My previous job was very much behind the times technologically.
I’ve been volunteering on political campaigns lately and Slack is a tool that we’re using. It seems like it’s just a mass IM tool that works on all platforms.
There’s got to be a lot more to the tool, right?
That is essentially what it is, rapid synchronous communication, as compared to email which tends to be more asynchronous.
Possibly behind the times, but not necessarily worse off or less efficient, depends on the nature of the work.
For me, one of the most critical things I need to do to be productive is to effectively manage interruptions. Many people at work use Jabber and wonder why I don’t (very often). I explain to them it’s the same reason I don’t have my email pop up a little box every time a new one arrives, it reduces my productivity by taking me out of my current task.
For complex tasks, I need hours of no interruptions. When I’m working on tasks that are more collaborative, especially with remote people, then the Jabber/Slack style of communication becomes more important.
We use it in my workplace only on an ad-hoc basis for specific projects. I don’t mind it, but I really can’t see how Slack (or Yammer or any of the other ones) differ from traditional Bulletin Board software like the vBulletin one we use here. Perhaps a little better with multimedia, but basically the same.
Nearly 280,000 employees worldwide and we don’t use it at all. Our chat app is Skype.
I used to work at a place that did vehicle relocations (e.g. move cars from dealers/auction lots, etc.). We were dispatched via a custom smartphone app and did all our communication with dispatch and fellow agents via Slack. It worked but I found it somewhat cumbersome. The benefit was that all message traffic was automtically logged.
We use Slack now. I mean as this morning. We are all now work at home IS people. We got it figured out and spent about 4 hours joking around and making sarcastic remarks.
:shrug: I could see it helping, but I already get enough info from coworkers. I sure as shit am not going load it on my phone.
We adopted Slack about a year ago, but never turned off Google. So people contact each other by any tool they desire. To me, Slack works better as a message board and group chats, while Google is better for one-on-one.
I have a phone at my desk so only use Jabber when remote. But I know people that exclusively use Jabber, despite having a dedicated phone.