Slack was not an immediate success within Frankwatching. Looking back, Frank Janssen, founder of Frankwatching, knows why. “In an office setting, it makes sense to have social chat with colleagues. Whether that is at the coffee machine, in the canteen or just at your desk. You then look beyond just the work. On an intranet or digital workplace, it often remains very formal. Isn't it strange that you can remove a successful element online? People simply work better together when they feel safe and have social contact.”
The three major advantages for Frankwatching
Because the first setup of our Slack was an 'overkill' of information according to Frank, people immediately dropped out again. That's why he removed all channels and started again with two general channels (#offtopic and #4all) and one channel per team (for example #redactietalk). This then grew very naturally to more than 100 channels. Anyone can open a channel, and anyone can join any channel. We do actively look at the bigger picture. That means that we sometimes merge channels or remove them again.
Slack has three major advantages for Frankwatching. Everyone can join, you can see who is interested in which subjects (and you can therefore make connections more easily) and it works as a database. Slack is also ideal because you can 'just' chat in it, and the pressure to respond immediately is somewhat less. We sometimes also use the chat in a WhatsApp-like way: both direct back and forth and postponed. It is often about 'small' things, things that are actually too small for email or telephone.
When you start a project, you think about greek phone number who you invite to think along with you. You compose an email or ask people for a meeting. At least, that is the usual procedure. But maybe other people also have (non-binding) good ideas about the subject. That is the advantage of Slack: everyone can join in on a subject and share ideas or inspiration. Incidentally, that does not mean that you as an organization should not set up 'checks', or that there should not be a person ultimately responsible.
Interests become clear
When you work in teams, there is a chance that you keep projects within teams. And that while in another team there might be someone with a matching interest. Because we have different theme channels in Slack at Frankwatching, you can easily make connections. For example, you see that colleagues X and Y share a lot of strategic articles or insights, while other colleagues are more in the analytics field.
Slack works like a database
If we get a new colleague in (for example) the editorial office, this person can read the channel 'editorial talk' to get a complete picture of the collaboration and agreements. And so it applies to every team: with the channels you build the collective memory of an organization.