Blog

In this blog we will share the tools and systems we use to communicate in an effective way,knowing the most important thing is the good and constant communication not only as a team but with our customers.

We mainly use two systems for immediate communication: Gmail chat (Hangouts) as that is where we have our business email and Slack to separate conversations per projects.

Instead of using Whatsapp, a tool widely used in Latin America as a means of communication, with our team we use Slack since whatsapp we consider it to be a tool mainly for personal use. However, some of our customers and suppliers prefer to use it. For us more than the tool, the important thing is to make us all focused on generating clear and quality communication and if a system works well we commit to it. Regarding the project management system, we use a tool called Trello, (www.trello.com) we have found it has the right elements to keep track of clients, projects and team progress. While there are many tools on the market that serve this purpose, the important thing for us is that it fits our needs and the team adapts to it.

As for the meetings of the management team, we organize two-week cycles with Trello with short-term development and production goals, and these in turn are tied to larger goals of 3, 6 and 12 months. Because of the different time zone we find ourselves in, this task is a little more difficult, however we are aware of the importance of these meetings and once a week we connect for an hour on hangouts to review and make decisions about the general aspects of the company.

On the other hand, we hold project follow-up meetings once a week, most often on Mondays. The objective is to review the status of each of the projects that we are running or closing at that time, being essential to be able to identify bottlenecks, or to prevent possible complications in them in order to be able to act preventively and not corrective, which is when everything usually has the greatest impact.

On the other hand, and not least, the company’s Project Managers are characterized by self- discipline and responsibility to the team they are leading and to the end customer. This makes everyone plan and lead their projects with great freedom always keeping in mind the fulfillment of the delivery dates agreed with the client. The tools used are Trello, Slack and Hangouts, having several meetings a week with the developer team and minimum once a week with the client.

The conclusion we come to, is that it’s not only important to use the tools which has made us have effective communication, despite not sharing physical spaces and the same time zones, but this is complemented by commitment and self-discipline of each of the team members.