The world is now quite familiar with videoconferencing and unified communication and collaboration technology like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet and others thanks to COVID-19 and remote work.
Because we aren’t all in the office together, we’re getting a lot more use out of those platforms than we’ve ever had, and we’re meeting more frequently. That’s because simple tasks or swinging by someone’s desk to ask them a question is now a scheduled meeting in your calendar, says Darren Chait, co-founder and chief operating officer of connected meeting notes software company Hugo.
Hugo, similar to other note-taking apps like Evernote, Microsoft OneNote, Google Keep and others, provides users with a central, searchable place for everyone’s meeting notes, Chait says.
This solves the problem of fragmented note-taking among different parts of the organization.
“So, Hugo brings all that together with a central place for your meeting notes built on top of your calendar, the whole company has one place where all the meeting insights stored organized and then connected to the rest of your tech stack,” Chait says.
According to Chait, companies are having about 40% more meetings than they were pre-coronavirus. Now more than ever — especially during a pandemic — it’s critical that your company is able to keep track of what happens in the litany of virtual meetings you have every week.
“That’s not a good thing, to be honest,” Chait says. “And I’ll say that even though we’re in the meeting business, and that’s because … we were noticing people were simply taking process from the office and putting it to your calendar. Me swinging by a desk and asking, ‘What do you think about this?’ is now a calendar invite Zoom meeting. That’s not effective. It’s usually time consuming and it’s even worse when we’re all trying to work from home where you’ve got family, pets, health concerns and those sorts of things.”
My TechDecisions Podcast Episode 89: Hugo and the Importance of Asynchronous Collaboration
Work asynchronously with meeting notes software
Hugo differentiates from other note-taking apps because it’s built on top of a user’s calendar, Chait says.
“If you think about your calendar as a source of truth for your meetings, it represents everyone you’ve met, where you met then and who’s in the room,” Chait says. “Hugo uses that to organize your meeting notes based on the contacts and companies.”
With collaboration platforms now essential to businesses, many of these note-taking apps integrate with our favorite platforms. Hugo, for example, integrates with Zoom, Asana, Salesforce, Slack and several others.
Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Slack and other collaboration apps allow for real-time, instant communication provided both parties are online at the same time. However, that hasn’t always been the case during the pandemic-induced quarantine.
“When you introduce time zones and family demands and the ability to work flexibly in the hours that you best work, it’s a different story,” Chait says.
Hugo and note-taking software allow for asynchronous collaboration because it eliminates the need for employees to be on the same call at the same time.
“I can go and see meeting notes and what happened in the meeting earlier while I was helping the kids,” Chait says.
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