11 Best Tools for Internal Communication Among Employees

Whether your team spans countries or rooms, it’s best to keep all communications in a centralized location.

Question: What technology does your company use as their primary internal means of communication, and why does it work well?

HipChat

"We have members of our team across the United States and in the Philippines, India, Pakistan and the UK. Hipchat allows us to easily create rooms for different teams. Whether we're chatting, sharing files or doing video calls, the platform has become the central hub for our internal business communication and sharing."


A Mix of Cloud-Based Technologies

"We use a mixture of several programs such as Basecamp for project management, Google Docs for uploading documents, GoToMeetings for virtual conferences and a few others for smaller projects, such as Appointment Core. My team might chat via Skype, but IMing is used for clarifications on projects rather than personally connecting. These all act as a reliable way to schedule our time and keep us all on the same page."


Basecamp

"Our company uses Basecamp all day to communicate with one another. We have multiple different "threads" set up, each based around specific clients, topics, new ideas, growth opportunities etc. You add whichever members you want to be involved in that thread and away you go. It's very easy to manage and there's virtually no learning curve, as the UI is simple yet feature rich."


Slack

"Slack is remote team communication and collaboration at its finest. When it first came out my immediate thought was, "not another platform!" This one is different, though. Think of Slack as a replacement for email with your team. In Slack, your messages are synced and indexed, and the search functionality is gold."


Zoom Video Conferencing

"We've tried every collaboration tool, plugin and gadget, and found that old fashioned video conferencing software is the best way to keep remote employees connected. The key is to require the video cameras be turned on, even when the work-from-home employees are in pajamas! We also have a "sound policeman" who makes sure remote employees can hear and are heard during our larger company calls."


Podio

"We've tested many tools and systems, but found Podio to be the most adaptable to our internal workflows. We use Podio to create projects, deliverables and tasks, and it also allows us to prioritize projects and make sure nothing is forgotten. The price per user is incredibly reasonable, making it a strong, scalable and adaptable platform."


Email and Skype

"We rely on email and Skype for internal or external communications because it allows us to connect in real time and resolve any issues in a timely manner. Many of our client trainings -- and ours -- are conducted through Skype because it enables screen sharing, and most clients already use it."


Flowdock

"Flowdock is vital to our workflow because it keeps everyone on the same page, lets us easily communicate as a group or one-on-one and makes for easy file-sharing. The inbox view shows things like git commits, outages, etc. so that everyone can see what is being worked on. This then integrates perfectly with the team chat features and makes for a perfect remote or office mixed-use tool."


GoogleDocs and Voxer

"We use Gmail and Google docs; both are reliable for communication and for collaborating on documents. Voxer has also been excellent for connecting quickly during the day. It allows you to send audio and text messages directly, and is a fast and simple way to communicate."


An Active Confluence Wiki

"This keeps everyone on the same page. As well, there’s one written record of the decisions from our meetings and one version of product specs. If anything changes, everyone gets automatically notified because Confluence sends out an email for Wiki edits to relevant parties."


Resources

11 Best Tools for Internal Communication Among Employees

Whether your team spans countries or rooms, it’s best to keep all communications in a centralized location.

Question: What technology does your company use as their primary internal means of communication, and why does it work well?

HipChat

"We have members of our team across the United States and in the Philippines, India, Pakistan and the UK. Hipchat allows us to easily create rooms for different teams. Whether we're chatting, sharing files or doing video calls, the platform has become the central hub for our internal business communication and sharing."


A Mix of Cloud-Based Technologies

"We use a mixture of several programs such as Basecamp for project management, Google Docs for uploading documents, GoToMeetings for virtual conferences and a few others for smaller projects, such as Appointment Core. My team might chat via Skype, but IMing is used for clarifications on projects rather than personally connecting. These all act as a reliable way to schedule our time and keep us all on the same page."


Basecamp

"Our company uses Basecamp all day to communicate with one another. We have multiple different "threads" set up, each based around specific clients, topics, new ideas, growth opportunities etc. You add whichever members you want to be involved in that thread and away you go. It's very easy to manage and there's virtually no learning curve, as the UI is simple yet feature rich."


Slack

"Slack is remote team communication and collaboration at its finest. When it first came out my immediate thought was, "not another platform!" This one is different, though. Think of Slack as a replacement for email with your team. In Slack, your messages are synced and indexed, and the search functionality is gold."


Zoom Video Conferencing

"We've tried every collaboration tool, plugin and gadget, and found that old fashioned video conferencing software is the best way to keep remote employees connected. The key is to require the video cameras be turned on, even when the work-from-home employees are in pajamas! We also have a "sound policeman" who makes sure remote employees can hear and are heard during our larger company calls."


Podio

"We've tested many tools and systems, but found Podio to be the most adaptable to our internal workflows. We use Podio to create projects, deliverables and tasks, and it also allows us to prioritize projects and make sure nothing is forgotten. The price per user is incredibly reasonable, making it a strong, scalable and adaptable platform."


Email and Skype

"We rely on email and Skype for internal or external communications because it allows us to connect in real time and resolve any issues in a timely manner. Many of our client trainings -- and ours -- are conducted through Skype because it enables screen sharing, and most clients already use it."


Flowdock

"Flowdock is vital to our workflow because it keeps everyone on the same page, lets us easily communicate as a group or one-on-one and makes for easy file-sharing. The inbox view shows things like git commits, outages, etc. so that everyone can see what is being worked on. This then integrates perfectly with the team chat features and makes for a perfect remote or office mixed-use tool."


GoogleDocs and Voxer

"We use Gmail and Google docs; both are reliable for communication and for collaborating on documents. Voxer has also been excellent for connecting quickly during the day. It allows you to send audio and text messages directly, and is a fast and simple way to communicate."


An Active Confluence Wiki

"This keeps everyone on the same page. As well, there’s one written record of the decisions from our meetings and one version of product specs. If anything changes, everyone gets automatically notified because Confluence sends out an email for Wiki edits to relevant parties."


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