The Deskless Workplace Paradox: When More Benefits Creates Less Value

Over the last decade, organizations have experienced historic app sprawl, becoming overloaded by tools, resources, and benefits. An average enterprise has between 125 and 200 systems. The inherent complexity of understanding how to and why to use each tool has created a dynamic in which few workers fully realize or capture the value of their benefits. This failure is compounded by the added manual effort imposed on HR teams managing and educating their populations on the numerous systems and benefits.

This inefficiency and loss of productivity disproportionately impacts those 2.7 billion global deskless workers across retail, health care, hospitality, manufacturing, and other occupations. Without intuitive, mobile-friendly access, organizations inadvertently fail to fully define the value of their benefits programs and miss core opportunities to deliver a connective culture for the teams with the highest turnover rates that are most in need of every dollar of benefit available to them.

Forward-thinking startups recognize technology’s potential to engage, not just administer, front-line talent. We spoke with Logan Sugarman, founder and CEO of Refresh, a platform that consolidates scattered HR systems into a single, intuitive app curated for each company’s deskless population. Users seamlessly access needed tools and updates while managers distribute relevant notifications companywide with ease.

When systems keep all workforce needs in focus, not just the headquarters’ aims, a better alternative comes into view. There exists a real opportunity to not only modernize but also humanize workplace technology in service and support of frontline workers and in furtherance of organizational goals.

When HR Tools Fail the Front Lines: The Fragmentation Problem

Without intuitive, mobile-first access, organizations inadvertently hide the very resources meant to engage deskless talent. When benefits, payroll details, schedules, and training portals remain siloed across disjointed systems, employees struggle to even find — let alone utilize — valuable offerings.

“It’s like bringing ammo to battle but not having the right weapon to fire it,” Sugarman said. “You keep investing in amazing benefits, tools, and resources. But if employees can’t even find them, none of it makes an impact.”

Sugarman noted that deskless workers in industries such as retail and hospitality don’t have spare minutes to toggle between multiple dashboards. A nurse rushing between patients can’t afford to context-switch from medical records to HR portals to learn benefits details. Warehouse pickers awaiting the next shipments don’t have time to hunt across various systems to check schedules.

The consequences across three key areas prove severe:

1. No Access to Benefits and HR Resources

Employers spend heavily on competitive benefits and wellness initiatives. Yet, when portals remain fragmented, deskless employees still miss out. About 6 in 10 (61%) of HR employees say deskless workers access HR resources from personal devices, but fractured tools make exploring complex benefits plans difficult. Health care offerings, retirement savings plans, and other critical programs fail to fully reach the employees who most need financial security. This disconnect is particularly concerning given that 60% of all employees consider benefits beyond health care and retirement savings to be major factors when considering job opportunities. When front-line workers can’t easily access these differentiating perks, employers lose a critical retention advantage.

2. Disconnected, Siloed Systems

Payroll, scheduling, training, and other HR functions often reside in separate portals. But deskless workers having to cross between various dashboards creates needless complexity. Retail associates and medical aides alike shouldn’t need to use more than five accounts just to check a schedule, submit a shift request, or finish compliance assignments. The fragmented status quo mires even simple tasks in multistep hassles. Recent industry data revealed that organizations used an average of 371 software-as-a-service applications, with portfolios growing 32% between 2021 and 2023 alone. What’s more concerning is that HR employees reported that 50% of their software systems perform overlapping functions, creating redundancy alongside fragmentation.

3. High Turnover and Disengagement

Ultimately, when employees struggle to access HR resources, they engage far less — and exit far more. Front-line turnover in retail is 60% as workers leave for slightly better wage offers without realizing their current employer’s full value proposition around benefits, growth, and workplace culture. For deskless roles especially, fragmented tools yield disconnected, transactional relationships, which results in turnover rates 1.6 times higher than they are for desk-based employees, according to recent SHRM data.

When HR technology assumes that all employees work desk-based roles with ample time for administrative tasks, it relegates an 80% majority to second-class digital experiences. The fragmentation status quo continues to cost organizations talent, productivity, and, ultimately, profits.

Delivering HR to the Front Lines: The Super App Solution

Instead of forcing employees to navigate disjointed systems, the onus should fall on HR teams to directly bring critical resources to front-line staff through unified mobile access.

Enter the super app model. Rather than perpetuate fragmented experiences, Super apps consolidate various HR functions into a single intuitive interface curated for front-line utility. Modern solutions can integrate otherwise siloed third-party systems for payroll, scheduling, training, and more under one platform. Super apps also enable organizations to integrate their own content and communications onto that one platform.

The goal isn’t reducing necessary HR tools — it’s personalizing access and eliminating complexity around utilization. A personalized super app experience meets employees wherever they are, whether that is assisting customers on the retail floor or treating patients in a care facility.

“It’s like having a personal HR concierge in your pocket,” Sugarman said. “Instead of bombarding people with disjointed messages, it tailors information to what matters for each worker’s role and preferences.”

Research by Workday revealed that more than half of front-line employees have adapted to new technologies without training. Intuitive mobile access counters any friction. The market for such solutions is nearing $180 billion as leaders realize that mobile-first platforms can help reach deskless workers.

Unified HR Access Delivers Productivity — and Engagement

Consolidating systems streamlines even simple tasks such as schedule changes that previously required multiple logins. The mobile experience empowers employees while reducing digital noise for managers.

“Employers want to provide a platform for both their covered and uncovered workers, but don’t have the ability to segment tools and communications based on status. This hinders their ability to create a unified culture for everyone. There is a significant demand for a tool to address this,” Sugarman said.

But the benefits run deeper. Holistic platforms boost visibility into the full employee value proposition, including development programs and health benefits. This helps organizations better convey their employer brand — a key driver of talent retention. Workers gain an understanding of longer-term career paths, reducing turnover.

In an age of unprecedented resignation rates across front-line sectors, unified HR access can uniquely re-engage essential workers. The super app revolution turns the employee experience into a consumer experience, easily engaging users with the organization wherever they are and whatever their needs may be.

Building for the 80%: The Future of HR Technology

Forward-thinking HR leaders realize that the biggest workforce segment has remained critically underserved, and productivity is being hindered as a result. They recognize that seamless mobile access is no longer a “nice-to-have” perk but the cornerstone of engaging deskless employees.

A significant frontier for HR technology lies in reimagining how to directly serve employees in field, warehouse, and customer-facing environments — not just optimizing existing software that was built for the much smaller share of workers who are deskbound. This requires:

Rethinking Digital Strategies Around Mobile Access

HR portals and dashboards still have desktop users in mind, but deskless workers require mobile-centric options intuitively designed for intermittent use during busy, on-the-go shifts. Meeting employees where they are with context-aware resources must become central to system design.

Consolidating (Not Adding) Disparate Point Solutions

One-size solutions rarely fit all roles — but neither does burdening workers with a half-dozen accounts to access basic HR functionality. Avoid perpetuating fragmented experiences that perplex employees and managers alike. Integrate necessary functions into consolidated platforms for simplified access.

Making Tools as Seamless as Consumer Apps

Front-line employees should never struggle to access a schedule, pay stub, or company news. HR systems should deliver payroll and benefits updates as readily as Netflix delivers new recommendations or as effortlessly as Uber confirms your approaching ride. Consumer tech has set the standard — now, HR must meet and exceed it. Having one system that “knows” what’s happening in your other systems enables a single interface that can progress employees along a journey regardless of the backend systems required to complete it.

Combating Technology Debt Through Governance

The proliferation of HR systems often results from flawed purchasing decisions and poor technology governance. Organizations frequently fail to decommission outdated platforms when implementing new solutions, creating a compounding “technology debt” that particularly burdens front-line workers navigating this digital maze. Innovative HR leaders are now implementing strict policies to ensure old systems are decommissioned when new ones are introduced — a practice that naturally complements the super app model by reducing redundant touchpoints before they multiply.

The Future Lies With the Front Lines

“We don’t know exactly what innovations like AI may bring, but we know tools must remain intuitive for employees as roles evolve,” Sugarman said. “Someone may stock shelves today and manage a retail store tomorrow. We must build systems that are adaptable to the workers using them — that’s the secret to future-proofing.”

With new waves of resignations shaping front-line sectors, organizations maintaining business-as-usual approaches risk falling behind. However, those investing in centralized and simplified HR experiences will reduce turnover, nurture company culture from the ground up, and secure the talent underpinning go-to-market strategies.

The greater impact emerges through creating holistic and — most importantly — accessible platforms that integrate the necessary touchpoints for the 80% of the workforce that is deskless and often struggles to utilize disjointed resources. Prioritizing mobile-first design philosophies that simplify payroll insights, benefits details, and communication channels for on-the-go employees promises to pay exponential dividends.

The writing is on the wall: Companies investing in streamlined mobile access will gain the upper hand in retaining and empowering the front-line majority and in significantly increasing the productivity of their HR teams.