Let’s take a closer look at what workplace analytics actually includes, what these tools can deliver, which vendors are worth knowing, and the key questions to ask before choosing the right solution for your goals.
Workplace analytics helps you replace guesswork with clear, data-backed insights about how people work, how your office is used, and where money or time is being wasted. In this guide, you will learn that workplace analytics is not a single dashboard but a mix of measurable metrics, signals, and insights. We also highlight vendors worth knowing, from smaller tools to full enterprise platforms, and outline what to ask before choosing the right solution. You will also find examples of workplace analytics dashboards, a vendor overview table, and a few free tools you can try before investing in anything.
What Is Workplace Analytics
If you’ve ever wished for a clearer picture of what’s actually happening in your workplace, how people collaborate, which spaces get used the most, or whether certain teams are overloaded, you are already thinking in the direction of workplace analytics.
In simple terms, workplace analytics means taking the everyday “noise” of work such as meetings, messages, office occupancy, and tool usage, and turning it into clear employee insights that help organizations make smarter decisions. This is not possible without the right workplace analytics software and usually involves combining workforce data from multiple sources.
Example: instead of guessing whether your office layout still makes sense, space use analytics reveals real patterns that often hide in plain sight.
The Promise of Workplace Analytics
Today, workplace utilization metrics and employee behavior insights matter more than ever. Remote and hybrid arrangements have become common for many organizations, while at the same time companies are under pressure to control costs and improve the onsite experience for employees.
And because so much of our working life now happens inside digital tools, we can better understand how work actually unfolds, where it flows smoothly, and where it gets stuck.
The promise is straightforward: data driven decisions that support people, improve spaces, and streamline processes. It is not about monitoring individuals. It is about giving organizations the clarity they need to build a more effective, healthier, and more flexible workplace, one that works for everyone in it.
What You Can Actually Measure with Workplace Analytics
When you think of workplace analytics, you should not imagine one magical dashboard. It is a way of bringing together dozens of data backed signals, metrics, and insights that show how people work, how spaces are used, and where things quietly break down.
There are several layers of data and different areas you can focus on, so let’s take a look at the most important ones.
1. How People Work: Productivity and Collaboration Patterns
Digital work leaves a trail: meeting hours, messaging rhythms, document activity. None of this is about tracking individuals, it is about spotting patterns that shape how effectively a team can work.
Typical insights in this area include:
How many hours a team spends in meetings each week
How often people get uninterrupted focus time
Whether a handful of employees become “communication hubs” doing most of the cross-team work
Signs of meeting overload or collaboration bottlenecks
Fig. 1: Example of a productivity analytics platform dashboard (source: MS Viva Insights)
2. How the Office Is Used: Space and Facility Utilization
Most offices have unused corners, underbooked meeting rooms, or entire days when occupancy barely hits 30 percent. Some rooms are booked constantly but barely used. Office space utilization analytics helps uncover these patterns so companies can adjust layouts, rethink schedules, or reduce real estate costs without guessing.
Examples of what is typically measured include:
Actual occupancy rates compared to calendar bookings
Peak hours for desk or room usage
The busiest days and workspaces
The ratio of bookings to real check-ins (no-show data)
Average office or parking spot occupancy
The gap between booked time and actual usage
Which parts of the office people naturally gravitate toward
To the space and facility utilization area also belongs parking analytics, which is often an overlooked source of substantial savings. In many companies, parking spots are permanently allocated to C levels, and when they do not come to the office, those spaces remain unused.
By looking at real parking occupancy, for example through parking management software, instead of relying on fixed assignments, organizations can uncover these inefficiencies and make much better use of their parking capacity.
Fig 2: An example of workplace utilization metrics dashboard (Dibsido)
3. How People Feel: Employee Experience
Beyond digital traces, the employee workplace experience still matters. Surveys, short check ins, and sentiment indicators help leaders understand how people feel about their workload, team culture, or work environment. The goal of employee experience analytics is simple: to create a hybrid workplace employees actually look forward to.
Analytics in this area might surface:
Sentiment trends from pulse surveys
Shifts in confidence, stress, or workload perception over time
Engagement scores linked to team structure or work patterns
Early signs of burnout, such as persistent after hours activity combined with negative feedback
Fig. 3: Example of an employee experience statistics dashboard (Qualtrics, source)
4. How Tools Are Used: Digital Workplace and Software Insights
Companies often rely on dozens of software tools, but not all of them are used the way they are intended. Workplace analytics can show where licenses go to waste, which apps slow teams down, and where digital friction creates daily frustration.
Workplace analytics should reveal:
Which apps see the most active usage
How many software licenses sit unused
Where long load times or complex workflows slow people down
How many steps it takes to complete common digital tasks
Fig. 4: An example of software usage dashboard (ActivTrak, source)
5. What Gets in the Way: Process and Operational Bottlenecks
Workflows can be surprisingly tangled. Approvals sit untouched, repetitive steps slow everything down, and simple tasks end up taking far longer than they should. Analytics helps pinpoint these slowdowns so teams can redesign processes to match real world behavior.
Common metrics include:
Average time tasks spend waiting for approval
Repeated loops where work gets bounced between teams
Steps in a process that consistently delay completion
Teams that act as bottlenecks due to workload imbalance
Fig. 5: An example of process optimization software (Celonis, source)
Workplace Analytics Software Vendors
There are many different tools that fall under the umbrella of workplace analytics, ranging from straightforward, eye-focused SaaS platforms like Dibsido, which solve a very specific problem well, all the way to large enterprise systems that cover countless use cases but often come with more complexity and a higher price tag.
The right choice depends on what you actually need. To give you a quick overview of who’s out there and what they offer, take a look at the table below.
Workplace Analytics Tool | Vendor | Description in a nutshell |
Collaboration and productivity | Microsoft Viva Insights | Provides anonymized data on meeting load, focus time, collaboration patterns, and work habits across teams. |
Space and office utilization | Dibsido | Tracks real-time occupancy, desk usage, room bookings, and check-ins to optimize office layouts and hybrid schedules. |
Employee experience | Qualtrics | Captures employee sentiment, engagement trends, and pulse surveys to understand how people feel at work. |
Digital tools and software usage | ActivTrak | Analyzes how employees use digital tools, highlights inefficiencies, and identifies underused apps or licenses. |
Processes and workflows | Celonis | Uses process mining to uncover hidden delays, duplicated steps, and inefficiencies across operational workflows. |
Table 1: Workplace analytics software vendors
Tip
Start With Free Tools Before You Invest
If you’re just getting started with workplace analytics, there are a few free options that can help you understand the basics before you invest in anything bigger.
For example, Dibsido includes desk booking in its free plan (for up to 20 users), along with core workplace utilization analytics. It’s a simple way to see how your workspace is used and how your team behaves day to day, giving you data to run a more employee-centric and cost-effective office.
Beyond that, there are also two completely free tools you can try right away:
Our free desk-sharing ratio calculator, which helps you understand whether you have the right number of desks for your hybrid setup and where you might be overspending.
Our free office space calculator, which shows you how much office space you actually need based on your team size, attendance patterns, and preferred working style.
These tools offer a low-barrier way to start exploring workplace analytics and make early, data-backed decisions without spending a cent.
4. What You Gain From Workplace Analytics
Workplace analytics brings clarity to areas that are usually driven by guesswork. How do people collaborate? Do we use our office space effectively? Where do digital tools help or hinder? Which processes quietly waste time?
When organizations start looking at real patterns instead of assumptions, these questions can be answered in a meaningful, data-backed way.
Here are some of the most tangible impacts companies typically see when using workplace analytics tools:
Optimized costs: reduced real-estate expenses through smarter space planning, leaner operational workflows, and fewer inefficiencies that quietly bleed budget.
Better use of office space: clearer understanding of peak days, underused rooms, actual check-in rates versus reservations, etc.
Improved employee experience: well-being initiatives based on real employee feedback rather than intuition.
Smarter ways of working: fewer unnecessary meetings, more consistent focus time, healthier collaboration patterns, and early visibility into potential overload or burnout.
More efficient digital tools: identification of unused or underused software licenses, recognition of apps that slow people down, and better alignment of the digital environment with the way people actually work.
Streamlined processes: reduced approval delays, fewer repeated handoff loops, better visibility into where tasks get stuck.
5. How to Choose the Right Workplace Analytics Solution
With so many workplace analytics tools on the market, from lightweight and focused SaaS apps to complex enterprise platforms, it can be difficult to know where to start. The right choice depends entirely on what you want to understand, fix, or optimize.
A good selection process is not about comparing features line by line. It is about asking the right questions and matching your needs to the tool that actually solves them.
Below is a set of practical questions that can help teams narrow down their options. Each one offers a hint about what type of tool might fit best.
What problem are we trying to solve first?
Are you trying to reduce meeting overload, cut real estate costs, or improve the employee experience?
What data do we already have, and what data can we realistically collect?
Some tools rely on building sensors. Others connect to digital tools like Microsoft 365, Slack, or Google Workspace. Some require check-ins or HRIS integration.
How important is ease of use versus depth of features?
Some platforms offer extremely comprehensive analytics but require onboarding, training, and ongoing maintenance. Others work out of the box with minimal setup.
What is our budget, and how fast do we need ROI?
Costs can vary significantly.
How sensitive is the data we will analyze?
Workplace analytics often involve patterns of behavior. Some organizations prioritize anonymity and strict privacy measures, while others need more granular detail for compliance or operations.
How fast do we want to see impact?
Some tools provide immediate value through simple dashboards, while others require weeks of data collection.
Final Thoughts
Using workplace analytics helps you move away from guesswork and take practical steps toward a workplace that is better organized, more effective, and easier on the budget.
You don’t have to start big, especially if you are running a smaller office. Many of the software tools you already use include some level of workplace analytics, and even a handful of simple insights can make a noticeable difference. Understanding which days tend to be the busiest, how often desks sit empty, or where collaboration slows down can quickly point you in the right direction.
What matters most is simply getting started. Once you gain real visibility into how your workplace actually functions, improvement stops being a series of assumptions and becomes an ongoing, natural process that supports both your team and your business.
Our platform is designed to empower businesses of all sizes to work smarter and achieve their goals with confidence.
