The Conundrum of Choosing a Collaboration Tool

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When it comes to choosing and buying a software, there are some specific steps the acquisition responsible usually takes. They are revolving around two major criteria: the purpose of the product and the budget (always the cruelest part). Choosing any type of software is difficult, but a collaboration tool comes with additional challenges. And that’s because you cannot really test it without involving a significant group of people who then should use it for real for a while. And that, before knowing if it’s the right tool for you.

(By the way, Quandora, our Q&A software, offers a 30 days free trial to help organizations determine its adequacy. And actually, we’re happy to extend the trial if the 30 days haven’t been enough: just ask us.)

Talking to different Community/ Knowledge Managers we found out what the most common obstacles in this routine are and we came up with a short suggestions plan, which we hope will help you with the evaluation process:

  1. Make a first assessment by yourself: spend some time looking at its functionalities – see if it’s both what your company needs need it to do and what you want it to do.
  2. See if the technical features meet your organization’s demands. Look into the compatibility with similar or complementary products. Contact the provider if you are interested in integrations with specific applications your company uses.
  3. Pricing – yes, that nasty task! Budgeting is the only impartial episode – you fit it or not.
  4. If the high level adequacy is established, ask for input from internal users. Recruit a limited group of people to make a real life test for a short while. Those people should be provided visibility on the expectations and goals of deploying the tool, as well as basic usage guidelines.

Chances are, if you got to the point 4 you already eliminated other products from your evaluation. Most of the companies wouldn’t have the resources and the desire to involve teams into using several collaboration tools in the same time. It’s more probable that you choose to invest into seriously testing one of them, and if it’s not successful, you’ll probably start over with a different “pre-selected” product.

Let us know if your experience with evaluating collaboration products is in line with our findings.

Happy Knowledge Sharing!

 

Looking for a great way to ask questions and build knowledge with your co-workers? Quandora enables simple, efficient knowledge sharing with your team, way more fun than a mailing list or a forum. Try Quandora

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