Teamwork has always been an essential factor in improving business performance. However, in today’s digital world, collaboration styles are evolving. Employees across the country and the world must still be able to communicate and collaborate on important projects. As a result, software and solutions designed to facilitate collaboration through video conferencing, real-time texting, and content sharing have risen in popularity.
For organizations to thrive in the digital environment, they need more than just a cohesive communication strategy. Collaborative tools are one of the fundamental requirements that all companies must meet in order to achieve exceptional outputs and employee performance. Here are a few of the most significant advantages of using collaboration software:
- Collaboration tools improve employee productivity. Collaboration software is truly revolutionizing the way businesses operate and professionals work. By bringing streams of data together into a single unified environment, collaboration tools help boost ROI and save time. Moreover, by integrating digital workflows into your organization, employees can obtain the help they need from the right colleague, no matter where they are or what device they’re using.
- Collaboration tools make tracking projects easier. When administrators and supervisors want to see if the projects are running smoothly, they can monitor what’s happening within a single software. They can also see when a document was last updated and who was responsible for making the most recent changes.
- Collaboration tools provide consistency and compliance. Collaboration solutions can reduce some of the risks involved in sharing and maintaining documents online by providing employees with everything they need in one place. They provide a single environment for the IT team to collect and protect data, as well as the ability for businesses to offer recommendations that let users be more productive online.
- Collaboration tools unite employees. Perhaps the most essential benefit of collaboration software is its ability to bring employees together in a setting where the workplace is becoming increasingly scattered. Thanks to trends like remote and mobile working, people from all over the world can join a team and do work from a range of devices, including their smartphones or tablet. As fewer people interact on a face-to-face basis, companies need suitable software to allow professionals to communicate despite their location and cooperate on projects without worrying about privacy issues.
Here’s a list of 20 of the best collaboration software that can improve your team’s productivity:
Communication Tools
1. Flowdock
Flowdock is a team collaboration solution that is especially well suited for startups and small organizations. It offers a team inbox and chat feature that centralize and make a team’s projects accessible.
Flowdock enables collaboration through group messaging and chat. Each project group is called a flow. You can create different flows for the different teams that you deal with. Within each flow is the chat, where users can talk and upload pictures, graphs, and other files.
2. GoToMeeting
GoToMeeting is especially convenient for firms with employees scattered virtually because it’s easy and cost-effective to convene everyone via an online meeting instead of flying them all to the headquarters.
You can schedule, host, and record online meetings and webinars using GoToMeeting. The free version has all of the features, but it only allows you to connect with two additional people. Tiered pricing, like other commercial web-based services, comes with different features depending on how much you’re ready to spend. Up to 100 users will be able to attend the top-tier version.
3. Zoom
Zoom is a cloud-based video conferencing platform that lets you set up virtual video and audio meetings, webinars, live chats, screen-sharing, and other collaboration features.
Zoom allows you to create and join virtual meeting rooms where users can connect with each other via video and audio. Participants can use additional features like screen sharing, file sharing, and text chat within the meeting group or privately with others in the meeting.
4. WebEx
WebEx is a cloud-based productivity suite that helps teams stay in touch. This suite combines Cisco’s web conferencing platform and Spark’s team collaboration tool.
With a capacity of up to 1,000 participants in a virtual meeting room, WebEx allows you to host or participate in video conferencing, online meetings, and screen sharing. Meetings can be joined in a number of ways via the WebEx desktop, web, and mobile apps.
5. Slack
Slack is a business messaging platform that connects employees to the information they need for their work. It changes the way businesses and professionals interact by bringing individuals to communicate in one place.
Slack allows you to communicate, share files and media, make phone and video calls, and integrate other applications that are essential to make collaboration better.
Project Management Tools
6. Asana
Asana is a flexible workplace project management dashboard that is tailored to meet a wide range of demands to help companies achieve their organizational needs.
Asana is customizable, allowing you to split down projects into tasks and establish clear team goals. The platform also integrates with a slew of other corporate programs, like Google Drive and Outlook.
7. Monday
Monday is a flexible platform that allows teams to quickly build custom apps to plan, run, and track processes, projects, and daily tasks.
Monday is a work operating system (Work OS) that enables your team to confidently manage projects and workflows. It’s a basic yet intuitive Work OS that allows teams to define workflows, adapt to changing demands, establish transparency, collaborate, and eliminate manual grunt work.
8. Trello
Trello is a team project management system that allows users to track team projects, highlight ongoing tasks and see to whom they’re assigned, and measure the progress of projects and tasks.
Trello organizes your projects into boards. Its Kanban boards are a visual delight in terms of organizing. Each card can hold a lot of information and tells you who is working on what at any given time.
9. Wimi
Wimi is an all-in-one collaboration platform that helps teams collaborate better and more efficiently. It brings together all of the tools your team needs to plan their work, organize their teams, communicate effectively, and ensure that nothing is overlooked.
Wimi provides users with their own ‘unified workspaces’ where you can manage projects and share files and calendars with your colleagues. There’s a rights-based system you can use to control access in each workplace.
10. ProofHub
ProofHub is a cloud-based solution for companies of all sizes. The solution provides applications for project management, project collaboration, resource management, task management, and more.
ProofHub allows you to organize files, plan and track projects, and collaborate with your colleagues and stakeholders. You can also use an online proofing tool to check and approve files.
11. Redbooth
Redbooth is a task and project management tool that allows teams to collaborate on work, have discussions, and share files. It is easy to use and adapts to the needs of project teams and departments.
With its intuitive design, projects are easy to plan and track on customizable Kanban boards. You can sort, tag, and organize your tasks for clear communication and better task management. In a single glance, you will know exactly who’s working on what and when it’s due.
12. Milanote
Milanote is a cloud-based collaboration tool designed to help creative teams handle storyboarding, creative writing and briefs, mind-mapping, note-taking, and brainstorming. It lets you create private boards and share projects with other team members to collect feedback and ensure service quality.
Milanote is a capable tool that may be used for a variety of purposes, including blogging. You can use this software to coordinate creative endeavors and create fantastic visual boards.
Document Management Tools
13. DropBox
Dropbox is a cloud storage service that allows you to store and share files using remote cloud servers.
Dropbox file sharing works in coordination with file synchronization, which keeps the file consistently updated across all shared nodes, even if it’s shared among a large number of individuals, ensuring that each recipient receives the latest version.
14. ClickUp Docs
ClickUp Docs seamlessly integrates with the users’ tasks and projects, allowing their team to respond quickly and complete work more efficiently.
ClickUp includes features for creating documents, wikis, and knowledge bases, among other things. It features text editing skills as well as multiplayer editing capabilities. It has options for sharing the document and customizing permissions.
15. Smartsheet
Smartsheet effectively automates workflows so that every member of the team is kept informed and engaged as they work to complete their responsibilities on the platform.
Smartsheet is a document management platform that is custom-designed to meet the needs and demands of its users’ businesses. The platform allows you to plan, manage, capture, and report on work from anywhere. It also gives business teams access to a real-time visual dashboard where you can collaborate with each other on a particular task remotely.
16. Google Docs
Google Docs is a web-based document management service that allows users to create and modify private and public word processing and spreadsheet projects. These online documents are saved in Google’s cloud storage which can be downloaded on the user’s computer.
Google Docs is designed for personal and collaborative documents. Document security is ensured by storing documents online and downloading them on the users’ computers. Moreover, all papers created can be printed or published as a web page and are compatible with most presentation and word processing applications.
17. Teamwork Spaces
Teamwork Spaces is a document management and collaboration software that helps you keep track of all of your key documents in one place. By using Teamwork Spaces, you can better streamline and share vital information across teams.
Teamwork Spaces provides document management software that is jam-packed with features that simplify task management. The platform helps you collaborate with your team on assignments in real-time. It also lets users add videos, photos, and charts to their documents to make them more interactive. The platform also includes a number of capabilities that allow you to collaborate with teams and receive client feedback.
18. Ademero
Ademero makes document capture, retrieval, workflow, and management simple with a range of solutions. The tool includes a centralized control method for storing all of your papers in one place.
Ademero users can organize their digital documents quickly with logical expertise and make them available as both commercial and open-source versions. The web-based agile system works with all the operating systems, thereby allowing full-text search and version control.
19. Worldox
Worldox is a commercial and comprehensive document and email management system. The software includes indexing tools such as Archiving and Retention, which make data instantly available anytime whenever required.
For the legal market, Worldox is a comprehensive document management platform with cloud and on-premises solutions. It’s the simplest and quickest method to get your employees the information they need, when they need it, no matter where they are.
20. SignedTrue
SignedTrue is a web-based application that offers e-signature and document management solutions. It provides electronic signature and document management solutions for businesses. The cloud-based platform enables enterprises to sign, send, and collect signatures remotely, create and edit documents, manage files and store them in the cloud, and share documents with encryption.
Choosing the right collaboration software can be tricky. With the massive number of collaboration tools online, picking the right ones for your organization is no easy task. So, to further help you, the checklist below shows four tips you can follow when selecting the right collaboration solutions for your team.
- Identify areas of work that could benefit from using collaboration tools. Whether you’re a startup or a large enterprise, your company is likely to experience a range of pain points with varying priority levels. The first step is to pinpoint these problems. Spend time talking to your team and prospective and current clients. Ask open-ended questions to them, allowing them to provide information in the form of their own opinions and wishes. When you have that data, arrange their needs in order of priority. Following the identification of problem areas, the next thing to do is look for the tools that match the identified needs.
- Involve possible users’ opinions for evaluation. Start by selecting tools that you believe will be useful. To begin, involve the possible users in the tool selection process. The goal is to gain their support in order to close any potential loopholes for future complaints. By doing so, you can expect a faster onboarding process with fewer issues and less room for costly rejection. Finally, you’ll have an overview of the preferences of the team members or users.
- Consider the tool’s software compatibility. At this point, you probably have a selection of tools that fit your needs and are acceptable to your users. Before you make your final decision, think about whether you’ll be able to install the solution given your current software setup. Even if it means paying more upfront, choose software that has more of the features and functionalities that are critical to your company’s needs.
- Measure the expected change. Every new solution is going to have an effect. The goal is to get a solution that assists people in making their lives easier, not the other way around. And you have to make sure that they see it that way.
Once all of these points are considered, the right tool for you and your business should be an easy choice. Whether you’re working remotely or not, collaboration is now mainstream in most organizations. Remember that the collaboration tools you use can make or break your team’s productivity. This is why finding the right collaboration software for your team is of great importance.