How online communication can win over the “real” one
I still remember the days when I had to explain how come that I don’t go to the office, that I’ve never ever met my colleagues and don’t have a permanent home address for that matter. Since then, the remote work culture has been growing at a crazy high rate and I am sure it’s on its’ way to becoming the mainstream. Still, we keep getting “Sure, that’s all nice, but the online communication will never be like the real life communication…”. Well, do we really want it to be? What if it can be even better for a remote team to get their work done? Keep reading for the top 5 features that The Chat can brag about in front of any “real life” conversation.
№1 Built-in meeting minutes
Ever had a super productive conversation by the glorious water-cooler on a random Friday and thought how you’d get on it first thing Monday morning? Comes Monday, you walk into your office just to find out that you don’t remember the third actionable point from that convo…
If only you used chat, you’d have everything logged, copy-pastable, referable… Shall we say “real”? 😉
№2 Backwards compatibility
Your team has just upgraded to version 3.0 (a new team member joined, again). “Too bad Joe wasn’t here yesterday when we were really on fire and had a super inspiring brainstorming session”, you say to yourself. “Oh wait, we had that convo online! I’ll just add Joe to our channel ASAP and simply tell him to go through our logs from yesterday. Works like a charm!”
№3 Travelling through time
You’re on your way back from the vending machine, happy with your fresh cup of coffee. You enter your office and find your team laughing their heads off. You stand there puzzled: ”Why is everybody laughing? Oh maaaan, I missed it again!!!” They finally manage to get some air, look at your confused face and just give you one of those “Oh, buddy, you had to be there…”. Don’t you just wish there was some magical invention that could let you go back in time and share the fun with your team? Oh wait, there actually is! It’s called the chat log and it even let’s you send your laughs once you read the joke. Pure magic!
№4 URL insertion
How often do you get into a situation when you talk to a colleague and tell him “I’ll send you the link later”, or “I’ll show you when we get to the computer”? Wouldn’t it be better if your colleague can click on your words and see the page immediately? He could offer his feedback right away and your conversation could continue smoothly.
№5 Your favorite playlist without interruption
You’re sitting at your desk, enjoying the playlist you’ve carefully curated. You’re in the zone and getting s**tloads of work done. Tom, your officemate, starts waving at you. You see him, but choose to pretend you don’t. “Shhh!!! It’s my song!“ — you think. “Plus I’m close to solving that nasty bug that’s been blocking us since yesterday. Hope he’ll just give up.” Next thing you know, Tom’s hand is on your shoulder, shaking you to grab your attention. You remove your headset, just to find out that all Tom had was: “We’re doing room escape after work. Wanna join?”. If Tom was using a chat tool, you’d be able to choose the moment when it’s the most suitable for you to allow an interruption.
Still not buying it? 😉
For learning how to add human touch to your online communication, check out my post Remote team communication: how a smiley can be more powerful than any fancy tool.
