People have always worked smarter when they’re part of an effective team. Thanks to the rise of modern technology, those teams no longer need to be restricted to a single office or even a single state or country.
Building a collaborative working environment has become a business imperative, especially for small businesses looking to maximize engagement and productivity without dramatically increasing overheads.
Driving a culture change to break down information silos
In the business world, a dinosaur is one that utterly fails to innovate because their employees and partners can’t collaborate effectively. Different departments don’t share information efficiently, which makes many critical business processes painfully cumbersome and slow. In the end, the first ones to suffer are customers. In this day and age, it’s a textbook-perfect example of how not to do things.
Unfortunately, fostering a more collaborative environment is much more complicated than just migrating to the cloud and setting up a Microsoft SharePoint site or something similar. All technical solutions will go to waste if your employees aren’t willing to use them. That’s why collaboration starts with a culture change that’s driven by transparency and mutual benefit.
To instigate a change in business culture, those in charge need to lead by example. They need to build closer ties with every department across the organization to see what makes them tick. Employees and key stakeholders all need tangible evidence of the benefits that your collaboration solutions can bring. You need to show how collaboration can make everyone’s lives easier.
Building a highly accessible team collaboration portal
Cloud and mobile technologies have transformed the workplace, thereby allowing innovative businesses to work with remote employees, contractors, and freelancers from all over the world. Geographical boundaries are increasingly irrelevant thanks to collaboration portals that bring everyone together and allow organizations to reach out to the best talent no matter where they reside.
When it comes to collaboration, accessibility is everything. No one’s going to participate if they have to wade through complicated sign-in processes or user interfaces. Your team collaboration portal should be like a forum and social network wrapped into one where people can share ideas, exchange and co-author documents, and much more from any device in any location.
A highly accessible team collaboration portal is naturally one that’s hosted in the cloud and is always available. Popular tools include Slack, Trello, and SharePoint, but there are many more to choose from. Make sure to choose tools that can be seamlessly integrated together and provide full cloud and mobile functionality. If all you have is a solution that people can only access from a computer in the office, then it’s hardly likely to take off.
Online collaboration is the future of business
Information silos are out, and a new era of collaboration has begun. Organizations that can’t keep up with that trend are doomed to fail sooner or later. However, for collaboration to work, you need to build a strong community around your efforts. You need to prioritize engagement and enable new ways to communicate so that everyone can work in the way that suits them best. It’s also important to recognize and reward collaborative behavior to honor the collective accomplishment and celebrate your most valuable members. That’s a tremendous way to help your employees, partners, and stakeholders become more engaged and loyal to your business.
Founders Technology Group helps businesses enable stronger collaboration through proven cloud technologies. Call us today to talk about your requirements.