Building a Better Office:
Collaborate Intelligently

Many small businesses have figured it out. They need to be able to work at a distance with telecommuters, traveling employees and even clients and business partners.

By turning to the Internet to connect these teams, companies can increase remote workers' productivity, reduce costs and improve communications.

Which collaboration tools should your company use to boost its remote work practices? Here are the most important.

Shared calendar systems
Some teams tend to underestimate the value of a shared calendar system when working at a distance. By bringing schedules online, workers can set up meetings by going to their virtual workrooms and reviewing attendees' availability. Without this function, they would have to contact all meeting members directly and then juggle schedules until they locate a free spot. This not only wastes valuable work time but can also rack up unnecessary phone charges.

Shared contact databases
Just as valuable as a shared resource is a contact database. By maintaining one common list of addresses, phone numbers and other contact data online, you ensure that team members always have easy access to the latest contact information. No searching for numbers in stacks of notes or making long distance calls to other team members when trying to track down contact details. A shared database also ensures that your company maintains access to important phone numbers when an employee quits or retires. Without it, when an employee leaves, so might his contact lists.

Centralized document storage
Editing and swapping documents directly through an online workroom is more efficient than remote access or e-mail networks because workers can view and retrieve documents without dialing into a server or downloading e-mail. Setting up these rooms is easy with an intranet/extranet tool such as bCentral's SharePoint Team Services, which allows team members to establish rooms with the click of a mouse.

Using Microsoft Office XP in conjunction with SharePoint streamlines document sharing even further, as workers using common applications like Word and Excel can save documents directly to SharePoint rooms through the "Save As" feature of their software.

Announcement boards
You can automate the process of informing remote teams about news by posting announcements directly to shared virtual workspaces. This reduces the administrative hassle of creating, addressing and sending print or e-mail announcements. You can take this communication a step further by setting up an announcement box at the top of your team's shared Web site.

Virtual conferencing
Real-time interaction with employees can be handled via conferencing software. Use this tool instead of face-to-face meetings or phone calls to reduce costs and maximize productive time.

Instant messaging
Instant messaging allows team members to chat online instead of using the phone. It's especially helpful for employees that need to communicate consistently but who don't want to be trapped on the phone for long periods of time.