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What Is the Impact Of Communication Tools And How To Choose Them?

August 23, 2021

Nowadays, the software that people use to communicate with each other is particularly important. Social networks, messengers, and emails influence the way we communicate.

For example, you may have noticed that your coworkers' conversations in Slack are very different from their email conversations. The means of communication influence the manner and style of our communication, and sometimes completely determine the topics of our discussions. They often dictate what we can say and what we cannot.

For example, we can't speak to a CNN political columnist, but we can tag Josef Biden on Twitter.

This has enormous social consequences.

Before you begin to search for ways of how to transfer contacts from Outlook to Gmail, or the ethics of communication in various programs, we recommend you to read about choosing different tools for different purposes.

What option is better for corporate communication?

Email is an exciting communication tool with many advantages. It is popular because it is really widespread. Sending emails makes sense when communicating with the outside world (clients, consultants, and others outside the office). But what about communication within the company? Taking into account all the advantages of e-mail, we are sure that this tool is not ideal for the employees' communications. According to Ben Mathes, it is necessary to ask yourself the question of what is your goal pursued in the case of a particular type of communication. Once defined, it will be easier to find the tools that are best suited for this case:

• Prompt and timely completion of tasks — you can discuss this in real-time in chats like IRC or Slack;
• Joint work — there are many tools for collaborative editing of documents;
• Accounting and analysis — for this there is a CRM, as well as services for project management.

The means of communication determines which types of interaction with interlocutors can be carried out and which cannot, and more often the efficiency of your job depends on this interaction.

Why is email so popular?

The means of communication is chosen by the person with the most power. According to Peter's Principle, people tend to continue to use an already proven idea, technology, or thing in a changing environment. In other words, you are forced to use email because your boss uses it. At the same time, this communication tool in a particular case may not be an ideal choice.

To be fair, this principle also works for CEOs. They have to adapt to their customers, so successful marketing includes not only internal workflow but external communications (email marketing, billboards, etc.). Email is a generally accepted means of communication, which is great. It can be very useful, but it may not be enough for daily professional activities in modern conditions.

If you have the authority to choose the communication tool for your team, then make that choice consciously. And if you don't have time for that, then let your team make their own choices.