How can you successfully work together remotely? We ask Paul Tilanus, Senior Project Manager at TNO, who talks about COBACORE, one of the many international projects he’s managed. Paul explains why he added Yabbu to his toolset.
“COBACORE was a European research project which 9 partners in 6 different countries participated in. With such international projects you’re limited in how often you can meet. The physical distance thus needs to be bridged digitally. Normally, the agendas and minutes of the meetings are distributed via e-mail, and documents are shared via SharePoint. A common problem is that not all participants can be present during the video conferences. That delays the process and decreases the support capacity in making decisions and assigning tasks. That’s why we used Yabbu from the start for the bi-weekly meeting with the project management, in combination with GoToMeeting for the video conferences.”
How did the introduction go?
“Yabbu is easy to use. But we did have to overcome some resistance. People nowadays often have the feeling that they have to use so many different applications already. That’s why it’s important to carefully introduce Yabbu. That requires preparation. You need to be able to explain to people what the goal is, what it will yield, and how to use Yabbu properly. As concrete as possible, preferably in combination with a small workshop, so that people get to experience how it works right away.”
What did it bring you?
- We are able to make decisions faster. Absent participants share their vision or standpoint ahead of the meeting. That allows for faster decision-making.
- The engagement in advance raises the level of participation, and alongside it the support capacity for made decisions and established task assignments.
- The meetings become very efficient. We often use only part of the allocated time, which the participants greatly appreciate. Experience in similar projects has shown that the allocated time often isn’t even enough to cover half of the agenda.
We are also curious to hear about your experiences. Or perhaps you have questions?
Send an e-mail to info@yabbu.com or call us on +31 (0)84 00 32 324.
