How Are Online Collaboration Tools Used – Do you know how to use online collaboration tools? They are among the most common kinds of learning tools that are being used right now by students all over the world. Collaborative educational tools can improve your grades, help you meet new friends online, and get diverse feedback on your work. If you are clueless about what are these collaboration tools, learn more about them here.
You won’t be using office suite programs any time soon. There are now online tools out there that provide you with all the resources needed to succeed in school. If you have no idea how do collaboration tools work or where should I use resources, read further!
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What are Collaboration Tools?
If you’ve ever had a project in which you’ve had to work with multiple people to accomplish a goal, you probably have a sense for how collaboration tools work. Collaboration is commonly defined as working with another individual or group in order to achieve something. With that, we can define a collaboration tool: a technology tool that can be used to help people work together to achieve a common goal or objective.
A collaboration tool can be something as simple as a whiteboard in a conference room that people gather around and use to brainstorm and solve problems. Another collaboration tool is a conference call, during which multiple people get together over the phone to hash out an issue. But for the purposes of this lesson, we are going to discuss online tools that allow people to work together to get a job done: email, workflow software, online workspaces, and so forth. These types of tools are also sometimes referred to as groupware.
The elements of online collaboration tools for business.
Take a look at how modern professionals conduct business today in comparison to just a decade ago, and it’s clear just how much has changed.
In the past, collaborating with others on a project typically meant being in the same room as everyone else. While in-person collaboration tools certainly have their advantages, they come with logistical issues that often make things more difficult than is necessary, especially for companies who work with remote employees.
Today’s solution to this issue is known as online collaboration tools, and they’re one of the biggest game-changers to come along in years.
Why collaborate?
If you want your business to get the most out of collaboration tools, consider the reasons why you want to introduce collaboration in the first place. There are many benefits that come along with collaboration when successfully pulled-off, including the following:
- Saved time – Time is of the essence in any industry, and the more you can save, the better. When employees collaborate with each other, they’re saving your organization time by achieving the end goal in a much quicker fashion. Time is money, after all, and the more you can save by embracing collaboration tools, the better.
- Strengthened team relationships – In many ways, your team is like a family unit. Building effective working relationships between members, then, is important. Collaboration tools are an excellent way for team members to become more comfortable with the concept of working together to reach a common goal. In this way, it serves a dual purpose that can benefit your business.
- Improved project management – Managing a project or team can be more difficult a process than many people give it credit for. Collaboration tools are a great way to ensure you’re getting the most out of your team, as they improve communication and keep easily avoidable mistakes at bay. When people work together, the chances that things will fall through the cracks dissipate immensely.
- Better organization – It’s easy for things to go missing when you’re in the middle of a project, which can result in headaches and wasted time. Better organization is something that every company should strive for, even if things are already going well. In many cases, collaboration tools are the best medicine when you’re trying to improve organization.
The levels of collaboration in your organization.
As you might expect, there are a few different levels of collaboration, each of which has unique effects on your business. Learning how to collaborate effectively is all about understanding how to go about the process. While there are countless “sub-levels” of organization to consider, it can be helpful to internalize aspects of the three most common options.
- Team level – At it’s core, collaboration is about a small group of individuals (usually between two and ten) working together to solve a problem. This is often referred to as “team level collaboration,” which tends to be the most intense, as well as the most effective. When a team collaborates on a project, members can rest easy knowing they’re part of a small group and only have to focus on what’s going on inside of it.
- Community level – Once you start moving past team level collaboration, you’ll typically find yourself operating at the community level. In modern businesses, this typically involves working with others in your social community to improve things on a larger level. This could include customer service, the UI of your social space, or content creation strategies. While a community is typically larger than a team, it’s one step below the network level of collaboration.
- Network level – If team level collaboration is viewed as a micro approach, network level collaboration is macro. Network level takes into consideration not only your organization, but the outside individuals who are directly tied into what you do — clients and customers, for example. The major difference between community and network level collaboration is that the former typically involves only internal employees, while the latter serves both internal and external audiences.
How to tell if your business is ready for online collaboration tools.
The big question today is, ‘are you ready for online collaboration tools?’ The adoption and widespread use of collaboration tools as part of the sales funnel is well documented. For larger companies, these platforms are helping save millions of dollars in improved productivity and efficiency. Online collaboration tools are also a growing need for many small businesses.
How though can you tell if your business is ready for online collaboration tools?
Here are 5 telltale signs.
It takes approximately 3 years for a business to be considered socially optimized. This means a 3-year journey is essential before your business is capable of measuring the impact of social from the time you start using social media services like Facebook. If your business has been actively monitoring re-tweets, Likes, Shares and other social metrics across the web this long, you are likely familiar with the whole social business culture.
To gain even more business value with social, online collaboration tools offer to take the game to a whole new level. Familiar features like activity streams, real-time messaging, and collaboration workspaces are now integrated with your CRM, ERP, and other systems already in place.
Introducing social into existing business systems improves efficiency since it gets employees involved and enthusiast.
The need for content aggregation is rising.
Faced with the decision of whether to maintain independent standalone applications or integrate all the systems together, most businesses opt to go with the second option. It saves time, resources, and dramatically improves speed of delivery.
If you are in the knowledge business, the need for aggregating files, folders, and archives has never been as challenging as it is today. Every day, your archive of valuable information increases and the need to locate it whenever the need arises helps your business remain competitive. Chat apps, wikis, blogs, and discussion forums are a valuable knowledge base and most employees use them to store literally everything they need.
Being able to search content authored by the internal team is key to improving productivity. Online collaboration tools are well-suited to deliver this capability.
Innovation is stalling.
At a time when innovative companies are challenging paradigms that have existed for decades, you can’t afford to play the catch-up game. Encouraging innovation from within is one way to stay ahead of the pack. For innovation to take place, you need a platform that encourages idea sharing and online collaboration tools are key to achieving this.
Most companies have decades of experience tucked away among workers. Some of these workers may have been with the company for years or decades. Their experience and knowledge is invaluable in helping you craft the next phase of your business. How do you tap into this vast resource of knowledge and encourage the sharing of ideas?
Social platforms where employees engage and interact can help monitor, collect, and act on conversations taking place across a company intranet.
Experienced employees know what customer care tactics work, what competitors are doing, and what has worked in the past… or potential ideas that could transform a company. This knowledge cannot be collected in board rooms. It takes time and requires continuous engagement before they can feel free to express their ideas and views.
You have high employee turnover.
Most young employees are highly disloyal and will jump ship as soon as they get bored or a bigger, better deal falls on their laps. Despite all the perks you may provide, employee turnover, especially among the young, remains high.
Could online collaboration tools help cut down your turnover rate?
With so many young people spending massive amounts of time on social networks, they are well familiar with these platforms and enjoy interacting and engaging with others. Imagine bringing the same kind of interaction and engagement into the workplace. While it is not a guarantee that social intranet software like Communifire could potentially reduce employee turnover, there is also a high chance that it could encourage sharing and interactions, all of which ultimately boost job satisfaction.
A lack of employee engagement has also been shown to contribute to a high churn rate. An engagement environment helps employees develop job satisfaction, it offers recognition for one’s contributions, and provides an opportunity to perform under challenging work. A proactive approach such as introducing social intranet software with online collaboration tools into the workplace will encourage users to engage and collaborate.
Project management is a headache.
Balancing the elements of a project can be challenging. Time, money, scope, and people need to be properly monitored and controlled for projects to be completed successfully. When working with teams, team members may not always have the needed competencies and access to information. A lack of accountability can result in finger-pointing and blame which are all unproductive. Poor communication may also result in project failure in some cases.
The collaboration tools found in Communifire can greatly enhance a project’s speed of delivery and communication.
You can keep and monitor all your documents, tasks, and conversations together and have everyone on the same page with activity stream updates. Sharing is also much more seamless, and locating information from blogs, forums, wikis has never been easier.
Conclusion
Collaboration tools were made to help people organize and delegate work. They can also help as a writing tool as it allows users to create an outline of the text. In addition, collaboration tools enable users to manage their respective roles as well as separate tasks from main tasks. With these features, you can easily collaborate with your team members without the need of leaving your desk.