Phil Simon's Blog, page 30

Reimagining Collaboration Book Trailer

I’ve been geeking out with wave.video over the past few months. Among my creations is the following book trailer for Reimagining Collaboration.

Enjoy.

You can preorder the paperback version of the book on Amazon now. It will be live on other sites shortly. 

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Publication of Reimagining Collaboration

[image error]I’m pleased to announce the publication of my eleventh book, Reimagining Collaboration: Slack, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and the Post-COVID World of Work. Cue This Is Spinal Tap reference.

The Book in a Nutshell

Episode 8: Collaboration and Stress With Dr. Mary Donohue

Firebrand and force of nature Dr. Mary Donohue of The Digital Wellness Center joins me to talk about the intersection of stress, collaboration, and technology. We also discuss her new book Message Received: 7 Steps to Break Down Communication Barriers at Work.1 Oh, and bubble baths and Dianna Ross—I’m not kidding—come up during our lively chat.

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Episode 7: Collaboration, AI, and Higher Ed With Dr. Terri Griffith

The insanely smart Dr. Terri Griffith joins me for a far-reaching conversation about higher education, privacy, data residency, and collaboration. (I try to keep up with her.) We talk about the future of academia and why it’s silly to view collaboration tools in isolation.

Transcription from otter.ai.

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How Many Slack Channels Do You Need?

​One of Slack’s most useful features is its flexibility. Watch below for my thoughts on creating channels.

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Special Edition: Salesforce Is Acquiring Slack

In this special edition, I offer my thoughts on Salesforce’s $28 billion acquisition of Slack.

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Thoughts on Salesforce’s Acquisition of Slack

It’s a done deal: Salesforce has agreed to acquire Slack in a deal worth roughly $28 billion.

Here are my immediate thoughts.

JUST IN: Salesforce agrees to buy Slack for $27.7 billion in cash and stock in one of the biggest technology deals of the year https://t.co/4yTPQd5Lt3 pic.twitter.com/zxc5Vd0n18

— Bloomberg Quicktake (@Quicktake) December 1, 2020

The Deal Isn’t All That Surprising

In Slack For Dummies, I made a series of predictions about the future of Slack—the vast majority of which have come true. I’ll focus here on four:

Better analytics
New and powerful third-party apps
More no- and low-code ways to use Slack with other tools
More artificial intelligence and machine learning.

To be fair, most of these prognostications weren’t terribly outlandish. For example, just about every software vendor worth its salt is embracing artificial intelligence and machine learning. Slack is no exception here. (What can I say? I’ve learned a thing or six about enterprise technology in my years.)

In the book, I also floated the possibility that another tech company would acquire Slack. I thought that Apple would be a natural fit, especially since Tim Cook’s company is increasingly generating its revenue from services, not hardware. What’s more, both companies share a common design aesthetic. 

From Chapter 14 of Slack For Dummies:

Competing With Microsoft

Ask Netscape’s former execs if competing with Microsoft is easy.

To my knowledge, Slack has not recently released new numbers on its daily active users. The word plateaued comes to mind. Its silence has been deafening. I’d imagine that growth has been underwhelming, especially given the explosion of remote work. Contrast that silence with Microsoft announcing that Teams now sports 115 million users.

Teams isn’t as good as Slack, but it’s tough to compete with free products.

Another data point: In July, Slack filed a formal complaint with the European Union over Microsoft’s bundling of Teams with Office 365. Brass tacks: Teams isn’t as good as Slack, but it’s tough to compete with free products, especially during challenging economic times.

What Will Change for Slack Customers and Users?

In the short term, not a whole lot—and history backs me up here. (See book excerpt above.)

Case in point: A little over a year ago, Salesforce gobbled up dataviz vendor Tableau for a shade under $16 billion. It’s not as if Tableau data visualizations stopped working for Microsoft Dynamics CRM. Marc Benioff is far too smart to start mandating wholesale changes in Slack’s user interface and core functionality.

Simon Says: Slack isn’t dying. It’s just finding a new home.

In the upcoming months, I suspect that Slack will more tightly integrate with Salesforce. If you bought Slack’s stock a while back (as I did), you’re happy with your return.

Feedback

What say you?

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Episode 6: The CEO’s Perspective With Chris Byers of Formstack

In this episode, Formstack CEO Chris Byers joins me to talk about the future of work, whiteboards, automation, the need for in-person meetings, and resistance to new technologies.

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Episode 5: Different Hats With Dorie Clark

Dorie Clark joins me on the pod to talk about collaboration and the different hats she wears. We discuss how, when it comes to collaboration, one size never fits all. We also delve into the unspoken norms and underlying power dynamics when people collaborate.

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Sample Pages From Reimagining Collaboration

As I write these words, the layout for Reimagining Collaboration is taking place. Here are a few sample pages from book number eleven.

Boom.

A few design elements may change, but this is the gist of it. We’re looking at roughly 228 pages, give or take. 

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