When the internet was still new and people were still exploring the options and the limits of what a digital world could accomplish, email emerged as the dominant method for communication. However, with the birth of the smartphone, tablet and other such mobile devices the question arises as to whether or not emailing is the best option for business collaborations.
Time is the key factor
The problem with email is that it's a point in time communication. If you need an immediate reaction in a business collaboration project then emailing can be just too slow. If your information is available to all parties involved and if comments are available to be seen on a project you will know exactly who has contributed and to what extent.
Interactivity demands more
Companies have found that interactivity is essential in business collaborations. Yet, emailing very much limits the abilities to be interactive and to convey the ideas needed in a collaboration effectively. It is for that reason that many companies are embracing newer technologies that enhance the current digital trends. The Office suite (Outlook, PowerPoint, Word and Excel etc), has always been geared towards productivity and now Microsoft, realising how important collaboration is, have introduced Yammer.
What is Yammer?
Yammer is an office 365 product which enhances the interactivity and collaborations that members of a project can have within a business. Yammer works much like a private Facebook for your company. This means that you can 'post' about a project and other individuals involved in the process can immediately add feedback and ideas so that there is a more effective workflow. This allows for a more organized collaboration. Furthermore, on projects which require multiple collaborations, the projects can easily be organized so that certain departments can 'post'. When the overall project needs to be reviewed, the project is already organized and available for those people to review without having to re-hash the information.
Yammer offers not only the intuitive workspace similar to Facebook, but also the tools needed to perform proper analytics, pricing comparisons and interactivity between all parties involved in a business collaboration. Because Yammer offers an indicator of whether or not a particular person in the company is online or not, time is saved. Emailing relies on the presumption that the person is online and will get the message when it is sent. Unlike emailing, yammer works much like a chat room in the way that messages are sent. If the person is not online to receive the message you will know.
So Is Email Dead?
Email is definitely not dead! It's just that unlike the good old days, it's no longer the only way to share and communicate our messages. Social media has taken the world by storm enabling billions of people to share thoughts, ideas and messages with each other - imagine what it could do for your people?
