Top 3 tools to boost your communication in a remote work setup
Let’s face it. Working from home is become your default. Yes, it has perks of making you more efficient on your work. Or the opposite. But whether you communicate using slack or zoom calls. Communication can be pretty challenging with your colleagues.
I have been working with a remote development team. Which upgraded my way of communicating gradually. It takes time really get to a level to make the communication process smooth with each other. But here are some useful tools to help you get there faster.
1. Team paper snap (mac app)
Show. don’t tell
It’s a screenshot tool to make your get your message across. When using messages, you sometimes don’t understand what others are saying. And vice versa. It’s challenging to explain every detail. As the the saying ‘Show, don’t tell’. Just showing what your referring to get’s the message through fast and efficient.
What’s different from your built in screenshot tool?
With your default system screenshot tool, it’s just tedious to take a screenshot. Find the image file and attach it to your messenger. With Team paper snap. You can take a screenshot. And point out with arrows and boxes, and save it to your clipboard directly. And paste it in right away to the messenger(slack). It’s just so easy to share screenshots.
2. Loom (web and desktop app)
Organizing a call takes time
Best way to explain your designs, or give feedback is to do a screenshare in a video call. To get your stakeholders in a call. You need to either schedule a call, or message someone and wait until they respond and do a call. It takes time and effort.
Save time and effort
With loom you can easily record your screen with audio and also camera. So viewers can see you when you talk. It automatically uploads online. And your get the link right away. Loom is optimized to making your video sharing as smooth as possible.
In result, you don’t need to sync up with colleagues on when to talk. I use it a lot for design handovers. So developers can watch it whenever. And I don’t need to explain multiple time to different people.
https://www.loom.com/blog-post-categories/use-cases
3. Miro
Best digital whiteboard
I have used various digital whiteboards. Or something similar for designers. From Invision freehand, Mural etc. And I can say currently in 2020 October, it’s must have tool for remote setup. You can see team member mouse movement and what they add. And also present your view. There are so many features. Not to mention it’s very smooth even with big groups. Recently new updates are very useful. I suggest you get started with Miro.
How I use it
I use it for so many things, but to name some. Creating a visual map of a product. Just paste from your clipboard(using team paper snap). Add sticky notes. Link them with arrows. Add pdf documents for download. Even add google sheets on it. It’s great to show your thought process an brain storming together with the team.
