform and able to add new services and capabilities while taking advantage of the simplified IT and cost savings benefits that come with it.
Find out more about Automated Configuration for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops.
We’ll be back next month for another installment of What’s New with Citrix Workspace.
