Empty Office

Digitally-positive UK workforce let down by workplace tech

by with No Comment Social Business

Fujitsu today published a study revealing a lack of digital services being provided by UK employers to their work force.

In the Fujitsu report, ‘Digital Inside Out‘, 73% of employees stated that digital is vital to the future success of their organisation, despite only 45% of employees feeling they are provided with access to the technology services and applications they need to do their job sufficiently.

A 29% of the working population admitted that their ability to do their job is being hindered due to poor digital services.

Michael Keegan, CEO at Fujitsu UK & Ireland, said: “Today’s employees are well informed and understand the benefits digital can bring to them in the workplace.”

The benefits digital brings to an organisation, and to the people working within it, were made clear by the employees surveyed.

Main advantages pointed by the respondents included the ability to work remotely (57%), real time access to information (50%) and time-saving (46%).

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Slack usage chart

Slack hits half a million daily users in its first year

by with No Comment SlackSocial Business

Slack turns one year old today. In its short but fascinating history, the startup has managed the remarkable feat of actually getting people excited about enterprise communication software. The company has more than 500,000 daily active users, and it’s adding tens of thousands more every each week.

“That’s our primary metric,” founder and CEO Stewart Butterfield tells Quartz. “If you’re not using Slack every single day, you’re not really using it.”

The chart above shows the peak number of daily active users every week in the last year. Minus the big drop off around the holidays, the company has been quickly gaining steam since August—around the time Wired published a big profile. Slack relies primarily on word-of-mouth marketing, helping keep costs low.

Impressive stats, and I really like the metric that they have chosen to represent their growth.  Not ‘registered users’ or ‘organisation domains represented’ but real users that are actually using the platform as it is intended to be used. ((And given Slack is not traditional enterprise software, they’re not indicating licences bundled with renewals for other products either))

I access Slack from my Mac and multiple mobile devices every single day, using it for the team that runs Social Connections, plus multiple other communities.  I have to say, no other tool I’ve used in the past year has had such a dramatic impact on my own personal productivity.  As I mentioned in my IBMConnectED post, I’m surprised that IBM hasn’t tried to counter the rise of Slack in any direct way.

However, other enterprise vendors have taken this on, and whilst I can see Slack continuing its impressive rise, it will be interesting to see how that chart continues over the next 6-12 months.

Learning from competition

by with 2 Comments Misc

Marco Arment, creator of Instapaper, writes on the correct way to deal with competition:

Reacting well to competition requires critical analysis of your own product and its shortcomings, and a complete, open-minded understanding of why people might choose your competitors.

They’re not fanboys. They’re not brainwashed by “marketing”. Your competitors’ customers aren’t passing on your product because they’re stupid or irrational.

They’re choosing your competitors for good reasons, and denying the existence of such good reasons will only ensure that your product never overcomes them.

CompetitionHe goes on to discuss why Microsoft’s recent reaction to the threat of iOS is more constructive than Google’s.

It’s a fascinating reflection, and bears great relevance to the way in which we see some Collaboration and Social Business vendors react.

Customers are not irrational, users are not stupid. If you want them to choose to buy your solution, or even more importantly, to desire to use it, you had better go focus your attention and resources on making yours significantly better than the opposition, not on dissing the opposition or those that buy or use their products!