Excessive Zoom video calls, phone calls, and growing expectations for instant replies can prevent you from getting the quality output you strive for. However, asynchronous tools for communication may just be what you need to improve your workflow.
Let’s explore what asynchronous communication is and some of the best tools for you.
What Is Asynchronous Communication?
Asynchronous communication occurs when two or more people don’t need to be available simultaneously for a conversation to take place- it does not happen in real-time. This allows you to communicate in your own time without the pressure of instant responses, for example, email.
With so many workplace interruptions leading to context switching and decreased productivity, asynchronous communication is an effective strategy, particularly for hybrid and remote teams. It enables you to respond to messages in your own time, to enjoy a laser focus on your work.
Asynchronous communication is beneficial for you and your remote team because it provides a better work-life balance by allowing you to manage the always-on nature of remote jobs. Furthermore, asynchronous messages are generally more thoughtful and well-crafted, prioritizing quality over speed and knee-jerk replies.
Consequently, asynchronous tools facilitate communication and collaboration between individuals or teams at their convenience. These software solutions allow you to set your availability and define your working hours, giving you more control over your communications and time.
The 4 Best Asynchronous Tools for Effective Communication and Collaboration
Although you can use most communication tools asynchronously, that is, without expecting immediate responses, some boast features particularly designed for asynchronous communication. Here are our top picks:
1. Twist
You won’t be able to enter a state of flow and do your best work when you are constantly distracted by recurring notifications from your messaging apps and endless meetings. All these don’t just cause your productivity to take a nosedive, but they also lead you on the expressway to burnout—unless you use Twist.
Twist is an innovative messaging tool that aims to disrupt the current status quo of real-time communication in the workplace. This asynchronous communication tool allows you to prioritize productivity over responsiveness and constant presence on communication apps.
Twist enables you to have complete control over your notifications; you get them when, how, where, and for which specific messages you want. You can also use Twist to create your channels (groups) to have organized conversations by subjects, projects, or department.
With Twist, you won’t have to waste time going through random chatter to find relevant information, as it organizes your inbox into searchable threaded conversations that allow you to catch up at your convenience. There’s also a Saved tab that gives you quick access to threads you have saved.
What’s more, it integrates with other popular tools like Asana, GitLab, Google Drive, Slack, and more.
You can now overcome all-the-time communication and protect your most productive hours to focus on getting the job done by using Twist.
Download: Twist for Android | iOS | Windows | macOS | Linux (Free, premium version available)
2. Yac
One of the perks of remote work is that you now only have to commute from your bedroom to your home office, allowing you to save time. But it appears you have been spending all that time on endless Zoom meetings rather than working. By the end of these back-to-back meetings, you feel exhausted, unable to focus on anything else. You can write a different ending with Yac.
Yac is an audio-first communication platform that allows you to collaborate more efficiently on projects, share knowledge, and create new opportunities for productive discussions, without falling prey to the always-on trap.
Instead of having your daily scrums on Zoom, you can use Yac to record a quick voice message to keep your teams in sync. Do you want to explain something too complicated to type? Clarify your point by recording your voice and screen, and sending it directly to your colleagues. Would you like to quickly save an idea you don’t want to forget? Talking is faster than typing; send yourself a voice note and refer to it when needed. This tool also lets you record to a shareable link you can send to anyone via email or Slack.
Best of all, Yac is time zone independent; send your voice messages when you want and let your team reply when they can. With Yac, you can personalize your message with your voice, spend less time typing messages and attending meetings, and more time working.
Download: Yac for Android | iOS | Windows | macOS (Free, premium version available)
3. Spike
Email is still one of the most common ways of communication in the workplace. Unfortunately, it has a considerable downside; you get flooded with messages, and it takes forever to find what is relevant and important amid all that spam. Plus, with more feature-packed communication tools out there, you might not find it so compelling to use this old medium anymore.
Well, that’s until you try Spike, a collaborative email platform that can completely overhaul your old email workflow and boost your productivity.
Spike lets you synchronize all your email accounts in one place, introduces you to simpler chat-like threads, and organizes your inbox. That’s not all; it also has several features that make asynchronous communication much more effective.
For instance, you can schedule emails to send at your desired time, use its online notes to document updates, provide comments, and more, allowing you to avoid yet another Zoom meeting. You can also leverage its to-do lists to assign tasks and track progress.
Download: Spike for Android | iOS | Windows | macOS (Free, premium version available)
4. Tettra
If you use various communication and collaboration tools, all your information might get scattered across different channels. To overcome this issue, you need a tool that can centralize them all in one place.
Tettra is one such tool. It lets you create your company’s internal knowledge base where you can store all your communications, workflows, and organizational policies in a format that’s easy to access and edit. You can also use it to host a company’s internal blog and share valuable posts with your team.
What’s more, it allows integration with other popular tools you might be using like Slack, Microsoft Teams, and Google Docs.
Join the Asynchronous Communication Revolution for Better Productivity
If the goal of communication in the workplace is to help you be more productive, then it makes sense to reach a point where you do less of it and more work. However, this is not to say that you should completely eliminate synchronous communication. It still has its place; the goal is to find a healthy balance.
The asynchronous tools mentioned above can help you improve collaboration by providing team members with a wide range of features. Add asynchronous tools to your repertoire to boost overall productivity in your remote workplace.
