15 Best Online Collaboration Tools To Boost Productivity For 2022
Want to see all your teams happy, right? You would have probably started planning for 2018. New projects. New strategies. New goals. Picking the right tool. How well are you collaborating with your team? With the rise of Internet over the decades and as the teams are growing, it is becoming vital for businesses to implement the right tools and strategies to accomplish the set of goals. And a secret for the success in business in strategy is: Collaboration. Collaboration helps team to grow together from different location, brainstorming ideas and making decisions quicker. The workplaces want best online collaboration tools for all of their needs, and there are plenty of tools out there for your teams to successfully collaborate.
Finding the right collaboration tools
Before we get into the essence of what are the various tools for various needs and what each tool has to offer, firstly we need to have a knowledge of finding the right tools for your team. As there are so many options right there in the market, it can be difficult to decide as to which to pick to fill your plate with the best collaboration tools. The following list of tools commonly used and you can easily find them for all your collaboration needs. Have a look at them for no confusion in picking a tool for your team.
Table of content:
- Project management tool
- Communication tools
- Design tools
- Documentation tools
- Collaborative coding tool
- Organization tools
- File sharing tools
- CRM Tools
Project management tool
For team collaboration, it is important to have a project management system that will keep your projects on track. Here is a top project management tool:
1. ProofHub
If you are looking for a tool to plan and organize projects within a real-time workspace, then ProofHub is the tool. It is a cloud hosted project management tool that enable collaboration with everyone using it. For growing teams, it is an exceptional tool for project management, scheduling, communication and many more. With ProofHub, you get plenty of options to stay more productive at work.
Key features of ProofHub:
- Task management
- Milestones
- File Sharing
- Proofing Tool
- Workflow management
- Discussions
- Gantt chart
- Time tracking
2. GanttPRO
This is another reliable project management tool based on a Gantt chart. In GanttPRO, users can easily create tasks in seconds, assign them, connect tasks with dependencies, and set milestones. Also, it is convenient to work with dates and deadlines and track the progress. Once you create a task, you get a clear visualization of everything you put into your chart.
This online software also allows collaborating with teams, managing resources, and working with personal calendars.
Key features of GanttPRO:
- Tasks management
- Progress tracking
- Team collaboration
- Resource management
- Ready-made Gantt chart templates
- History of changes
3. Instagantt
Instagantt is the go-to option for many project managers looking for easy-to-use task management and team collaboration platform that simply works. In Instagantt, users can create professional-quality Gantt charts and start managing projects with just a few clicks. Users can also choose from a variety of ready-to-use templates that can be edited very easily by plugging in tasks and scheduling them.
This online Gantt chart creator is an ally to project managers who struggle with being able to track team progress and to stay on top of deadlines because Instagantt specializes in illustrating timelines and resource progression. For instance, they recently revealed their Overview feature, where users can quickly visualize their overall progress within a project: their tasks assigned, workload, and currently spent and estimated hours. This feature also enables project managers to compare their current progress against the progress that was initially estimated when the project was first scheduled, and this information can be extremely valuable when analyzing team and resource performance.
Their team collaboration options are also a plus, especially with remote work on the rise. Team members can easily update their progress, assign tasks to each other, leave comments, add files and tags, and mention other team members, thus truly making it really simple to communicate while getting work done.
Key features of Instagantt:
- Drag-and-drop functionality for task creation
- Automatic project scheduling
- Workload management
- Establishing deadlines and priorities
- Unlimited workbooks and projects
- Task dependencies, milestones, and progress checkpoints
- Project budget management
- Overview and Board View (Kanban style)
- Templates
- Shareable options for clients and stakeholders
- Team communication and collaboration
- Inbox for comments and notifications
- Integration and two-way synchronization with Asana
- Mobile version
Communication tools
Communication is the core of collaboration as your teams need a way to keep in touch with each other, know what’s going on in the project, what the team members are working on and also to socialize a bit. These amazing communication tools will help you in all situations:
4. Skype
The old faithful communication tool that has always been around the corner — Skype. It has tons of reliable features to help you stay connected with everyone in your team and discuss things online.
Key features of Skype:
- Instant messaging
- Voice and video calls
- Conference calls
- Screen sharing
5. HipChat
HipChat is another famous communication tool, there is not much difference in Skype and HipChat as they both offer stable and secure features.
Key features of HipChat:
- Share files
- Discuss tasks
- Video calling
- Screen sharing
Design tools
As the companies have started working remotely. It can be difficult for them to have the right tools to achieve great things. Design collaboration tools are empowering remote teams today and supercharge the creative process to collaborate in real-time. Here are some best design tools for teams:
6. Canva
Canva is a design tool for businesses to easily create beautiful designs and get creative on your project. Designers can bring dynamic changes to their website and create amazing and professional quality graphic designs. It offers users templates and designs that can be edited and configured by everyone to introduce changes. Also, users can also comment on the project that brings collaboration and easy communication.
Key features of Canva:
- Add text to photos
- 8,000 templates
- Image croppers
- Photo frames
- Image transparency tool
- Photo enhancer
7. Adobe XD
Adobe XD is a user experience design software with real-time collaboration. It has a creative cloud to let others edit on design in real time. It is an all in UX/UI solution for designing websites, mobile apps and more.
Key features of Adobe XD:
- Eliminates tedious tasks with repeat grid
- Fast, versatile artboards
- Control and customize your experience
- Faster feedback
CRM Tool
8. Salesmate
Salesmate is a truly intelligent sales CRM helps sales reps be more productive, increases their sales and engage deeply with their customers. Salesmate helps businesses close more deals faster. With Salesmate, it got easier for businesses to manage their pipeline, save time at all stages of the sales cycle and win new customers without breaking their back on busywork.
Key features:
- Easy to use sales pipeline
- Smart workflows for sales automation
- Built-in email client and email tracking
- Built in phone system for calling and SMS
- Integrations with 1000+ apps including G-suite (Google Apps)
Salesmate CRM is now coming up with the built-in calling and bulk SMS features. Which means no more integrations, or add-on hardware cost. Just make and receive more sales calls from your CRM system. You can also make use of your smartphone for this feature. Try now!!
Documentation tools
Documentation tools are good choices for collaborating on documents if they need to be online. There are some great and easy to use document collaboration tools for your teams to work together. Here are a few suggestions to explore:
9. Google Docs
Google documents are perhaps the most famous of the documentation tools. It allows teams to collaborate on documents in real time and access the shared documents at any time.
Key features of Google Docs:
- Take notes
- Share files
- Multiple people can edit the same file at same time
- Leave comments
- Revision history to see changes made
10. Office online
Office online is designed to help meet the need of your organization for security and reliability. It gives the core of office: Excel, powerpoint, word, and OneNote. It gives the ability to get things done from virtually anywhere.
Key features of office online:
- Real-time co-authoring
- Editing and converting PDF made easy
- Resume reading your word documents
- Reply in-line to email
- Work anywhere from any device
For collaborative coding
To make your life easier, collaborative coding tools help people collaborate in real-time to work in the ongoing code to have more accurate results. Let’s have a look at some of them:
11. GitHub
GitHub is the best tool to make sure everything is kept in order. Many programmers are collaborating on computer code and can work on same projects at once. Every person gets a working copy of the code on their computer and if a change made breaks of the things, it can be easily rolled back.
Key features of Github:
- Seamless code review
- Integrations
- Team management
- Social Coding
- Documentation
- Code hosting
Organization tools
The use organization tools is becoming a tradition nowadays for employees to have more focus on their work and have a less hectic and chaotic life. You can easily organize your workload with the right organizational tools to organize your valuable time. Let’s explore them:
12. Evernote
Evernote is a better-known tool for organizing information. It syncs across all devices. Make your life easy by capturing ideas and creating notes in Evernote. There are many softwares like evernote available in the market as well.
Key features of Evernote:
- Organizing research and interview notes
- Drafting blog posts and ebooks
- Saving articles to read later
- PDF annotation
- Audio recording feature to note down your ideas
- Save texts, links, and images
13. G Suite
G Suite is a productivity and organizational collaboration tool for you to do your best work with G Suite. In one package together let your team work seamlessly from their computer, phone or tablet.
Key features of G Suite:
- Connect with your colleagues wherever you are
- Access to files and find what you need instantly
- Manage data securely and easily
- Store and share files in cloud
File sharing tool
File sharing tools helps project managers to collaborate on documents, meet all the file sharing needs by accessing files from any devices and communicate changes within the team. These tools make it easy to share files across individuals, co-workers, outside vendors and anywhere. Don’t miss on these tools:
14. Google Drive
Google Drive is a safe place for all your files and anyone can reach them easily. You can easily invite others to view, edit or leave comments on any of your files. Files like your videos, photos, and documents can be backed up safely so you do not lose them.
Key features of Google Drive:
- Store any files
- See your stuff anywhere
- Share files and folders
- Gmail attachments
15. Dropbox
Dropbox is a collaborative file sharing tool that is best for small teams and individuals and integrates well with Google Docs. It is a tool that employees can trust for secure file sharing and storage solution.
Key features of Dropbox:
- Sharing and collaboration
- Dedicated live support
- Advanced security features
These online collaboration tools will manage any kind of team easily and streamline your processes. Once you find the right collaboration tool for your business, it can work wonders for the teams and productivity of your team. Online collaboration tools do not contain all the features. It’s important to identify the specific needs of your team and make sure to get your team started in the right direction in 2018.
