The 14 Best Team Collaboration Software You Need in the Remote Era
The best team collaboration software, along with key features, benefits, pricing details, recommendations, and more.
Team collaboration tools have gained tremendous popularity in recent years. In a recent TechRepublic Premium poll, 95% of respondents reported that their companies use digital collaboration tools.
The demand for powerful, best-in-class solutions in this space will continue to increase, especially as more companies embrace remote work. By facilitating task management, progress tracking, file sharing, communication, and more, collaboration tools promote transparency, increase productivity and ultimately improve your team’s output, no matter where they are located.
If you’re interested in acquiring a team collaboration solution but not sure where to start, you’ve come to the right place! We’ve put together this guide to break down everything you need to know about team collaboration software, including the best vendors, key features, pricing details, and more to help you make an informed decision.
Best Team Collaboration Software
To curate this list of the best team collaboration software, our team attended product demos, analyzed user reviews, consulted industry experts, and put many of these tools to the test. We concluded that the most important elements to look for in team collaboration software are ease of use, communication capabilities, integration options, and security features.
- Ease of use: The ideal collaboration software has an intuitive, uncluttered interface so employees can quickly figure out how to message coworkers, share files, start video conferences, and more without complicated tutorials or extensive training. We looked for platforms with a gentle learning curve, contextual help, and role-based interfaces.
- Communication capabilities: Since the core purpose is to enable collaboration, we examined the breadth of communication channels offered, like group chat, direct messaging, video meetings, voice calls, and screen sharing. The top tools provide a range of options to fit everyone's needs.
- Integration options: Integration capabilities are key so these platforms can pull in essential workplace apps like email, calendar, documents, and business systems. This provides convenience and continuity for employees as they switch between tools while working. We focused on platforms with expansive integration options and APIs.
- Security features: As dispersed teams work with and share sensitive company data, security is non-negotiable. Our research prioritized platforms offering robust measures like SOC2 compliance, end-to-end encryption, role-based access controls, single sign-on, and data backup/retrieval capabilities.
To learn more about our software selection standards, this article on editorial methodologies breaks it all down.
Podio
The difference between Podio and a typical team collaboration app or Podio and project management software is that it’s totally customizable, from the dashboards to the apps you can create with little to no coding knowledge needed.
PROS
- Create your own apps in Podio with little to no code that fit your team’s specific needs
- Free plan doesn’t limit most features, but does limit users and number of items
- Includes contact management tools to serve as a lean CRM
- Podio includes a power dialer and phone system for its highest paid plan, which can eliminate your need for a separate voice over IP (VoIP) system
- Automated workflows are available for all paid plans, which are usually unavailable on low-priced plans on other productivity apps
CONS
- Podio’s platform often crashes, has error messages, and glitches when creating a new app
- To continue using Plecto’s interactive sales dashboards after the first six months of your subscription, you must subscribe for Pletco at a steep monthly price
- It can be overwhelming to learn how to use Podio, but it’s easy to use once you master it
At first glance, Podio seems like a lean, easy-to-use collaboration tool with task management, calendars, and workspaces. However, it has built-in functionality for making apps you can create yourself with no coding necessary. Simply drag and drop elements you want in your app and click “done.” It’s a great way to organize projects, assign work, and access the finished products.
The activity stream, built-in messaging, and commenting makes it easy to see who’s working on what, when it’s due, and encourages conversation, and thereby collaboration. Podio offers an intuitive platform, but it does take a while to learn how to create apps and use the platform to its fullest potential.
Some of the biggest names in business use Podio, including Sony, NFL, Volvo, Sotheby’s, and Deloitee.
Podio offers three plans and an option for custom pricing for enterprises:
- Free: Podio’s free plan lets you share the collaboration platform with up to five people. It includes basics, such as task management and workspaces, but you’re limited to 100 items. It’s a good choice for a freelancer or small agency that’s just starting out.
- Plus: On this plan, you pay $11.20 per month, if paid annually, and you get access to most of the features, plus you can create an unlimited number of items. You’ll miss out on reporting functions and sales dashboards, though. This plan is a better pick for small startups that need to collaborate but don’t yet have a full-fledged sales department.
- Premium: For $19.20 per month, if paid annually, you get access to all of Podio’s features, including a power dialer and interactive sales dashboards via Plecto. However, the sales dashboards are only free for the first six months and the ongoing price will be $220 per month to $350 per month (with only 10 licenses included).
Best For
Businesses with time to devote to customizing workspaces with the apps they need. It’s a good collaboration supplement to integrate with your project management software.
Flock
For team collaboration, Flock stands out by offering a reminder feature that lets you set up reminders for meetings for yourself and others. It also lets you create and manage mailing lists within the software, which is great for announcements or invites to guests and collaborators..
PROS
- Flock’s free plan is fairly generous. There’s no limit to users, messages, or one-on-one video calls
- Not all chat programs offer video conferencing, but Flock’s platform allows for one-on-one video calls and group video chats.
- You can expect standard collaboration tools from Flock, such as direct messaging, channels for specific topic chats, and file sharing. Video calls and voice notes also help you collaborate with teammates. One of the more unique tools Flock offers is built-in polling for getting consensus on topics or issues.
- Another unique tool built into Flock is a reminder setting. You can create a reminder for yourself about anything, such as to make a call, send an email, or finish a project. Also, tag a colleague or employee in the same reminder for meetings or video conferences, for example.
- Some plans allow you to set authentication requirements, such as SSO, or you can create a whitelist. You can also automate data backup and set permissions for who can create channels, invite guests, or send messages.
CONS
- If you’re familiar with Flock’s more popular competitors, you may find Flock hard to use at first. The interface isn’t instantly intuitive, so it may take a while to get used to the layout of tools.
- The free plan only lets you search up to 10,000 messages, which seems generous, but messages add up quickly.
- Flock lets you customize, search messages, and set your notifications in a few different ways, but it misses the mark when it comes to more advanced features. You can’t customize notifications much and there aren’t advanced filters for searches.
Flock is mostly a remote office chat application with team collaboration tools. Send different types of messages, including one-on-one and group messages; create public and private channels; and set up minor projects in a channel. The to-do lists, polls, and reminders (that you can set up for yourself and others) combine to make Flock a great communication and work operating system.
Although Flock doesn’t include full-fledged project management features, it lets you store and share files with one or several people within the app. And like other collaboration software, Flock lets you integrate more than 50 other apps to add more functionality to the platform.
There are several big companies that use Flock for remote collaboration, including McDonald’s, Namecheap, Web.com, and Britannia.
There are three plans available from Flock:
- Free: The free plan from Flock is suitable for a small team that needs a simple chat app. You get unlimited one-on-one and group chats, 10 public channels, and one-on-one video calls. Storage is limited to 5 GB overall, and you can only search up to 10,000 messages.
- Pro: When your business grows (20+ people) or you need more resources, you may want to upgrade to this plan that costs $4.50 per user, per month. Storage is increased to 10 GB per user and you get group video calls. Plus, there are no limits on your searchable messages.
- Enterprise: If your company is much larger, you may want to consider Flock’s Enterprise plan. All users get 20 GB of storage, single sign-on (SSO) is available, and you’ll get dedicated support. Contact Flock for a custom quote.
Best For
Flock is a good pick for any size business that needs a remote team collaboration and communication tool.
Miro
Miro’s online collaboration tool that lets you start with a whiteboard and build your custom flowchart or mind maps with prebuilt shapes, sticky notes, markers, and other tools with all of your remote teammates. Then you can save those boards.
PROS
- No matter which plan you use, Miro allows you to invite an unlimited number of collaborators. High-tier plans let you invite guests to boards for viewing or approval.
- In addition to offering a free plan, Miro offers a range of paid plans that cost $8 to $16 per person, per month (billed annually).
- Miro is fairly intuitive to use, but if you have issues there are multiple guides to help you. The drag-and-drop interface is easy to navigate, and the sidebar has easy to understand icons.
- All boards are editable, so you can create a board, save it, and revisit it later. All paid plans get an unlimited number of boards, too.
- Miro lets every user leave comments on elements of boards. Additionally there are video chat options and “smart meetings” that let you set up breakout brainstorming sessions and timers to keep everyone on task.
CONS
- When several people use Miro at once, the system can get bogged down and laggy. This can create confusion among users when they’re all trying to click, add shapes, move, and create together.
- Although Miro makes it clear who commented, it isn’t always clear who created what or when. This could be problematic when revisiting a flow chart or diagram in the future.
- You get basic shapes on the low-tier plans, which works for creating simple designs. For developers and more complex diagramming, you’ll need to upgrade to a high tier plan to unlock specialized shapes.
- Despite Miro offering a free plan, the paid plans are a bit expensive especially for a small business on a tight budget.
What makes Miro unique to other team collaboration software is its interactive whiteboard. It replaces the in-person brainstorming sessions you may have had before when working in an office. Team up with all of your coworkers remotely for real-time ideation. You can all work on the same board simultaneously using prebuilt templates, shapes, and frames to suit your project or map.
You can use the included video chat to connect with teammates as needed, run a “smart meeting” for collaborative brainstorming, or integrate other communication apps to share boards through software you already use.
Some of the biggest businesses use Miro for collaboration, including WalMart, Deloitte, Okta, Volvo, and Cisco.
Miro has four plans, including:
Free: Miro’s free plan gives you one workspace with three boards and access to more than 1,000 templates for flowcharts, workflows, agendas, and projects. It’s a good plan for freelancers or very small teams that don’t need advanced collaboration tools or support.
Starter: The Starter plan costs $8 per user, per month (billed annually) and includes more tools for remote team management and collaboration with outside users. It’s a great solution for small businesses and agencies that want built-in tools to help track project progress and meet with teammates via video.
Business: This is the plan you may want if you’re looking to run engaging and interactive meetings, build diagrams using prebuilt shapes, and get single sign-on access for all users for a more secure login process. This plan costs $16 per user, per month (billed annually).
Enterprise: The Enterprise plan from Miro gives you more security features, 24/7 support, and more admin management tools. There’s no pricing available publicly, so you should contact Miro directly for a custom quote.
Best For
Remote teams and companies of any size that need cloud-based whiteboard software to collaborate on projects would do well with Miro.
We used Miro as both an internal collaboration tool as well as for interviews. Miro helped tremendously with product interviews as it is a familiar tool for many Product Designers and Product Managers. The ability to have a whiteboard element that was extremely easy and intuitive to use ensured that candidates didn't struggle too heavily during interviews to get their ideas across. Internally, Miro also acted as a whiteboard which helped massively for collaboration and engagement in presentations.
- Intuitive to use
- No permanent account required
- Beautiful UI/UX
We bought Miro for several reasons. First, it helped for internal team collaboration by providing an easy to use whiteboard while we all worked remotely. Second, it helped improve our candidate experience during product and engineering interviews. This was really important during COVID when candidates couldn't whiteboard in person. Lastly, it helped provide better engagement for collaboration during presentations. The fact that it was free was also a plus.
- Sometimes it can be a little difficult with guest accounts.
- The aspect ratio between different types of screens can mean super zoomed or very tiny content.
- Those are really it though.
I've liked using Lucidchart a bunch especially for building process workflows but I've found that Miro is easier to collaborate in.
- What are you intending to use it for?
- Will you be using it exclusively with internal stakeholders, external stakeholders, or both?
- If you plan to use it for interviewing, how difficult is it for people to pick up using it comfortably?
- If you plan to use it for interviewing, do your product/engineering teams want to use it?
- Product (Product Designers, Product Engineers, Product Marketers, Product Managers)
- Project Management Teams
- Engineering Teams (Software, Physical, etc)
- HRIS/ Recruiting Operations teams
Teams that don't need to collaborate with a whiteboard
Slack
Slack sets itself apart from other team collaboration software by being fun to use, highly accessible for people with different audio and visual abilities, and for its numerous integration options.
PROS
- Slack offers a generous free plan with unlimited users, messages, and 10 integrations.
- The interface is immediately familiar to anyone who’s used a chat room.
- Paid users can customize the sidebar and notifications and schedule a notification to minimize disruption.
- Advanced search filters allow users to narrow their search focus to pinpoint what they need.
- Provides audio clips with automatic transcribing, dark mode, and an option to adjust text size.
- Lots of emojis and gifs. Users can even create custom emojis for their Slack workspace.
- Integrates with 2,500+ apps.
- Slack offers a lot for a free plan, including unlimited users and messages. You get 10 integrations on the free plan, which may be enough for freelancers or small businesses.
- Of all the team collaboration software options available, Slack is one of the easiest to learn and use. The interface is immediately familiar for anyone who’s used a chat room. You can easily access channels, direct messages, and figure out how to use all the tools because of the simple interface.
- On paid plans, you can customize your sidebar to include only what you want to see. You can customize your notifications and set up a notification schedule to minimize disruption.
- Slack makes it easy to find a specific message, file, or comment in a channel with advanced search filters. Rather than scroll through endless results pages, you can narrow your search focus to pinpoint what you need.
- Audio clips are a convenient way to get a message to someone, but Slack made sure to include automatic transcribing for better accessibility. There’s also a dark mode to make it easier to read text and you can adjust text size with a zoom function.
- Slack is known for providing a fun atmosphere for work through a variety of emojis and gifs (just paste a link into a channel or message). You can even create custom emojis for your Slack workspace.
CONS
- Can be a distraction from work.
- Free plan users won’t be able to access messages and files 90 days old or older.
- Can be laggy sometimes.
- Slack has a bad reputation for being distracting. There is a way to minimize the number of notifications you get, but even without active notifications, it can still be a distraction from work.
- Paid plan users don’t have to worry about decaying message history, but if you’re on the free plan, messages and files disappear after 90 days.
- Slack sometimes gets laggy or even freezes before restarting. Notifications aren’t all that reliable at times, too.
- Collaboration in Slack comes down to messaging, specific channel group chats, video conferencing, and file sharing. There is no way to work on documents or files with others in real time.
Slack is among the most popular tool for corporate communication for numerous reasons. The most obvious one is its extensive integration list and easy-to-use communication features.
Slack supports more than 2,500 apps. By leveraging its integration ecosystem, it provides users with simplicity and versatility. As users, we can rest assured that our current apps will likely connect seamlessly with Slack.
We appreciate the inclusiveness and user-friendly nature of Slack's communication features. Users can send private messages, create group chats, and utilize dedicated channels for teams, topics, or custom categories. Sharing files, making announcements, and conducting audio or video calls are seamless, providing a comprehensive communication platform.
The search feature stands out, enabling users to retrieve essential information quickly. While free plan users can still utilize the search tool, their chat history only includes conversations from the past 90 days.
They offer four plans, and many of the users we interviewed said they started with Slack's free plan and upgraded as their team grew.
Integrations, support, and storage are things the platform can adjust to fit its customers’ teams. However, depending on the integrations also means that it’s your responsibility to vet vendors, pay them, and sync it with Slack, which may not be ideal for teams looking for an all-inclusive suite with everything in-house.
Slack is well known among most of the corporate world, so it’s no surprise that it’s used by companies such as Uber, Target, Netflix, Expedia, and the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs.
Slack offers four pricing plans:
- Free: unlimited users, 10 integrations, one workspace, and limited to one-on-one messages and video chats.
- Pro: costs $7.50 per person per month (billed annually) with unlimited access to message history and integrations.
- Business+: costs $12.50 per user per month (billed annually) and includes Pro features, plus single sign-on, channel posting permissions for all channels, and 24/7 support.
- Enterprise Grid: has a custom quote. Features include priority support, HIPAA compliance, and unlimited workspaces.
Best For
Slack’s first three plans are best for growing teams to improve their team collaboration via a scalable communication tool that has extensive integrations built-in, while the enterprise plan is ideal for teams with multiple brands.
We use it every single day for communicating. Our development team uses it for an async daily standup, which has replaced jumping on a video call at a particular time each day. It helps with time zone differences and keeps things easy.
The Ops team uses it for onboarding, and engagement, we have some key activities we do as a team when someone new joins, and also play games together if we want to socialize. Our company uses it for important announcements, and to link any new policies so they are easy to find and search within Slack.
- Love the easy-to-use interface - it’s pretty clear how to use it, not a steep learning curve which we like a lot.
- Love the emoji use - gif use - it makes it more fun and accessible. You can add on many different apps to make things more custom and add integrations for tools that you use.
- Love the multiple channels - you can create as many channels as you like and then archive them when you like. We use them for retreats, and then we archive them once the event is over, to reduce clutter.
As a remote company, we wanted to effectively communicate in one place. We were finding that there were signs of isolation, and we didn't want that to increase. We loved that Slack has the ability to integrate with our tools and we can add as many relevant channels as we like whether it’s related to work or water cooler talk.
It’s also been really helpful during onboarding, it’s a great tool to help integrate a new team member while also keeping them in the know of any company announcements. I've been using it for over seven years at various companies that I’ve worked with.
- That it can get noisy - you really have to minimize notifications or you may be inundated with pings and emails. You’re able to mute certain channels and also specify times that you’d like to be notified, and not.
- With an org larger than 500, it could get really bloated, and would be more challenging to cut through the noise. You may have to change the way you use Slack, we found it really hard to manage channels with a lot of people, vs smaller groups.
- It can be expensive! The more people you add the higher the price, so you have to look at your budget, and perhaps consider some other affordable options.
Easy to use, easy to integrate, well known. It helps when a lot of people know how to use it, or have used it previously.
Price, size of org, needs of org, remote/hybrid. I would consider what the company is using now, and also what are the current habits of communicating internally. I would also budget and create some guidelines about how you might want to communicate and what features are important to the organization before purchasing any tool.
Yes, they've added many more integrations and features to support more functions. They really listen to user feedback - for example, to create reminders, there was a more manual process to change it, you had to delete it entirely and create a new one, and now you’re able to edit a reminder very easily with a button.
Anyone!
Can't think of any.
Wrike
Wrike was named a Forrester leader for a reason; their solution is robust and comprehensive enough to be used by large enterprises, and their pricing is reasonable enough for small and medium-sized businesses to use and derive value.
PROS
- Can manage both projects and ongoing work.
- Option to view projects and tasks through different views like Kanban.
- A very efficient tool for team communication and work management.
CONS
- Doesn’t offer integrated live chat.
- Time tracking cannot be used for invoicing.
- The free plan offers very limited features.
Wrike is a powerful project management and collaboration platform suitable for businesses of all sizes. With interactive Gantt charts, shared Kanban boards, intelligent risk prediction, customizable dashboards, workflows, forms, and much more, Wrike has everything you need to execute projects efficiently while maximizing productivity and collaboration both within and across different departments in your company.
- Dell
- Ogilvy
- Okta
- Airbnb
- Siemens
Wrike has four plans that are priced as follows:
- Free: Though limitations on the number of active tasks apply, this plan is free of charge and is ideal for small teams looking to get started with a project management tool.
- Professional: The Professional plan packs full project planning and collaboration features and costs $9.80 per user per month.
- Business: The Business plan costs $24.80 per user per month and includes everything in the Free and Professional plans, along with customization and exec reporting features.
- Enterprise: Through this plan, Wrike offers enterprises a comprehensive project management solution with advanced security and controls. Contact Wrike’s sales team to get a price quote for the Enterprise plan.
Note: The prices shown above are billed on an annual basis. User licenses are sold in groups of 5.
Best For
Wrike has plans for companies of all sizes.
Trello
Trello makes it easy for businesses to collaborate with team members and freelancers on tasks and projects. Its drag-and-drop interface is intuitive, and users can leave comments on each card for full board visibility.
PROS
- Trello provides a feature-packed free version commonly used for personal and team projects.
- Offers affordable paid plans that can serve small teams to large enterprises.
- Easy-to-use Kanban boards.
- Includes no-code automation features on all plans.
- Two-factor authentication (2FA) on all plans.
- Has a mobile app.
- Offers a feature-packed free plan and paid plans are affordable
- Scalable for small teams to large enterprises
- Easy-to-use visual boards (Kanban)
- Multiple views allowed at higher price points
- Excellent for personal projects
- No-code automation included on all plans (including the free plan)
- Two-factor authentication (2FA) on every plan for top-notch security
- Mobile app available for iOS and Android
CONS
- Limited customization features.
- Not easy to see subtasks at a glance.
- Integrations may require extra costs.
- Doesn’t support a visual dependency option to connect one card to another.
- Free plan users cannot assign subtasks.
- Have to scroll the board to view all lists if you have more than five.
- Limited customization options (custom fields only; available for paid users)
- Difficult to see subtasks (checklists) at a glance
- Power-Ups (integrations) often include added cost to use
- No visual dependency option to connect one card to another
- Cannot assign subtasks (checklists) to different users on free plan
- Only five to six lists are viewable without having to scroll your board
We have used Trello for personal projects and as a collaboration tool to organize our work and track our progress. The platform has been helpful to us in various ways, and we also find some of the tool’s drawbacks.
One of the things we like best about Trello (and if you have used it, you will agree) is that it is very easy to use. We can create boards for each project and then create lists and cards within each board. This makes it easy to track our work and see what needs to be done, by when, and who.
Did we mention it has a stellar free plan? We often are very skeptical about free things (we have trust issues with free stuff’s quality), but Trello has opened our minds. Did we mention it has a stellar free plan? The free version is simple but effective. We can even use automation features without upgrading to its paid plans.
Teams that use Trello for project management can get a bird’s-eye view of each project by glancing at each board available to them. Clicking on a card, we can see a task description, who’s working on it, a checklist of subtasks, and attachments. We can also leave comments on each card to collaborate with other team members within the app. However, tracking the history of user activities on Trello isn’t easy. While the automation feature is helpful, it can take time to figure out. We also wouldn’t recommend Trello to teams that require native time tracking, robust customization, and features like project dependencies.
Google, Coinbase, John Deere, Zoom, Visa, Grand Hyatt.
Trello offers four plans:
- The free plan allows you to create unlimited cards with up to 10 boards.
- The Standard plan costs $5 per month per user (billed annually) with no limitations on boards, and you can upload files up to 250 MB per file.
- The Premium plan is for $10 per month per user (billed annually) and includes calendar, dashboard, timeline, and map views. You also get access to priority support.
- The Enterprise plan starts at $17.50 per user per month (billed annually) and requires a minimum of 50 users. You get everything that Trello offers at this level, plus more security and permissions for better organization of data and users.
Best For
Trello’s scalability allows individuals to manage their personal projects and teams to collaborate internally and externally on tasks and projects.
I use Trello for tracking my to-do list. Moreover, it is great for working cross-functionally. It is very helpful to find out where we have delayed and who is the responsible person. On weekly basis with my team members, I used it for status updates in internal meetings as well. It is very user-friendly and fun with customizable features.
Trello has made it incredibly easy for me to stay organized and on top of my projects. The platform's intuitive interface makes it a breeze to create boards, add tasks, and prioritize projects, and the ability to collaborate with others on projects has been a huge plus. Excellent software to maintain the progress as a team and achieve the targets as a team. Monitor the team's progress and a wonderful application full of tools helps us to do things right.
We bought Trello when we deployed targets per each employee in the company and Trello was very helpful for tracking the targets. We had a great opportunity for effective communication and visibility. I use this platform for my personal goals as well. I have been using it for 5 years. It has a mobile version as well which is great to get notifications about updates/changes from the users. Trello is an eye-catching, fun, and intuitive app that helps you organize, coordinate, and track work.
The accidental "drag/move/delete" is scary for us because you can accidentally move a card when you're just trying to scroll over on the screen and that can be problematic. I can not see the archived tasks on the calendar as an option. Not being able to archive a task after you complete it and still see it on the calendar is a bummer.
The product has a good look and is easy to use. Regarding the integration of the processes, it is very good and agile with the other members. I think that Trello is the best Kanban board, bar none, and it’s worth checking out for that alone. Trello offers a relatively reasonable pricing system. Trello offers templates in the form of pre-designed board layouts that help users quickly set up and customize their projects according to their specific needs. These templates cover various use cases, such as product development, marketing, and team collaboration.
User-friendly. Easy to customize and use. Sharable and interactive.
Despite its simplicity, Trello’s automation tools are generous and just as easy to set up. Butler, Trello’s automation bot, makes setting up rule-based triggers and desired actions easier than ever.
Both for small and big size companies.
Fear of insecurity is a shortcoming of the apps. Some bad people can use this app for their ill purpose.
Asana
Asana offers cross-team collaboration tools for tasks, projects, and conversations. Using it, you can get a clear view of who’s doing what and by when, which helps when you all have to work on the same tasks, projects, or goals.
PROS
- Feature-packed free plan with few limitations
- Excellent tools for cross-team collaboration on projects, tasks, and goals
- No limits on file storage (except file sizes)
- Conversations, assets remain centralized to project and tasks
- Drag-and-drop functionality makes it easy to build projects
- Workflow automation helps reduce manual tasks (available on paid plans)
- Real-time reporting makes it easy for managers to see 50,000-foot views of data with the ability to drill down to more granular views
CONS
- No built-in time tracking (must use time tracking app integration)
- Overwhelming amount of features for those not used to project management software
- Tasks and subtasks cannot be assigned to more than one user
Project management software like Asana is a great pick when you need strong team collaboration tools. The timeline view shows what each person on every team is working on, along with dependencies (if there are any), which helps employees, managers, and stakeholders.
The messaging and commenting features keep all conversations relevant to each task or project, so you can collaborate easily (and without having to sift through email chains or call a meeting). Use the form builder to communicate between teams and find out what’s needed — the completed form can be easily turned into a project.
Amazon, Google, The New Yorker, AT&T, PayPal, Slack, Spotify all use Asana.
Asana has four plans:
- Basic: This is a forever-free plan. There are no limits to tasks, projects, messages, or file storage (100MB per file limit). Collaboration is limited to 15 members, so it’s a good choice for new small businesses and solopreneurs.
- Premium: For $10.99 per user, per month (billed annually) you can get everything in the free plan plus timeline view, a workflow builder, forms, automated rules, and milestones. You can also invite an unlimited number of guests (good for client approval on projects).
- Business: This plan costs $24.99 per user, per month (billed annually) and includes everything from the two lower-tier plans. There are more advanced features at this level, such as goals, custom rules builder, and integrations with programs like Salesforce and Tableau, making it a great pick for larger businesses and agencies.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise plan requires a custom quote from Asana. You get all the same features as the Business plan, but you also unlock custom branding, data export, and 24/7 support. It’s best for large companies that want to add their brand to the Asana platform for a more professional look and require access to customer support at all hours of the day and night.
Best For
Asana is the reason for a relatively stress-free environment at companies big and small, even solo operations! Their plans can fit all kinds of business sizes and use cases. It is used to manage projects by content creators, software developers, editorial teams, designers, NGOs, and much more.
We use Asana every day, for multiple projects, across all of our teams. It’s especially useful for Onboarding/Hiring and off-site planning within the Ops department. Our marketing team uses it to track launches and social calendars. Asana has a recurring feature, which is really helpful for our Finance team, they can have duplicate tasks based on their workflows each week/month/quarter, and year.
- Easy to use - the user interface is fairly intuitive, and it’s really easy to get started. Although there are many features, the basic ones are straightforward and Asana has many great tutorials to help you learn the rest.
- Integrates with Google / Slack - this is a great reason to use Asana because you can create tasks from Slack, and then keep track of things that are said/need follow-up.
- Easy collaboration - You can create teams in Asana so that each project can be customized as to who needs visibility and access. It’s a great way to be able to work together in real-time, or even async, which is really important to us.
We were losing track of tasks that needed collaboration, and due dates were being missed. Asana helps us keep track of multiple projects within different departments and allows for better collaboration. We are now able to stay on top of projects and know who is accountable for each task. I have personally used it for over seven years and could not imagine not using this tool for work and personal use.
- That you can't assign one task to more than one person - sometimes a task needs to be completed by more than one person, it would be great to assign one task to more than one person - currently, you have to duplicate the task.
- There's no time tracking - for contractors it would be great to have a feature that could time track each task, and then support them with their invoices to monitor how much time they spent in total
- Can get too complex - there are many views / additional features that can get overwhelming, but once you learn how to use Asana to its full extent, this does get easier to navigate.
I've used ClickUp and really dislike it - it's quite bloated and not as intuitive or easy to use. I prefer Asana because it’s a cleaner user interface. I’ve also used Trello, and while it can do a lot of what Asana does, I think I still prefer Asana.
How big/small your team is, how proficient people are with technology, how comfortable they are with using a tool like this - it should support tasks, not take up more of your time.
Yes, there have been more integrations and also dependent tasks and prioritization features.
Well-versed in technology, project management, operations.
Non-profit, people who aren't well versed in tech.
Teamwork
The Teamwork devs seem to understand that client-based businesses require tools to make team collaboration easier. All plans get collaborative document management, built-in team chat, and shared dashboards.
PROS
- Free plan with more than standard project management features, such as team chat, time tracking, and unlimited client views
- Proofing tools are included for all paid plans, so you can review files before handing off to clients
- Create custom tags for projects and tasks
- Built-in time tracking and invoicing means you save money because there’s less dependency on integrations
- Intuitive interface makes it easy for anyone to learn how to use, so there’s less downtime for your team
- Switching between project views is simple
- Subtasks nest under main tasks in list and table views for clear bird’s-eye view of projects
- Affordable, scalable plans make this a viable project management solution for any size of business
- Built-in chat makes it easy to communicate with colleagues without needing to integrate another app.
CONS
- Storage is limited on every plan, from 100 MB on free plan up to 250 GB on Grow plan
- Two-factor authentication (2FA) only on high-tier plans
- User minimums required on all paid plans
- Interface is a bit cluttered with small fonts, which makes it hard to read all the info you see
- No markup tools for attachments
Teamwork is project management software that many teams rely on for collaboration, especially for client-oriented projects. Tools to help with collaboration include built-in direct messaging, collaborative document storage, and commenting on projects.
It’s an ideal pick for small agencies that have remote teams working together on client-based projects because of advanced tools. For example, you get built-in time tracking and unlimited client views on your projects, plus invoicing.
Teamwork serves several types of businesses, including ValPak, Cox Media Group, Salted Stone, Northwestern Mutual, and Infosys.
Teamwork has 4 pricing plans:
- Free Forever: This plan is free of charge for up to 5 users and is ideal for individuals and small teams getting started with project management.
- Deliver: This plan is ideal for teams that want to manage multiple projects and costs $10 per user per month, billed annually.
- Grow: This plan is ideal for larger teams that need to work more efficiently. When billed annually, this plan costs $18 per user per month.
- Enterprise: This plan is designed for enterprises that require advanced security and extra speed. Contact a Teamwork sales representative for a price quote.
Best For
Teamwork’s client-minded features, like built-in time tracking and invoicing, it’s best for agencies and freelancers with clients. Although it’s scalable, it’s better for smaller teams, but cross-team collaboration tools could change that.
Jira
It’s easy to collaborate with teams via Jira’s visual boards. Create cards with multiple subtasks and set up task dependencies for collaboration on projects. All users can leave comments on each task to keep conversations relevant to each issue.
PROS
- The no-code workflow automation builder is accessible for all users, so you don’t have to be a programmer or developer to create easy solutions.
- Jira’s Kanban board is specifically designed for Agile style project management, but they’re flexible enough to work for any department.
- Agile teams can use Jira scrum templates to quickly set up sprints, saving you time from having to set them up manually. Simply fill in an epic with a user story and cards with your tasks.
- Advanced security features (SSO, 2FA, permissions, roles) make Jira one of the safest project management apps.
- Roadmaps give clear visibility on projects and task dependency for 50,000-foot views. They’re ideal for product development and management.
- While all project management apps typically offer integrations with popular software, Jira has more than 3,000 integrations (more than industry standard) to make it easy to extend the functionality of the platform.
CONS
- May be difficult to master the advanced features (roadmapping, dependencies, automation), especially for new users.
- You won’t find as many project views as other top-rated project management software, so don’t count on Gantt, calendar, or timeline views.
- Jira has much more expensive paid plans than other leading project management apps.
- Users report Jira isn’t the most intuitive platform at the beginning. Finding tags, fields, etc. can be difficult.
The visual boards in the Jira platform are excellent for team collaboration because it’s easy to see who’s working on each task. You can click into any card to see subtasks, comments, and files attached to that one main task. Beyond the commenting system though, Jira isn’t set up for natural team collaboration.
To get a more seamless environment for team collaboration on Jira projects, you may find it necessary to integrate other apps, such as Slack or Confluence.
Some top-tier customers prefer Jira for product and project development, including Square, eBay, Pfizer, Cisco, and Visa.
Jira offers four plans:
Free: Jira’s free plan allows up to 10 users and includes most features. File storage is limited to 2 GB. It’s a great pick for a small team or a freelancer.
Standard: The low-tier Standard plan from Jira costs $77.50 per month and the user limit is set to 35,000, which is much higher than industry average. Most features are the same as the free plan, but you also get access to user permissions and project roles. File storage limit increases to 250 GB. It’s the best plan for small to midsize businesses.
Premium: For $152.50 per month, Jira’s Premium plan unlocks more advanced features and fewer limits. User limit stays at 35,000, so it can work for any size business. You can create automations for multiple projects and you get advanced roadmap and task dependency features. You also get more security features, admin controls, 24/7 priority support, and unlimited file storage.
Enterprise: The Enterprise plan includes everything Jira has to offer, including a subscription to Atlassian Access, which gives you single sign-on and enforced two-factor authentication (2FA). It also lets you set up multiple sites, which is best for businesses with many brands that need separate workspaces.
Best For
Jira is ideal for software development teams that prefer to use the Agile method of project management. Its plans work well for any size team given its high user limit.
We use Jira to track progress toward reaching goals. This helps us assign tasks to our team. It also helps us manage timelines and identify roadblocks. We also use it to keep track of our medium and long-term goals.
Jira is great for remote teams. It helps us track our progress. It also keeps the team accountable.
We subscribed to Jira to manage projects. We use it for a number of projects, but especially tech projects. It helps keep our remote team on the same page. We have been using it for 2 years.
Jira is more costly than other solutions. It can take a bit of time to get used to the UI.
Jira seems to be used by more tech professionals so it is easier to get our team to use this tool.
They should look at the cost and how easy it is to deploy and use on a daily basis. They should also look at the number of users and boards per pricing tier.
It is good for any remote team, but especially tech teams.
I think it is a good fit for all, even in-office teams.
ProofHub
ProofHub offers numerous features, enough for growing teams to collaborate, but not so many that it's overwhelming and leads to disengagement. Their fix-price (unlimited users) is also a bonus.
PROS
- Works well for design-related projects.
- Easy to use and set up.
- In-app messaging.
- White labeling personalization and customization.
- Available in 11 languages.
- Flat rate paid plan allows unlimited users.
- Provides guest access.
- Has a free trial. Free versions are available on request.
- This product allows you to store and manage files within the platform. It has a capacity of up to 100GB of storage.
- In-app messaging capabilities
- White labeling personalization and customization
- Multi-lingual (available in 11 languages)
CONS
- Limited integration options.
- API access and report features are for the top-tier plan only.
- Lacks resource management and budgeting capabilities.
- No employee monitoring features
- This product has limited integration options. You can only integrate with about five tools which do not include the likes of Jira, Notion, and Zapier.
- No project tracking and budgeting capabilities
ProofHub has all the essential features of a team collaboration product, such as Gantt charts for planning and adjusting schedules and Kanban boards for visualizing and tracking task progress. Teams can also track their time on each task with ProofHub’s built-in time-tracking tool.
There are also some unexpected features, like ProofHub Discussions. This feature helps users create structure around discussions, whether entirely internal or including external stakeholders.
It also lets users add comments directly via email (no logging into the platform) and look up previous discussion topics easily with advanced search.
The in-built proofing tool enables users to preview, review, proof, and share feedback on a shared file. This is especially useful for creative and visual product teams.
Unlike Asana, which only allows one assignee per project, ProofHub users can assign tasks to one or multiple team members. Plus, users can mark a task as private if the card contains sensitive information that specific people should only see.
ProofHub contains a great set of features for distributed teams to collaborate. Admins can add users with attributes like access type, title, language, and timezone information to maintain orderly and engaged collaboration.
ProofHub is used by 85,000+ businesses worldwide, including Google, Netflix, Nike, TripAdvisor, Nasam, and Pinterest.
ProofHub has two pricing plans:
- Essential: For $45 a month (billed annually), this plan comes with 40 projects, unlimited users, and 15 GB of storage.
- Ultimate Control: For $89 a month (billed annually), this plan comes with an unlimited number of projects, users, and 100 GB of storage.
Best For
Distributed, remote, office-based businesses and agencies in marketing, and creative/design industries.
At my organization, we regularly use ProofHub to help us create projects, assign team members, set deadlines, and track progress. We create project templates to save time and ensure consistency across projects.
We use it primarily for the task management feature that allows us to create tasks, assign them to team members, set due dates, and track progress. we also create custom task lists and workflows to match our team's needs.
ProofHub's interface is intuitive and easy to use, even for those without much experience in project management software.
They allow users to create custom workflows, task lists, and project templates to match their specific needs and processes.
The software offers a range of collaboration tools, such as discussions, file sharing, and chat, that can help teams communicate and collaborate effectively.
My organization bought ProofHub because we were struggling for a central workspace where we could manage all our projects, tasks, and communications in one place. This helps us save time and reduce the need for multiple tools.
ProofHub offers us a range of project management features, including task management, time tracking, Gantt charts, calendars, and Kanban boards. These features help our organization stay organized and stay on top of our projects.
ProofHub has been a game changer for us since we started using it. ProofHub also offers collaboration tools such as chat, chat, and file sharing. These tools help us communicate effectively with our team members and keep everyone on the same page.
I've been using ProofHub for the last 2 years.
ProofHub has limited integrations with other software tools compared to other project management tools.
While ProofHub offers a range of pricing plans, some users have mentioned that the higher-tier plans can be expensive, especially for small businesses or individuals.
The tool has a bit of a learning curve, especially for those who are new to project management software.
ProofHub offers a wide range of features in a single platform, including project planning, task management, team collaboration, reporting, and more. This can save time and reduce the need for multiple tools.
- The tool should have an intuitive and user-friendly interface, making it easy to navigate and use. Look for demos, free trials, or customer reviews to assess the ease of use of the tool.
- Evaluate the pricing plans to ensure that they align with your budget and requirements. Look for features and limitations at each pricing tier and assess if it offers good value for your money.
- The tool should be customizable to meet your specific requirements. This includes the ability to customize workflows, task lists, project templates, and more.
- Evaluate the features and capabilities of the tool to determine if it offers the functionality required to manage your projects and tasks effectively. Look for features like task management, project planning, collaboration tools, reporting, and more.
- ProofHub has continuously added new features and functionalities to its platform to meet the changing needs of its users. For instance, it has added features such as project templates, time tracking, custom roles and permissions, and Gantt charts over the years.
- ProofHub has undergone several UI changes to make the platform more user-friendly and intuitive. The current interface is streamlined and organized, making it easier to navigate and use.
- ProofHub has added customization options, including custom workflows, task lists, and project templates, allowing users to tailor the platform to their specific needs.
- ProofHub has improved its customer support by offering phone, email, and live chat support, as well as self-help resources such as FAQs, guides, and video tutorials.
Small and medium-sized businesses: ProofHub's affordability, ease of use, and all-in-one project management features make it an ideal choice for small and medium-sized businesses.
Creative teams: ProofHub's online proofing feature makes it a great choice for creative teams such as marketing agencies, graphic designers, and content creators who need to review, approve, and collaborate on visual content.
Remote teams: ProofHub's cloud-based platform, collaboration tools, and mobile app make it a suitable choice for remote teams who need to work together on projects from different locations.
Large enterprises: ProofHub's features and pricing plans may not be suitable for large enterprises with complex project management needs. They may require more advanced features and integrations that are not available on ProofHub.
Organizations with specific compliance requirements: Organizations that require compliance with specific regulations or standards, such as HIPAA or GDPR, may need additional features or integrations that are not available on ProofHub.
Monday.com
Not many project management apps offer functionality for so many types of businesses, ease of use, and affordability like monday.com does. It also offers gamification for users, such as visual celebrations for completing a task, which makes it fun and motivating for everyone in your department or company to use.
PROS
- Free plan available, and affordable, scalable plans for small to midsize businesses
- Easy to learn and use
- Customizable dashboard
- Collaborative document creation with the ability to turn content in docs into tasks in projects with a few clicks
- Gamified progress tracking with visual celebrations for users
- Workflow automation for repetitive tasks
- Built-in communication tools reduce reliance on email
- Customized forms for in-house or client use that can be easily turned into projects
CONS
- 3+ users are required to get on any of the paid plans
- Limited storage on the Basic plan
- Could be too complex for simple project management needs
- No phone customer support
- Tracking different conversations can be difficult because of all the clutter
Monday.com is an easy-to-use cloud-based project management system. The gamified progress tracking (colorful celebrations with each task you check off) makes work fun, and the collaborative and dynamic documents feature makes it easy to create projects from lists.
Depending on the plan you subscribe to, you have more than 10 different views of projects. Monday.com also lets you customize your dashboard, so you can see the data or projects most important to you. The drag-and-drop interface is intuitive and you can add or remove specific widgets for your needs.
More than 110,000 companies use monday.com, including Hulu, Uber, and Coca-Cola. :
Pricing for monday.com ranges from free to $22 per user, per month, billed annually, with a three-user minimum.
- Individual: $0 (up to 2 users). Users on this plan get a maximum of three boards, no limitations on document creation, and more than 200 templates to use.
- Basic: $10 per user, per month (billed annually; 3-user min.). This plan lets you share boards with an unlimited number of viewers, ups your storage limit from 500 MB to 5 GB, and removes limitations on board creation.
- Standard: $13 per user, per month (billed annually; 3-user min.). The Standard plan is monday.com’s most popular because it gives you everything in the Basic plan plus more storage (20 GB) and unlocks workflow automations and integrations, though these are limited to 250 actions per month each.
- Pro: $22 per user, per month (billed annually; 3-user min.). At this level, your storage increases to 100 GB and you get up to 25,000 actions per month each for workflow automations and integrations. You also get built-in time tracking, chart views, and workload views, which is helpful for team leads.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing. This plan ups your storage to 1 TB and your actions increase to 250,000 per month for automations and integrations. Features only found on the Enterprise plan include a dedicated account manager and a 99.9% uptime guarantee. You’ll also get single sign-on (SSO) for your whole company, IP restrictions, and HIPAA compliance level security.
Best For
We think monday.com is suitable for almost any type of business that needs to track projects or collaborate on work. It's a highly scalable solution, making it an ideal solution for all sizes of businesses.
The sales team enters any new business into Monday.com. Then, the manager assigns the tasks associated with the new business to various members of the team. Each task has a deadline accompanying it. When done, those tasks are marked off until the project has been completed. When completed, it is billed in its entirety.
Easy to work with after it's set up properly. Reminders for jobs that need completing. Its ability to grow with the company.
As we grew from a small business to a medium sized business, we needed something to guide us through the increased workload. After researching and interviewing several companies, we chose Monday.com. Although there is a significant learning curve, it has definitely paid off for us. We are more organized and there are checks and balances for the employees. There also is increased accountability.
Learning curve was time consuming. Customer support was limited to a specific amount of hours. Some parts of the site are not perfectly intuitive.
We thought the price was competitive with other tools on the market. We liked the graphics on the site. We believe we can use the platform for several years as it will absorb our growth.
Price is always an important consideration. Getting the best support is critical. There's nothing worse than having to fill out a ticket and wait 24 hours for a response.
Monday.com seems to be providing additional updates to its product. We often get emails about new features that are available. We may consider using its CRM in the future to keep more products in the same bucket.
It has worked well for our advertising agency where there are many new opportunities on a daily basis.
Perhaps a business that was highly technical, but I simply don't know how to answer this.
Benefits of Team Collaboration Software
Using team collaboration software allows companies to:
- Increase speed and efficiency: Collaboration software acts as a shared virtual space where team members can instantly access information, share feedback, find and store different types of files, and much more. It particularly comes in handy for cross-functional and remote team collaboration where the members involved are scattered across different offices, if not different countries.
- Improve internal communication: Collaboration tools provide teams with a channel to instantly and informally communicate. Team members can privately message one another, comment on shared content as well as chat 1:1 or in groups over audio/video calls. Depending on the platform you use, you may get to permanently store the communication history and search it as needed.
- Manage projects better: Though they don’t completely replace project management software, collaboration software features like boards, to-do lists, shared calendars, etc can facilitate basic project management. Managers can assign responsibilities, request status updates, and check on their team to ensure they have everything they need and aren’t facing blockers.
- Improve employee satisfaction: When your employees are limited to outdated and formal communication and collaboration channels, it is easy for them to get frustrated and dissatisfied with your company which in turn, will have a negative impact on your projects’ development. Investing in a good collaboration software streamlines how your employees work together and complete tasks, which will not only boost their satisfaction but in the long run, foster a work culture where everyone is encouraged to reach out, share knowledge and help one another.
Mistakes to Avoid When Buying Team Collaboration Software
With so many products on the market, meticulous research and evaluation are required to make sure you don’t buy the wrong one. Here are some of the most common mistakes businesses make:
- Getting into a long-term commitment with a vendor before thoroughly testing their product: Most software vendors will offer you a discount if you sign an annual contract. Some will even try to tempt you to get into a 2-year commitment. While such deals are cost-effective in the long run, you should only commit to a vendor after thoroughly testing their product and verifying that it works for you. This is to save you from the hassle of going back and forth with the vendor regarding their refund policy and incurring cancellation fees.
- Buying advanced team collaboration features when all you need is a whiteboard-like software: Team collaboration solutions can pack advanced and flashy features such as scrum boards, change management, and risk management. Those features are fantastic for teams that use them, such as software development teams. If your team doesn’t have a use for those features, don’t buy them.
- Choosing a team collaboration system that isn’t scalable: Your company may grow rapidly in a matter of months. It may also experience financial struggles, requiring you to shrink your team. No matter what the future holds, you’ll definitely need your team collaboration software to grow or shrink accordingly, without needing to switch to different providers every time you scale.
Pricing Models of Team Collaboration Software
As with many software products, the pricing of team collaboration software is usually broken into tiers, often between 2 to 5. The pricing of those tiers can either be a flat subscription fee ranging between $45 and $100 a month for an unlimited number of employees or follow a per-employee-per-month model, which could cost anywhere between $4.50 and $40 per employee per month.
Do note that in all cases, additional fees may still apply for on-demand services such as product implementation, training, customization, dedicated account management, and cancellation. Consult your chosen team collaboration software vendor on the exact breakdown of all their fees, both recurring and non-recurring.
One more thing to look out for is whether or not the vendor has a minimum price commitment policy. Vendors with such policy won’t let you subscribe to certain plans (often their best-value plans) unless your total monthly or annual bill exceeds a predefined amount.
For more information and to learn about our software pricing best practices, check out our ebook on getting the best pricing in HR tech.
Key Features of Team Collaboration Software
- Task management: Team collaboration solutions allow you to create and assign tasks. They should also allow you to order tasks in terms of importance, and—if someone on your team is away for any reason—reassign their tasks to other individuals with the capacity to take them on.
- Boards and Lists: Another common feature of team collaboration products is the ability to create boards and lists to stay organized, have important tasks/elements in one place, and easily visualize all pending/completed items.
- Customizable workflows: One size never fits all in team collaboration, which is why most software tools in this space allow you to customize workflows and continuously finetune them to boost your team’s productivity and achieve the best outcomes.
- Reminders and notifications: Team collaboration software ensures you never miss important updates through in-app, email, and mobile push notifications. You can also customize what you get notified for and set reminders for when certain deadlines are approaching or when certain milestones are completed.
- Docs and file management: A good team collaboration solution should allow you to share documents and other types of files easily and quickly with a large number of people. It should also offer extensible cloud storage so you can save all of those documents and files long term.
- User administration: Projects often bring together collaborators at different levels. These include but aren’t limited to managers, employees, freelancers, third-party vendors, and clients. As the person in charge, you may want to give all of those people access to your project but customize that access to keep certain information on a need-to-know basis. With the help of team collaboration software, you can create user groups with different access levels. When done, all that’s left to do is just add people to the correct user group, and they’ll automatically receive the access level that comes with it.
- Third-party integrations: The majority of team collaboration tools offer integration options with your existing business tools, such as those for recruiting, payroll, enterprise resource planning (ERP), team communication, and more, to extend the functionality of your software, have your data synchronize automatically, and eliminate duplicated effort.
- Mobile access: Mobile accessibility is essential to collaboration tech. Nobody wants to limit themselves to laptops or desktops, which is why most collaboration solutions offer iOS and Android apps that teams can use to send/receive updates instantly, view progress, keep track of deadlines, and more on the go.
- Additional features: In addition to the above, some team collaboration software solutions may also carry features for time tracking, invoicing, expense tracking, asset management, issue tracking, and risk management.
Questions to Ask During Your Team Collaboration Software Demos
As you’re vetting different team collaboration software products, we always recommend that you schedule demo sessions with the top vendors on your list to make sure their solution is right for you. Here are a few questions you can ask team collaboration software vendors:
- Can you show me what employees see through their accounts?
- Does your software leverage any artificial intelligence (AI) or machine learning for process automation?
- Can team members video chat with one another through your platform?
- Is your software easy to implement, and would I be able to set it up myself?
- What business apps does your product integrate with?
- What metrics have you used to prove the effectiveness of your software?
- What data protection laws is your software compliant with?
- How much does your product cost for my team size and needs?
- How will the current pricing change as our team grows or shrinks?
- Do you assign businesses a dedicated account manager?
- What are your service level agreements (SLAs)?
- Do you have a knowledge base with articles/guides for self-service?
Implementing Team Collaboration Software
The majority of products in this space are cloud-based, delivered through a software-as-a-service (SaaS) infrastructure. Getting started with cloud-based software is fairly easy. Once you’ve selected a vendor that meets your needs and purchased a subscription, you can create an account and start configuring it right away (e.g. import your employee data, invite your employees to sign up, start communicating, sharing files, and more).
Though not many, there are some team collaboration software solutions that are self-hosted (on-premise). Self-hosted solutions generally take longer to set up compared to their cloud-based counterparts. If you choose to go with a self-hosted product, make sure you consult the vendor regarding their product’s compatibility with your current company hardware. You may even be able to have them install the product on your behalf, which is always recommended as they know best and can get you up and running in no time.
Note: Most of the software vendors we’ve listed in this guide provide step-by-step video tutorials and help docs that assist customers in implementing the product. For more information, you can reach out to your assigned account manager or a customer support representative.
Team Collaboration Software FAQs
What is team collaboration?
Team collaboration is when team members work together to achieve shared business objectives. It involves equal participation, planning, strategic task assignment, and a lot of communication to ensure everyone is on the same page.
How to improve team collaboration?
Collaboration improves when teams are constantly aligned to a shared set of objectives and are provided with good tools to communicate and work more efficiently.
What is cross-team collaboration?
Cross-functional team collaboration is when employees from different departments (e.g. sales, marketing, IT, etc.) join forces to work on a common project.
What is team collaboration software?
Collaboration software acts as a shared virtual space where team members can instantly access information, communicate with another, share feedback, files, and much more. It is particularly useful for cross-functional and remote team collaboration where the members involved are scattered across different offices if not different countries.
What are the features of team collaboration software?
Team collaboration software commonly offers features for:
- Messaging and video conferencing
- File sharing and management
- Editable boards, cards, or lists
- Reminders and notifications
- User administration
- Analytics and reporting
What are the benefits of team collaboration software?
Collaboration software enables teams to communicate better and work more efficiently.
What should I look for in team collaboration software?
Besides ensuring a team collaboration solution covers the features you need, make sure it is also easy to use, scalable, can integrate with the rest of your tech stack, and has a mobile app for on-the-go access.
What is the best free team collaboration software?
The best free team collaboration software solutions are:
- Podio: Has a plan that is free of charge for up to five employees
- Flock: Has a plan that is free of charge for up to 20 users
- Miro: Has a plan that is free of charge without limitation on the number of users
- Slack: Has a free plan with limitations on message history access
- Wrike: Has a free version with limitations on the number of active tasks
- Trello: Has a free version with an unlimited number of users, cards, and up to 10 Trello boards
- Asana: Has a free version that’s great for teams getting started with team collaboration
- Zoho Projects: Has a plan that’s free of charge for up to 3 users
- Teamwork: Has a plan that’s free of charge for up to 5 users
- Jira: Has a free plan that’s limited to 10 users
- Monday.com: Has a free plan that’s limited to 2 users
- Redtooth: Has a free plan for up to 2 users, 2 workspaces, and 2GB of storage
- Airtable: Has a free plan with unlimited bases (1200 records and 2GB attachments limit per base)
Final Advice on Buying Team Collaboration Software
All companies, including yours, can benefit from the right team collaboration software to boost productivity, promote teamwork and improve output. Before choosing a product, make sure you:
- Align with your managers and key stakeholders regarding their needs and expectations before selecting a product.
- Carefully consider those needs, as well as your budget, and choose a product that meets them.
- Request a trial account to test the platform’s features first hand.
- Schedule demo sessions with different vendors in this space to get all of your questions answered.
Thanks for reading our guide on team collaboration software. If you’re interested in similar software solutions that boost team productivity and drive up engagement, check out our guides on Project Management Software, and Objectives and Key Results Software.
About Us
- Our goal at SSR is to help HR and recruiting teams to find and buy the right software for their needs.
- Our site is free to use as some vendors will pay us for web traffic.
- SSR lists all companies we feel are top vendors - not just those who pay us - in our comprehensive directories full of the advice needed to make the right purchase decision for your HR team.
