How can I make my work collaboration tools more effective?
When you manage a customer-facing team, good communication and collaboration should always be at the top of your agenda.
It’s essential to ensure efficiency, productivity and, ultimately, success because, without solid communication and engagement tactics, your business can quite literally fall apart.
In fact, 86% of employees and executives cite the lack of effective collaboration and communication as the main cause of workplace failures.
Just like any area in life, poor communication results in unnecessary conflict and stress, which negatively impacts behaviours, attitudes and morale. And if this happens over a long period of time, it can have disastrous effects on your business.
It has been reported that 79% of worldwide workers use digital collaboration tools, and most companies use the same ones. Check out some of the most popular ones below.
The most popular work collaboration tools include
Meta Workplace by Facebook
Google Workspace
Slack
Microsoft Teams
Yammer
Webex App
Jive
Workvivo
Microsoft SharePoint
Simpplr
Cisco
These are all primarily used for instant messaging, file sharing, social updates and document collaboration. Their collaborative features are impressive, and these smart platforms have become ingrained in business culture.
They help businesses worldwide tackle the most common internal challenges, which include;
Poor team communication
Collaboration tools provide a platform for team members to communicate in real-time, regardless of their location. This leads to faster and more efficient decision-making and better coordination among team members.
Poor productivity
Collaboration tools allow team members to work together on projects, share documents and files, and assign tasks, leading to increased productivity and efficiency.
No organisation
Collaboration tools provide a centralised platform for managing projects and tasks, making tracking deadlines, deliverables, and progress easier.
Lack of transparency
Collaboration tools allows team members to see what others are working on and track their progress, promoting accountability and transparency.
Low team morale
Collaboration tools can help foster a sense of community and belonging among team members, even if they are working remotely.
High-costs
Collaboration tools can reduce the need for in-person meetings and travel, resulting in cost savings for organisations.
But with the good must come the not-so-great, and when something seems a little too good to be true, it usually means that it is.
If you’ve been using any of these collaborative tools for a while, you’ll notice the perfect mask fade away, and some new workplace challenges appear through the cracks.
One of the most common issues is information overload.
Why information overload is so damaging to employee productivity
We’ve all been a victim of information overload.
Just think back to when you were trying to get a million things done and were flitting from task to task.
While jumping from one activity to another, you were also getting alerts on your phone, email and collaboration tool.
Were you actually productive during that time?
The answer is most probably not.
That’s because just 2.5% of people can multitask effectively, and whilst your favourite workplace collaboration tools weren’t made for multi-tasking.
They put a lot of pressure on people to update themselves on more information than they need. This is primarily because they become a dumping ground of information, without clear guidance on what employees should follow or the priorities.
This can lead to your staff trying to read too much and top up their knowledge in areas which aren’t relevant because they think that’s what’s required of them.
The overwhelming amount of information blurs the line between valuable information and distraction; making it harder for them to keep track of and filter information. The result is information overload.
Naturally, their brain tries to tell them to multitask as a way of taking a ‘shortcut’ without realising that this shortcut is probably the biggest lag in their efficiency. Research shows that multitasking reduces productivity by as much as 40%.
If you’re wondering how they encourage information overload, then read on. We’ll tell you the biggest issues with work collaboration tools such as Workplace and what you can do to overcome them.
They turn into the Wild West of communications
When you use a collaboration tool such as Workplace by Meta. People start using it the same way they use Facebook outside of work. This means employees are getting bombarded with important work information and policies alongside social updates, including anything from fluffy pet pictures to work social updates.
As a result, it turns your collaboration tool into a Wild West of communications, making it hard for your employees to know what’s worth tuning into.
Even scarier is that they start tuning out altogether, which can mean they miss business-critical information.
How to overcome this?
Create guidelines around what should and shouldn’t be posted on your collaboration tool and develop a schedule which each department has to stick to. This will prevent unnecessary information being shared and the scheduling of published content means that managers will be more selective about what they do post on the platform.
We’d suggest using your collaboration tool or internal social media platform for social updates but not for crucial announcements as blending the two never works.
“While it may be tempting to engage employees where they are using your collaborative tools as an engagement space, it's worth delineating engagement channels from other resources even within the same platform. Employees want to choose when and how they engage, and those who are looking for a crucial business resource may find social content distracting, or even frustrating.” Jen Holloway’s book, Am I on mute?
Alternatively, you can use an engagement app to complement your workplace collaboration tool and only share business-critical updates on it. Our customers like to use Engage for this, and as a result, it means that no important information is missed. They use it alongside large workplace collaboration tools, and they’ve seen a 98% engagement rate on the platform.
Not signposting information
Your employees are busy people and need a little support to help them stay on track with everything they need to know. The problem with large collaboration tools is that they rarely signpost information to ensure that critical information doesn’t slip through the cracks.
If someone is off on holiday or absent for a few days, when they return to work, it’s nearly impossible to catch up on information vital to them and their job. As a result, they neglect to update themselves on any information. This leads to poor communication and low levels of efficiency.
How to overcome this?
Make it easy for your employees to see what news they haven’t read and assign content to relevant teams and employees wherever possible.
Our customers use the personalised news feed which Engage offers, so no matter how busy employees get, they always have an easy way to stay updated on only the unread news which is relevant to them and their role.
Everyone can edit critical information
One of the biggest challenges with large workplace collaboration tools is that everyone can edit business-critical information.
This means there is no single version of the truth.
Employees log on to the platform to look for information and are faced with multiple versions of the same document.
How do they know which to read, and how can you ensure that misinformation isn’t circulating within your business?
How to overcome this?
Set guidelines around who can and can’t publish content and make it a requirement to delete old versions from the platform when you publish a newly edited version. This will lessen confusion and improve usability.
One of the great things about having a quick, flexible platform like Ocasta Engage to use alongside your large workplace collaboration tool is that you can use it to deliver one version of the truth. Employees will know that if they read it on Engage, it’s correct so they don’t have to waste time worrying about whether it’s right or wrong.
Complexity
Like any social networking platform, collaboration tools can be overwhelming for new users. It may take some time to learn how to use all of the features effectively and some employees may be overwhelmed by the complexity of the platform.
How to overcome this?
Introduce new features gradually rather than bombarding your employees all at once. Allow them time to familiarise themselves with new features before you incorporate more into your training and comms initiatives.
User adoption
Workplace collaboration tools are only effective if users widely adopt them within your organisation. If only a small group of employees are actively using the platform, it may not be an effective tool for communication and collaboration.
How to overcome this?
Assign a role to your workplace collaboration tool, e.g. to manage projects or share social updates. Use a complimentary tool your employees enjoy engaging with to guide and update them on what they need to know. This will allow you to reap the benefits of a workplace collaboration tool whilst engaging with employees effectively, making it easy for them to know what steps they need to take to stay informed and updated.
To summarise
Workplace collaboration tools are great for working more cohesively and improving efficiency, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have their challenges.
Be wary of the biggest difficulties and use the actionable tips in this article to prevent them from causing productivity issues within your business. To recap, those are;
Using them as an information dumping ground.
Not clearly signposting information
Allowing everyone to post multiple versions of the same document
Allowing employees to become overwhelmed with the complexity of the platform
Not keeping a close eye on user engagement
Join our customers who use Engage alongside their workplace collaboration tool
Just like you, our retail customers faced many of the challenges mentioned above. They couldn’t get rid of their workplace collaboration tool because it had become so ingrained in their culture, however, they could use a speedy and highly effective engagement platform alongside it.
They now use Engage to easily keep their employees updated with business-critical information, and their engagement rates are unlike any they’ve seen before.
Virgin Media O2 have a 98% engagement rate, with employees actively using the Engage on a daily basis, and their comms team are no longer struggling to cut through workplace noise to get their information noticed.
If this sounds like something your business needs, get your free demo below, and one of our friendly experts will walk through how it can work effectively alongside your workplace collaboration tool.
