Essential Collaboration Apps for Businesses

After two years of widescale remote work and accelerated digital transformation, the era of hybrid work is here. So, what collaboration apps should your business use to keep productivity levels and engagement up, no matter where people are working from?

We’ve put together a comprehensive list of collaboration tools every business should consider using in the new normal. You’ll also find an example of one of the leading apps in each category. 

1. Team Messaging App

A messaging app lets your teams communicate via chat. You can create groups or ‘teams,’ set up shared spaces for group conversations and files, and track work meetings so users know when co-workers are unavailable.

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is coined as the ultimate messaging app. It lets users schedule video or phone meetings and offers the advanced features you’d expect from modern video conferencing software, including screen sharing, chat functionalities, and call recording.

One of the major perks of this collaboration app for large businesses is the ability to set up webinars and group meetings with up to 10,000 participants. Even at this scale, users can expect quality audio and video and excellent reliability.

There is one downside to keep in mind – complexity. This collaboration tool comes with a ton of features and third-party options – not all of which your company will need. This can make the interface feel overwhelming rather than intuitive. But, for current Microsoft 365 users, Microsoft Teams is an excellent option for remote team collaboration.

2. Unified Communications

Unified communications (UC) brings together all the essential business communication tools to help users save time and boost productivity. Your business can use a stand-alone unified communications solution or combine your UC with your contact center software to integrate your internal communications app with your customer communications solution.

Intermedia Unite

The Intermedia Unite desktop and mobile apps provide your employees with cloud-based phone services, video conferencing, chat, and file management – it’s all the must-have internal communication tools under one umbrella.

Users can work on files together from different locations, host group meetings, get answers from co-workers in real-time with individual and team chat, access over 90 business phone features, and experience high-quality calls from anywhere with an internet connection.

With this collaboration app downloaded on your teams’ smartphones, laptops, or other devices, their workspace can travel with them, whether they’re in the office, working from home, or on a business trip. It’s a must-have application for deploying a “pajama work model” and cutting back on operational costs through hybrid work.

Even better, it integrates with other popular business collaboration tools, including Microsoft Teams. You can set up a single sign-on for your users for both tools, giving them the ultimate communication and collaboration power-pack.

3. Project Management App

Project management tools are helpful for organizing group projects and tasks. They provide a centralized location for all collaboration-related communications and assist with productivity tracking.

Asana

If you’re looking for a collaboration app to help your business organize projects and track progress, Asana is worth exploring. It’s designed to make organization easy and comes with handy features, including to-do lists, calendar views for project scheduling, reminders for deadlines, a project search function, and the ability to comment on projects within the app. You can keep everyone on the same page with Asana.

4. Online Whiteboards

For industries that rely on brainstorming, such as advertising, software development, and design, whiteboard apps are very useful. If your teams are remote, they’re essential. Collaborators share ideas and make comments using a chat feature, and with the ability to digitally erase the information, everyone can move through iterations of an idea or plan swiftly.

Mural

Mural is an online whiteboard with plenty of functionality. Your teams can customize their whiteboard sessions with templates, content boxes, and other features.

There’s also an anonymous vote feature, which lets users choose their favorite idea or collaborator. As it can be difficult to get candid feedback in remote meetings, the voting tool can be incredibly helpful for getting needed feedback on an idea so the group can move on to the next task or iteration quickly.

This tool works well for both small and large businesses. You can make separate rooms for different whiteboards and set permissions to limit access to each one.

5. Shared Calendar

Remote and hybrid teams use calendar apps to see, at a glance, when projects are due, who’s working in a meeting, and when people are taking time off. While some of these features are found in other business collaboration apps, a calendar tool is still useful for storing scheduling information the entire staff or certain groups need access to.

Teamup

With a colorful interface, Teamup makes it easy to see what’s going on in your company and who’s involved in each activity. You can use this app to consolidate calendars from other applications, organize projects, events, or goals with custom fields, coordinate vacation time, and more.

Keep Your Hybrid Teams Engaged with Important Collaboration Apps

With the right set of collaboration apps, your business can thrive no matter what. Even when everyone is working remotely, co-workers stay connected, collaboration is efficient, and your people can be effective, whether they’re working on group projects or individual tasks.

Learn more about how technology can make hybrid work better – discover Intermedia’s suite of communication and collaboration apps.

Kirsten Barta

Kirsten Barta is Sr Marketing Communications Manager at Intermedia