Integrate digital-first into your cultureÂ
Itâs human nature to default to familiar habits. For example, employees who return to the office may instinctively revert to pre-pandemic in-office routines, like using only a physical whiteboard for taking notes during meetings. Consequently, theyâll miss out on valuable digital records of their ideas and decisions and run the risk of excluding their remote teammates.
To truly ingrain digital-first collaboration into your culture, you need to help your workforce understand how to put digital-first into practice and become effective digital collaborators.
âCulture is not just about the values we espouse but how they are lived out in our day-to-day operations. A culture that fails to adapt to the new ways of workingâthat doesn't support flexibility, collaboration, and inclusionâis one that will struggle to succeed in the modern business landscape.â
âJeff Boggess, director of product marketing, Avocor
Start by identifying the most accessible places where digital collaboration in the workplace could make the greatest impact, such as:
- Recurring meetings. When you meet with the same group of people regularly, a digital-first approach can help the group capture shared notes, keep everyone aligned on action items, and help team members who may have missed the meeting stay in the loop. Use a digital solutionâmaybe a Google Doc or a Lucidspark boardâas your primary touchpoint before, during, and after the meeting.
- Reviews and feedback. âLook for meetings or activities where people share deliverables, review progress, leave feedback on results, and plan follow-ups,â said Christopher Bailey, principal professional services consultant at Lucid. For example, by taking a digital-first approach to Agile events like sprint reviews, stakeholders can easily leave feedback and ideas, and youâll have a digital record to reference their input at any time.
- Brainstorms and plans. You could ideate on a physical whiteboard, try to take a picture of your sticky notes, and manually make an action plan. Or, you could brainstorm on a digital canvas, summarize your brainstorm in a few clicks, and automatically transform your sticky notes into action items. The latter, digital-first approach is far more inclusive, efficient, and actionable.Â
To actually help teams adopt this behavior, executives can lead by example and be the first ones to add a digital format to their meetings or other collaborative activities.Â
âSay to your team, âWeâre going to experiment, weâre going to learn. And it might be a little messy at first, but weâll figure it out together.â That relieves a lot of pressure on people because the entire team is now learning together.ââ
âDan Lawyer, chief product officer, Lucid
To help reinforce a digital-first culture, Rosenbaugh suggests leaning on mantras such as, âEvery meeting in Lucidspark!â or âEvery process documented in Lucidchart!â" For many teams, itâs beneficial to document these best practices they collectively establish in a team agreement. A team agreement adds a bit of formality to how a team will work together and eliminates ambiguity.
âCreating team-level agreements is critical to enable teams to make the right decision for them and clarify expectations. Including things like what tools they use for what tasks, when they work asynchronously vs. synchronously, and what is the expectation for response time will go a long way in ensuring everyone is on the same page about how work happens."
âChristina Janzer, SVP of research and analytics, Slack
The more clarity you can create around best practices, the more likely the organization is to adopt digital-first. For example, since Dropbox implemented its Virtual First model in 2020, theyâve received employee feedback on needing more guidelines on how to actually communicate asynchronously. To help, Dropbox created actionable, digestible guidelines called âVirtual First Quick Tipsâ with links to their Virtual First Toolkit, podcast, and more.
As different teams see success in digital-first formats, share these early wins across the organization. Teams will draw inspiration from each other, and eventually, these practices will become second nature.Â
Standardize your tech stack
Digital-first collaboration simply isnât possible without the right tools, yet only 43% of knowledge workers reported that their organization has implemented digital collaboration tools, according to a recent Lucid survey.Â
But what tools exactly do you need? Well, a pandemic-driven tech stack likely wonât cut it. Itâs now time to look closely at your existing investments.Â
Ask yourself:
- Is there an opportunity to replace multiple tools with a single tool?Â
- What tools will allow technical and non-technical teams to work together?Â
- How can I keep teams connected in both meetings and asynchronously?
- What challenges or gaps are left by our existing tools?
âWe find that the hardest piece for collaborating as a distributed team is managing the way organizations use their internal knowledgeâmeaning, teams struggle with keeping their company knowledge accurate, up to date, and useful. Many tools just simply don't provide the necessary workflows to combat this issue before it's too late.â
âAddison Shultz, developer relations lead, GitBook
Need a little help getting started? Here are a few must-have digital collaboration tools:Â
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Communication tools: Choose a consistent tool to facilitate digital communication across your organization, such as Slack, Google Workspace, or Microsoft 365. While these shouldnât be your sole communication channel, they are a great way for teams to share brief updates, ask questions, and connect.
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Visual collaboration: With visual collaboration softwareâincluding virtual whiteboarding and diagrammingâyou can clearly show the connection between complex ideas, plans, systems, and more, accelerating understanding. GartnerÂź identifies visual collaboration as a key part of the new work hub, listing it as a must-have application in the digital workplace (Gartner, âDeliver Peak Digital Employee Experience Excellence in 4 Steps,â June 15, 2023).
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Project management software: No matter where teams are working, keeping track of projects in a cloud-based, digital tool (such as Asana, monday.com, Jira, Smartsheet, and others) will help everyone stay aligned. Bonus if your project management software connects to your solution for visual collaboration!Â
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Video recording software: One of the great benefits of digital collaboration is that you can cut back on meetings by transitioning some activities to asynchronous digital formats. Video recording tools like Loom or Zight allow users to record videos (often in conjunction with other digital tools) to explain topics, provide updates, or walk through project instructions. And unlike the ephemeral meeting, teammates can reference this video anytime they need.Â
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Documentation management tools: Finding digital ways to share and centralize your organizationâs documentation helps all teams innovate faster. Digital collaboration solutions like Dropbox can help teams easily store and share important information. Youâll also want to consider the different use cases and needs across teams when choosing a solution. For example, engineering teams may benefit from a technical management tool like GitBook.
- Interactive touch screens: For in-person or hybrid teams, setting up interactive touchscreens (such as the Google Board 65 from Avocor) in offices combines the best of both physical and digital experiences. And when these touchscreens are integrated with visual collaboration software, all participants can contribute equally to the whiteboard. âInteractive touch screens are not just for presentations,â says Boggess. âTheyâre a canvas for collective brainstorming, problem-solving, and meetings that require decision-making.â