Collaborative Communication Tools & the Return to the Office

Collaborative Communication Tools & the Return to the Office

During Lockdown, business communication tools became a lifeline. Whether it was Slack, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Trello, Jira or others, these tools took over traditional face-to-face communications, ensuring colleagues could continue to work together despite being remote.

But will a return to the office lead to their decline? Or will a new era bring forward further options for businesses, including virtual and augmented reality ? Let’s delve into the pros and cons of these tools, and how they will remain needed whether there is a return to the office or not.

Comms Tools: Collaboration or Miscommunication?

Before Covid-19, online communication tools would have captured a divisive audience. On the one hand, you have tools that can provide remote links for a company to its colleagues across the globe – if you have an up-to-date device and a stable internet connection, these tools provided instant communication for businesses. But for others, these tools meant a move away from traditional ways of business – networking, travel, conferences, even coffee meetings with colleagues.

However, when the pandemic hit, these communication tools skyrocketed in terms of their use in the modern workplace. Liked or loathed, the shift to remote working relied heavily on these tools.

But do they maximise collaboration amongst staff, or do they open opportunities for poor communication to seep into your business? As the Irish workforce begins to move back to the office, or at least into a state of hybrid working, businesses are beginning to consider whether they will continue to use comms tools in the future. For the foreseeable, the state of the travel industry means that for long-distance business at least, video calls will continue. For the daily workings of the office, the hopeful closure of lockdowns and the pandemic may mean a wane in the popularity of these comms tools – but it certainly won’t spell an end. Here’s why:

1.???Quicker & Smarter

Whilst some staff will have struggled to get to grips with channels and chats, for others, comms tools like Teams or Slack mean working quicker and smarter. No longer do people have to find email addresses, decide who to ‘cc in’ and who to not, or share hard copy documents.

With modern comms tools, channels and chats can be used to share working documents in real-time, have meetings without having to ensure rooms are free, and even manage events whilst still doing your own work in the background.

Comms tools allow colleagues to work quicker and smarter, maximising the productivity within your workplace but also ensure tasks aren’t lost in chains of emails.

2.???Adaptable

How else will comms tools avoid a death in the workplace? Adaptability.

Whether you are working from your kitchen 3 days a week, in the office 2 days a week, working remotely on a permanent basis, or in the office full time, comms tools work for your colleagues in any location.

Whilst nothing can beat traditional communication like meetings or coffee chats, nothing stops businesses from adapting these traditional methods in the new hybrid world of working. If you have staff in and out of the office, comms tools adapt by allowing you to jump on a call in your boardroom, allowing for in-person and virtual communications.

This adaptability allows you to incorporate flexibility into your workplace culture, ensuring no one misses out on vital communications whilst allowing both WFH and office colleagues to stay in the loop with each other.

3.???New Habits

We’ve all heard the saying, “Old habits die hard”; the pandemic has last for nearly 18 months, creating new habits both in and out of the workplace.

Your colleagues are likely used to communication tools now. For some, they might struggle to remember how they worked before adopting these tools.

Listen and learn from your staff – if they wish to shake things back to as they were, then take the time to prepare for this shift back. But if they would prefer to continue with their pandemic communication tools, and you feel the pros have outweighed the cons for your company, the stick to your new habits. Communication is key within a business – make sure to take the lessons learnt from the pandemic and maximise their benefits for the future.

David Bell is CEO at The HR Department

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Ahmad Muhammad Aminuddin

EHS | OSH-C Trained Person | First Aider | Second Lieutenant

3 年

This is a great point of view! I think this can be applied too in university studies as given the current pandemic situation, even a lecture room cannot afford to accommodate 100% of the total students as to minimize the risk of Covid-19 infection in a cramped space. Which comes to this method, flexibility. Students can do rotation between themselves like those with good connections can learn from college and the other half can go face to face with the lecturer in lecture room. Nevertheless, as a university student myself, I still think face to face is more practical way to further understand lectures in many aspects ??.

Luis Ferrinho

Human Resources Business Partner

3 年

Thanks for posting

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