Co-authored by Emily Flowers, Manager, Content Marketing and Communications at McDermott Will & Emery LLP
Coffee dates, lunch meetings, and conference room meetups have largely fallen by the wayside as internal teams and vendors are spread across the country or even the world. Fortunately, technology allows us to meet up and maximize our productivity, despite a lack of face time. In this article, we discuss the benefits and drawbacks of different collaboration and project management tools. Even if you work in a small firm with one office, these tools can still be used to maximize your productivity and enhance your firm culture.
Project Management Tools
Basecamp: Basecamp is a collaboration and project management platform that can be scaled up to encompass entire company, scaled down to a small team, or used between your Marketing department and vendors. Basecamp allows users to hold robust conversations in discussion threads, which can be bookmarked and shared - a great feature over some chat apps in which the conversation disappears after you close out, or digging through an inbox and constantly forwarding emails. You can also separate different parts of a project into teams (business development in one team, graphic design in another, and so on) so brainstorming and in-depth collaboration can happen among subject-matter experts rather than before an entire group. In addition, users can assign tasks to people within their projects, which helps with accountability and keeps projects moving along. Finally, Basecamp allows you to upload files and images, which can be helpful in communicating with vendors or sharing large amounts of data that exceed the limits of an email attachment. After a free trial period, Basecamp is $99/month for businesses or $1,000/year. https://basecamp.com
Slack: Slack is growing in popularity, particularly in the startup world. The interface is reminiscent of Twitter, Instagram, and social media management programs, using hashtags (#) to organize information into threads, heart icons to favorite something, and emojis. Often described as a productivity tool, the goal of Slack is to reduce internal email. According to Slack, customers see an average of 48.6% reduction in internal email. To accomplish this, Slack divides teams into channels, such as one channel for the events team or one channel for a particular project, like a newsletter launch. Channels can be public or private and allow team members to chat about projects outside of email. Slack allows users to share files from their computers and tools such Dropbox, which can be connected to the program with a plug-in. All content is searchable, including content within shared files. Users can also message with one another one-on-one for private conversations or to decide where to have lunch. Slack can also send notifications when something in the program requires your attention, eliminating the need to constantly monitor it. Finally, Slack is available on desktop or mobile. Slack has both free and paid plans, which run from $6.67 - $12.50 per team member. There is also a “Slack Enterprise Gold” plan; you must contact the Slack team to learn about pricing and complete features. https://slack.com
Asana: Asana is a web and mobile-based collaboration tool that specializes in workflow management to help teams become more productive. It is less of a product management tool than it is a platform to keep track and follow the status of daily tasks (you can create and assign tasks, and set due dates, upload files, and communicate with team members). Teams of up to 15 individuals can use the full Asana platform for free. For larger teams, accounts cost $99 per person per year. www.asana.com
Internal Networking and Building Firm Culture
Workplace: Workplace is a collaborative internal social networking platform that was launched by Facebook in late 2016. Similar to Facebook, there is a newsfeed and an IM component that allows you to send direct message other users. Colleagues connect with one another, share updates and photos, ‘like’ each other’s updates, and set up common-interest groups. It is a great platform for building relationships across multiple offices, enabling easy sharing of firm news, personal milestones, and pro bono/community services accomplishments, among others. www.facebook.com/workplace
Intranet: If you don’t have access or budget for new tools, your firm’s intranet can also be a great way to share internal news items. It can also act as an easily accessible place to house and maintain best practices and processes. In addition to a general firm intranet, many firms opt to have their intranet segmented by interest area, so that each practice group and department maintains their own section of the site. This allows items to be carefully targeted so confidential information is only shared with select groups. Unfortunately, in most cases you need to be logged onto your firm’s network or VPN in order to access content, so it can be a challenging platform for individuals who work remotely or travel frequently.
Jabber: Jabber is an internal instant messaging (IM) system that syncs to your telephone, Outlook email, and calendar. As a Cisco product, it is likely compatible with your firm’s current security protocol and suite of technology. It allows users to chat one-on-one or create group messages. It also alerts you if someone is on the phone, in a meeting, or has turned on “Do Not Disturb.” While it does reduce back and forth on email, it has two drawbacks: conversations are not saved when you exit the system and you cannot share files or images within group chats. A message from a team member that you received Tuesday night will be gone on Wednesday morning, so email is still the best option for sharing information or providing instructions that need to be accessed in the future. http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/unified-communications/jabber/index.html
Skype for Business: Skype for Business integrates many of the common channels of business collaboration, including IM, VoIP, file transfer, web conferencing, and email. It enables users to easily schedule and run chat-based web conferencing with multiple people, share their screens, and transfer control to other users. The IM comes with some superb animated emojis and has a drag and drop feature for files, so you can easily send coworkers documents, screenshots, and more within the chat window. www.skype.com/en/business/skype-for-business/
File Sharing and Additional Collaboration Tools
Dropbox: Dropbox is a file sharing platform that can be used to share documents and large files, such as new lawyer photos and graphic design files, with your internal team and with vendors. Dropbox is particularly useful when sharing files that are larger than the file size your email can handle, and can be great when you are collaborating with external vendors (think holiday card season). However, as an open file-sharing tool, it may not be compatible with your IT security measures, which are becoming increasingly strong across the legal industry. https://www.dropbox.com/
Google Docs: Collaborating on this article was the perfect testament to the file sharing and accessibility benefits of using Google Docs. We used Google Docs to brainstorm and share research. We were able to work in the document simultaneously, without any version control issues or the limited, one user at a time access that occurs with DMS. We were also able to pick up work on the article after switching from home to office, or office to mobile. Google also as has Google Sheets (similar to Excel) and Google Slides (similar to PowerPoint). You can control access to Google Docs by sharing them with only the team members who have permission to access the file. You can also limit editing abilities of the people you share a file with if you do not want any changes made to the document. While version control and one-user-at-at-time access are certainly beneficial, Google Docs is a great alternative when you want to work with a team simultaneously or when you are on the go. Note that a Gmail email address is required to create and share Google Docs. https://www.google.com/docs/about/
With any web-based platform, be sure to check with your firm’s IT team before you download or start a free-trial. In many cases, it may be prohibited for security or privacy reasons, so be sure you know your firm’s policies. Even if your IT policies do permit you to use certain platforms, take care to guard your sensitive data. A research project or lateral on-boarding campaign may be easier on a web-based platform, but firm security should always come before convenience.
By Emily Flowers, Manager, Content Marketing and Communications at McDermott Will & Emery LLP and Ashley Hollingsworth, Marking Communications Specialist at Miller & Chevalier Chartered.