Cake Development Corporation

Felix liked to Get Things Done™. And through experience and what became an interactive idea and experience sharing productivity session, he explained mechanisms and methods that he has used to achieve the best results for projects in the shortest time possible.

Communication. While this means your team should be in contact, and that those contact points should be quality communication, it doesn't mean that instant communication is a requirement. Communication mechanisms would ideally be: decentralised and work in an offline capacity (at least for partial functionality).

Return on investment is an interesting statistic to consider when responding to or creating a new item of communication. Provide a concise message. Enough to ensure the intention of the communication is clear, and ambiguity is reduced if not eliminated. Email is a great tool, especially for the following: Timezone differences, announcements, spawning debates that require discussion, emergency notifications / reports, mailing lists, shared email accounts and automated reporting / information.

Using Email over an instant messaging mechanism for spawning debates allows contributors to formulate a constructed response. This can assist the better understanding of some ones input to the discussions, as instant messaging can be difficult for items that require discussion.

Instant messaging has good and bad traits:

1. Good Stuff
   1. Instant
   2. Group Chats / conference calls
   3. Varying methods of communication
   4. Various formats (text, voice, video)
2. Bad Stuff
   1. Distracting (interrupts workflow)
   2. History tracking / compatibility
   3. Citations / logs