Come Together

In the last several years, the concept of collaborative technology has taken hold and changed the business landscape in offices far and wide, big and small. Skype, GoToMeeting, SharePoint, Google Hangouts, WhatsApp, instant messaging, and a growing number of tools are helping companies conduct business in a faster, more efficient manner.

Many of us are “old” enough to remember the advent of the fax machine: the then-incredible ability to send a letter—thousands of miles away in just minutes—was the beginning of a technological revolution that changed the way the world conducted business. Not long after, email would transform the business world again, allowing us to communicate in seconds rather than minutes, and connecting everyone in a manner few ever imagined.

For many companies, email is the primary method of communication (other than the tried-and-true telephone) and the advent of lighter laptops and a mobile phone in every pocket have made using these technological marvels even easier.

WHAT IS IT?
Collaborative technology is exactly what it seems—technology that allows people to collaborate directly, whether it be within a company, between a company and its customers, on a special project, on everyday tasks, or even as a pathway to help employees get to know each other and build relationships.

This gets to the heart of one of the major benefits of collaborative tech—human connections. And while in the past, in-person human connections were the main method of collaboration, as companies shifted to global selling, with multiple locations and customers around the world, in-person interaction became increasingly expensive. Email and voicemail served to close the gap, but it also served as a barrier to face-to-face interaction even as it allowed us to contact one another more easily.

Mark Greenberg, president of Capespan North America in Gloucester City, NJ, says the company wrestled with finding the best way to communicate, while still maintaining a personal touch. Email, he says, became a double-edged sword. “If you go back six or seven years before Skype was so ubiquitous and before WhatsApp, everyone communicated by email and it almost became sort of a ‘cop out’—I’m happier having a conversation and following up with written confirmation as opposed to just using email as a means of getting something off my list and onto somebody else’s.”

Collaborative technology can be used for anything from video calling to internal social networking, virtual meetings, instant messaging, and to even encourage employee volunteerism.

Software search site Capterra.com lists 349 collaborative software products, both web-based and installed, broken down into a number of categories. These wide-ranging tools can help with brainstorming, email integration, group calendars, content and document management, group writing and synchronous editing, discussion boards, and much more.

HOW DOES IT HELP?
With a parent company in Capetown, South Africa and divisions in New Jersey, Quebec, and California, Capespan is the kind of company that can benefit from collaborative tech. Although Greenberg says the company started with specialized video conference lines, he believes Skype may make them obsolete as Internet speeds get faster. “We all use Skype; you feel like you’re face to face. We deal with a lot of partners and suppliers using Skype.”

Bancroft, WI-based RPE, Inc. uses Skype Instant Messaging for Business. Randy Shell, vice president of marketing, finds it “useful for internal communications between our employees. Colleagues can check in on each other’s progress and ask questions instantly, without the chance of it being lost in an email.”