Don't Slack on Collaboration

So you want to be a Slacker?

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I’m a slacker, I admit it. When I should be focusing on one task, I’m caught with one hand tied behind my back multitasking like a Millennial. And I, being a people loving introvert, believe in the future of groupthink, of better software to promote better teamwork and communication. And, I'm sick of Email. I grew up with her, we had a bad relationship. We fought as siblings. 

So little old me, knew I found a group tool that I would try to use, given circumstances that seemed appropriate and context magically adjusted to the demands. That’s all we need in life right? One more software tool that borders on a social media channel. That’s just what Slack is I think, something funny that kills email. Email is kinda cluttered, kinda old-fashioned, is it not? It has no interface, no personality and certainly gets stressful when my phone feels like it’s being hijacked by the internet of messages. Have you been there, have you done that?

So why not try Slack, the founder of Flickr (good memories!) has reinvented a chat app that some believe will save some sanity at the workplace. I like hype, I like collaboration and I eagerly want to adopt the new. Who doesn't? Nowadays people in (progressive companies) just use apps that plug into each other. Twitter into GitHub with a dropbox. Microsofted failed us in innovation, so we had to turn somewhere. Thousands of startups will revolutionize how we communicate in the next 5 years. And the pace of change is only increasing. You have to work in a hole in the wall not to notice.

Whether it’s a team of 3, 10 or 100, they have to commit to try to use the tool and see. But growth in such devices, usually means quality in the product, the reviews are trendy. 90% of emails now are from a machine, automated or junk mail or social spam like new twitter followers. Slack is especially designed for work teams, for efficiency and for productivity.

So what if there was an app, that centralized all our communication. It’s a simple concept but how would it work? What about just one big thread between you and others. Email is a dinosaur, it needs to make way for unicorns and the way of the future, that’s SaaS. Otherwise known as software as a service, enterprise tools that are growing faster than other app types.

This is a fresher Asana, but not a Basecamp replacement. Slack has a reputation for being a more casual comms tool while offering surprising layers of complexity. The root is in the Team, and if you’re lucky, you’ll be part of many useful teams. Each team gets to own their own social space and dashboard with threads that are important to name right. Channels on which you are not up to date, go bold. So this amounts to multiple inboxes from specific teams. Slack does not slack on the tutorial department, helpful hints pop up until you are ready to shut them off.

Slack intuitively knows you like a learning curve! This is not for the soon to retire. You can customize that you will be pinged (desktop alert) triggered by the use of certain keywords or when you get a direct message. These come with their own audio tones. Slack is Trello compatible, among others, anyone use Google Hangouts?

On G2 Crowd Slack is rated a 4.6 out of 5 stars. Think real-time comms with archives and alerts that can be integrated with other comms channels. That’s obviously a future in this sort of SaaS and the free options are pretty extraordinary. These folk seem to know what they are doing.

Fans and adversaries alike have  mentioned the following:

• They like the integrations and integration potential of the app.
• They like how easy it is to search the archives
• This can avoid time wasted in meetings
• The ability to star messages help your prioritize
• Helps improve teamwork by keeping lines of communication open
• They like how channels come up organically via groupthink
• Ideal to manage communication issues involving coordination of multiple departments.

But I guess the question really is, are you actually ready to give up Email? Is your enterprise really able to give up old inefficient habits.