With the proliferation of the home office, improving collaboration between telecommuting team members has become a key issue for corporate efficiency. This new type of working relationship is no longer limited to chats: participants have to work together in many ways, and new techniques are needed to serve them.
The range of solutions available is very diverse. We offer everything from chat apps, e-mail traffic management and management tools to workgroup project management applications. Some of the new startup tools build on an existing concept and allow us to move beyond the locally deployed solutions to the cloud and mobile worlds. However, new types of teleworking tools do not only make collaboration more efficient: by completely rethinking the system, putting teamwork on a new footing.
Here are some developers that can help companies adapt to the specific requirements of telecommuting. and they can tidy up the jungle of business processes based on informal discussions, meetings, and correspondence. We aim to highlight solutions that enable interactive, real-time teamwork, planning and implementation, meaning they can take corporate efficiency to the next level.
Airtable
Airtable seeks to rethink the use of spreadsheets and offers flexible, low-code solutions to help you plan and manage group projects. With this startup task management tool, enterprise users can create customized apps that fit specific workflows (marketing campaigns, video post-production, etc.).
The spreadsheets of the business, which started in 2015, can include a wide range of information about the projects and allow you to add photos or checkboxes to a section, for example. You can track project progress using deadlines and statuses, and assign tasks to team members. There are several ways to view projects: from a traditional spreadsheet view to a calendar to a gallery and Kanban-style interfaces, you can choose from a number of solutions.
Although creating apps in Airtable does not require any programming expertise, but it doesn’t hurt for users to be at home moving around managing datasets and business processes. However, once the basic structure has been put together, the interaction should no longer be a problem for anyone.
Although Airtable’s developers initially targeted individual users, they later turned to workgroups and focused on making their work easier. they began to position their solution as a tool. As a result, the app is now able to serve the activities of up to hundreds of actively collaborating employees at once. , if unregulated, often confusing, and misleading ad hoc or manual work is diverted to the digital bed. Airtable wants to provide a forward-looking solution for this.
Around
At the time of the epidemic, traditional workplace meetings were replaced by teleconferencing and there was a wide range of video app appeared on the market. Although these types of teleconferencing tools are now indispensable in corporate work, they are not really suitable for quickly discussing specific, often tiny-crumbling issues. Around’s video app doesn’t take up the full screen, instead it offers floating video channels that you can click to have lightning-fast discussions if you want to clarify something with a colleague.
While the solution uses the possibilities of traditional video, creativity and puts productivity at the center. It provides just as much personal presence as we need for our work and doesn’t distract us unnecessarily. Around works mostly in the background, and its use does not lead to the kind of fatigue that will inevitably occur to users of traditional video apps.
It can also be seen as a layer of communication that other workgroup devices hovers over and efficiently serves the multi-user mode of operation that requires, for example, joint editing of a document. The developers tried to make their solution as unobtrusive as possible. The Echo Terminator service uses ultrasonic technology to detect nearby laptops and prevent the spread of microphones. In addition, noise cancellation dampens annoying background noises – it works just as well in a noisy family home as it does in a busy office. , and in their experience, by intentionally degrading the lifelike of the image, it really reduces fatigue, and users also have to worry less about their appearance during the discussion.
Coda
Coda uses an ambitious “all-in-one” approach to increase workgroup efficiency: from a word processor to a spreadsheet to a workflow manager app, it has all the tools you need to edit and access a collectively created document. The work starts with a blank page, but you can turn a simple list into a to-do list in a matter of seconds, set deadlines, and view achievements on a chart.
Great for designing projects: Uber, for example, has a large application redesign used a single Coda document to coordinate the activities of hundreds of engineers
Its developers started by recognizing that the focus of the work was not on applications but on documents. If we ask members of a team about their work, they will list the names of a range of programs, but if we look at what they are actually doing, we see them making documents, spreadsheets, and presentations all day. The developers at Coda wanted to do something with documents like YouTube with videos: their dream was to make it easy for everyone to describe and share ideas using a simple, friendly interface. The success of their solution suggests that they have not gone wrong.
Donut
Telework has many advantages, but many suffer from home isolation. The Donut Slack application is designed to somehow replace classic workplace chats and strengthen cohesiveness. Developers were driven by a single goal: to forge closer collegial relationships by all means. This has more than just mental health benefits: social bonds also help innovation and information sharing.
It has two main components to the solution. The Intros service creates a Slack channel that connects employees. This can be useful for connecting telecommuters, for example, but is also great for strengthening personal relationships between office workers or helping to introduce a new employee.
The company has recently launched the Watercooler service, which is a good question. encourages chat between co-workers by posting. A seemingly banal suggestion (what’s your favorite number? How do you like eggs?) Can start conversations in a good mood, and employees already feel less isolated.
Figma
Figma is a browser-based, workgroup interface design app designed to serve real-time, multi-user editing. It includes solutions that satisfy professional designers as well (vector tools, reusable UI styles, code generation), and allows team members to discuss changes with feedback, comments, and share files with each other via live links
. ). In their experience, design teams are usually involved in other disciplines, so it’s a good idea to adapt the design tool to this
But developers don’t just think about in-house applications: the recently launched Community Public Source allows external users to share and even “remix” each other’s plans.
Our article is from Computerworld 2021/10. published on 26 May
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