'Tools that changed the world (of work)' is a social series run by Qatalog, where we explore how different historical innovations revolutionized the way we work. Nowadays we often focus on technological advancements, but simple things like stone tools, written&nbsp;language and pieces of paper once&nbsp;heralded even more important changes. At Qatalog, we are constantly inspired to innovate; and inspiration can come from&nbsp;the most obscure parts of history. Keep up with the series on our <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/qatalog/mycompany/?viewAsMember=true" rel="follow">LinkedIn</a>, <a href="https://www.instagram.com/qataloghq/" rel="follow">Instagram</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/qatalog" rel="follow">Twitter</a>.
<h2>The ChopperNHB2013-02228</h2>
<img src="https://cdn.buttercms.com/x1nrkjT1KESKaXJ8VBgQ" alt="undefined" width="665" height="449" />
It&rsquo;s estimated that there are around <a href="https://www.becomingminimalist.com/clutter-stats/">300,000 objects in the average American home</a>. From coffee machines to laptops to cars to toothbrushes; we rely on hundreds of objects to simply get us through the day.&nbsp;
But what if we told you there was a time when humans relied on one very simple object to do lots of things?
Well, meet the snappily named ChopperNHB2013-02228.&nbsp;
The Chopper (for short) was an upgrade from your average rock &mdash; defined by its irregular shape, which was created through the removal of stone flakes from one side. This tool was a must-have 2.5 million years ago when it came to woodworking, spear-sharpening or meat-processing. Later on, the design was advanced in order to create the more modern hand ax.
But what does all this have to do with Qatalog? We&rsquo;re glad you asked. The chopper changed the way we work &mdash; and Qatalog plans to do the same.
Join us over the next few months as we uncover more tools that revolutionized the way we work (in chronological-ish order). Just head to our socials to stay up to speed.
&nbsp;

Follow our new social series, where we explore how different historical innovations revolutionised the way we work.

Tools that changed the world (of work) | Qatalog

Before the invention of the Internet or the first Apple computer, the simplest tools created the biggest waves in the world of work.

Tools that changed the world (of work)

Imagine joining a company, where you have no idea who is on what team, who is reporting to who and have no general oversight of how the organization is made up. This might make your <a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/create-a-seamless-onboarding-experience/" rel="follow">onboarding process</a> a little disorientating, not to mention time-consuming for your hiring manager, right?
Or imagine that you need to talk to someone in another team, but there is no way for you to understand who is on that team or what projects they currently work on. You will probably end up asking around and pinging at least 2 or 3 people to find out (which let&rsquo;s be honest, nobody wants to do).
Or imagine that you need to go into a cross-functional meeting and there's no way for you to look up the people who are going to be in the room, or their job functions, to get some context beforehand.&nbsp;
All of these examples have been a problem for years, but the <a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/technology-has-failed/" rel="follow">shift to remote work has exaggerated them</a>, as you can no longer walk around a physical office and introduce yourself.&nbsp;
That&rsquo;s where organization charts come in.
<h2>What is an Organization Chart?</h2>
In their most basic form, organizational charts, organizational structures, business charts, organigrams, or just <a href="https://qatalog.com/org-charts/" rel="follow">Org Charts</a> as we dotingly call them here at Qatalog, are a diagram format representation of the hierarchy of an organization.&nbsp;
The usual organizational chart is built with the purpose of showing the relationship between individuals, or how one team is tied to another. The viewer can get a sense of how much responsibility sits on each name by looking at the number of connections underneath.&nbsp;
For the analytically-minded, there are subtle hints to how a company functions; where decisions are made, management approaches, and areas where the most (or least) human resources are invested.&nbsp;
<h2>The hierarchy of Organizational Chart creators</h2>
If we could make a hierarchical chart of Org Charts, at the bottom you&rsquo;d find the static, Microsoft Word, or Powerpoint drawn images. This jumble of lines and shapes is made for single use, left to be forgotten in dark corners of hard drives.&nbsp;
One step above, live the customizable org chart creators. They can be aesthetically enhanced through templates, colors, and graphics and usually allow for drag and drop positioning &mdash; a company directory playground. However, many of them come at a steep price and require tedious manual work to edit, which means they are rarely up to date or reflect the true realities of a company. Most org chart software will pull up a visual representation of your directory at the exact time of its creation. But that&rsquo;s all they will do.&nbsp;
Our Product Managers had a better idea. Using our <a href="https://qatalog.com/work-hub/" rel="follow">Work Hub</a> as the foundation, we built a living, breathing Org Chart that updates in real-time.&nbsp;
It eliminates all the tedious work required and offers much more than the usual who's who. They&rsquo;re also a what, where, and why.
<h2>Why use a live Org Chart?&nbsp;</h2>
<h3>Better productivity levels</h3>
Org Charts put meaningful information about individuals behind the job titles &mdash; where people live, the time zones they are in, their skills, hobbies, and interests. But most importantly profiles are tied to the work that they are doing &mdash; the <a href="https://qatalog.com/projects/" rel="follow">Projects</a> they are leading or contributing to, and the <a href="https://qatalog.com/goals/" rel="follow">Goals</a> they are driving towards. Updates to profiles happen naturally, as the work itself happens.&nbsp;
<img src="https://cdn.buttercms.com/q4VjJZqWTfCLhwSBxtKp" alt="undefined" width="675" height="456" />
This is key for collaboration and accountability, as 62% of workers <a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/barriers-to-collaboration/" rel="follow">find it hard to figure out what others are working on</a>. With Qatalog, Org Charts provide visibility into the work of others and insight into how shared Projects are progressing, while Threads and Posts provide a visible place for the discussions that add context and drive them forward.&nbsp;
<h3>Promote operational efficiency</h3>
Traditional organizational charts show lines of authority, but not how that authority plays out. Qatalog Org Charts double-up as accountability charts when using the &ldquo;teams&rdquo; view.&nbsp;
Teams are functional groups that have distinct responsibilities and goals. Team Goals can be set and tracked from within Qatalog and key results assigned to contributors. With Qatalog you can also &ldquo;follow&rdquo; specific people, so their actions appear in your personalized, real-time feed.&nbsp;
The Team view can also house key resources and documents such as a team charter, annual roadmaps, and important policies or guidelines, so that <a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/limited-visibility-at-work/" rel="follow">everyone has visibility on what their work is driving towards</a> and how to get there.&nbsp;
<h3>Help employees develop</h3>
For new joiners, especially those working in a remote or asynchronous environment, getting a dynamic view of the company and all the parts that put it together is transformative. We can&rsquo;t put it any better than one of our recent additions to the team:&nbsp;
&ldquo;What Qatalog was able to do for me, was to provide me with the information and context I needed to quickly understand what someone&rsquo;s name and role were, what team they are on, and to whom they report. But Qatalog also gave me insight into the projects they are involved in and work they&rsquo;ve done previously, which actually put meaning into their job title.&rdquo;&nbsp;
<h3>Provide a sense of belonging&nbsp;</h3>
Colleagues can also give and receive instant feedback via the Kudos button embedded into their profiles. These positive interactions communicate the value we see in contributions and are a great way to provide camaraderie.&nbsp;
For remote and hybrid workers, <a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/sense-of-belonging-at-work/" rel="follow">a shared Work Hub is where team unity and a sense of belonging are forged</a>.&nbsp;
<h3>You can create it almost instantly</h3>
That&rsquo;s the best part &mdash; Qatalog creates one for you. And you can download a PDF of it.
There&rsquo;s no need to spend hours tirelessly creating a doc to illustrate your company&rsquo;s hierarchy and each person&rsquo;s title.
Qatalog allows users full visibility across your entire organization, enabling them to easily see someone&rsquo;s title, what team they&rsquo;re in and what they&rsquo;re working on. What once would have been a complex process across many tools, is now easier than ever in one place.
Want to learn how Qatalog can make Org Charts simpler for your business? <a href="https://qatalog.com/contact/sales/" rel="follow">Get in touch here.</a>&nbsp;

With live org charts there’s no need to spend hours tirelessly creating a doc to illustrate your company’s hierarchy and each person’s title. Read more.

Transform a traditional org chart into a strategic tool | Qatalog

Org Charts are more than just a nice-to-have. They could be the key to enhancing efficiency within your company.

Transform a traditional organizational chart into a strategic business tool

Already have projects started somewhere else? Don't fret, we've introduced migration from Asana to help you pick up right where you left off. Keep working on your existing Projects and easily add Goals, Tasks, Workflows and more to get you and your team closer to your achievements. Plus, we&rsquo;ve also launched external Project sharing so even stakeholders outside your team can collaborate with you.
Read on to discover more exciting updates, or<a href="https://qatalog.chilipiper.com/book/round-robin-queue"> book a call</a> with our friendly team to learn more.
What&rsquo;s new?
<img src="https://cdn.buttercms.com/KHNUeA9zRZGpB3uisyRI" alt="0822 newsletter whats new" width="701" height="355" />
<ol>
<li>Migrate Projects from Asana: Your Asana Projects (including description, due-date, status, people and tasks) can be imported into Qatalog and found in the <a href="https://qatalog.qatalog.com/projects/" rel="follow">Projects</a> section.</li>
<li>External Project sharing: Invite external collaborators to securely manage projects within one hub.</li>
<li>Bamboo HR integration: Sync your Bamboo HR directory with Qatalog &ndash; automatic population. Everyone will come in as an inactive user (and won&rsquo;t get an invite until you activate them as a user).</li>
<li>Activity feed: See activity feed across your tools, such as Trello, included within activity feeds across your work, grouping events.</li>
<li>Improved Search: Faster filters that work across different apps showing you richer search content, whether you&rsquo;re searching on Dashboard or using quick search. We&rsquo;ve also added Groupings so it&rsquo;s easier to find what you need.</li>
<li>More filtering on Directory: You can now filter by location, manager, and custom attributes for enterprise customers (sync from Active Directory).</li>
<li>Template manager: You can create a page or post template.</li>
</ol>
What&rsquo;s Coming?
<img src="https://cdn.buttercms.com/vbsD7SwpTuWazuPWmb0Z" alt="0822 newsletter whats next" width="701" height="366" />
Here&rsquo;s a sneak peek of new updates coming soon!
<ol>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Team Digests: Automated summary of what&rsquo;s happened in Teams in a Post or Slack message. It will go out to teammates and collaborators on a bi-weekly basis.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Homepage keeps getting better: You will have a &ldquo;for you&rdquo; section and actions you can take to catch up on the day e.g. approvals, follow-ups.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Keep better track of Goals: Automatically track goals in Salesforce, better OKR tracking and updates</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">Import from Notion: You will be able to bulk import pages from Notion.</li>
</ol>
Hints and Tips
<img src="https://cdn.buttercms.com/CFH6aiASPyIO3DXzq0hQ" alt="0822 product-newsletter &mdash;&nbsp;In-email-asset" width="701" height="366" />
<ul>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">🔍 Leo: Press &ldquo;CMD (or CTRL) + K&rdquo; on your keyboard to quickly search for a file, folder, or repo, across your connected tools.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">🪟 Varun: In Projects, Workflows or Goals, you can set up filters you often use and save that view for future use.</li>
<li style="font-weight: 400;" aria-level="1">🔗 Kaitlin: Chaining actions in Workflows, for example a link (e.g. Jira or Shortcut ticket) that gets produced after a step to create an object in an integration can be really helpful for tracking issues and reporting.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Keep up to date on everything Qatalog</h3>
If you want more updates on all things Qatalog, you can subscribe to our <a href="https://qatalog.com/newsletter/" rel="follow">monthly newsletter</a> and keep up with our blog.

Here’s what we’ve launched or updated in Qatalog in the past month.

What’s new on Qatalog: August 2022

Qatalog recently launched a mini-documentary series examining the staggering pace of change in the workplace and sets out to find better ways of working along the way.&nbsp;
The second episode focuses on the strategic role that operations teams play in bringing the pieces of increasingly complex workplaces together. Through our conversations with operations leaders we find out what operations is, why the role has become so important, what challenges they face in our new digital and distributed workplaces, as well as what tips they have for building a career in operations.&nbsp;
Visit <a href="https://language.work/documentary/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=qatalog&amp;utm_campaign=LW-documentary&amp;utm_content=Operations-nation-blog" rel="follow">language.work</a> for the full episode, or read below for a quick summary of what we learned.
<h2>Operations Nation</h2>
Don&rsquo;t you love it when the organization you&rsquo;re at works like a well-oiled machine? When things get done, when colleagues aren&rsquo;t bumping into blockers, but have the right set of tools that enable smooth teamwork and collaboration at their fingertips. There are normally a few people working behind the scenes to make that happen &ndash;&ndash; the ops team. They are the unsung heroes who enable individuals and teams to do the work they have set out to do and allow organizations to unlock their collective potential.&nbsp;
<h2>Operations in the modern workplace&nbsp;</h2>
So what is ops, and what do they do?
It&rsquo;s much more than just keeping the lights on. Ben Gateley, CEO and Co-Founder of CharlieHR defines operations as &ldquo;the foundation of any organization &ndash;&ndash; it&rsquo;s the processes, the ways of working, the rhythm, the routines, and the policies that govern how a company does what it does.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Gerisha Nadaraju, Head of BizOps at Dojo, refers to ops as enablers, &ldquo;that&rsquo;s actually what I do, enabling others to do their jobs better,&rdquo; she explains.
But the role can vary massively, depending on the nature of the organization.&nbsp;
For Astrid Verstraete, Co-Founder of Operations Nation, a content hub for current and aspiring operations leaders, this role is hard to define, &ldquo;it is so different according to the company&hellip;however ultimately it comes down to creating processes, helping people navigate them and removing friction.&rdquo;
So how do they remove frictions and challenges your org might be facing?&nbsp;&nbsp;
Qatalog&rsquo;s Chief of Staff, Marta Kutt, sees a lack of transparency as the leading culprit for workplace frustration. Breaking down silos between people and teams has become a key part of her role, &ldquo;operations teams can find tools to help us work better&hellip;if you don&rsquo;t have silos if you know where you can find information people are much happier and can work as a team much better&rdquo;.&nbsp;
<h2>Empowering organizations to scale&nbsp;</h2>
So, we know that operations has a critical role to play in empowering teams. However, what works for a team of 50 will need to be reconfigured to work for a team of 5000. Having long-term vision within operations will allow your company to consistently reach the next level. Operations are the ones who do the heavy lifting and problem-solving related to key business challenges when it comes to scaling.
According to Mike Strange, Director of Operations at Just Eat for Business, ops always need to keep an eye on the future with everything they do in the present. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s what you need to start changing tomorrow, next week, or next month to enable the foundation for 10x growth in a few year's time&rdquo;.
<h2>The changing face of operations&nbsp;</h2>
As companies grow and layers of complexity are added, operations departments get pulled in different directions and become more specialized to better serve the needs of the business. It&rsquo;s now become much more common to see product ops, sales ops, design ops, and marketing ops roles, which were few and far 10 years ago. However, this decentralization of operations may bring challenges of its own. &ldquo;With this new trend we&rsquo;re seeing we have to ask if operations are creating new frictions or new silos,&rdquo; Verstraete says and warns that this is something business leaders need to keep a close eye on in the coming years.&nbsp;
The other big challenge facing operations leaders has been the rise of remote and hybrid working. &ldquo;Since switching to online we no longer have visibility on corridor conversations,&rdquo; Strange explains. To counteract this, he advises catchups, standups, and even regularly becoming a fly on the wall in cross-functional conversations as techniques to identify emerging silos between colleagues and create processes that tear them down.
<h2>Operations and company culture&nbsp;</h2>
There is often a perception that operations is more the &lsquo;boring stuff&rsquo; - with a focus on the processes. But this is wide of the mark, as how your company operates ultimately defines the culture. It&rsquo;s how you attract the best people, how you retain them, and how you get the most out of them&hellip;it&rsquo;s not a pool table in the office or drinks after work on Friday&rdquo; - explained Gately.&nbsp;
He also warns that the rise of remote work means organizations cannot leave culture to chance, as work has an even greater potential impact on our lives. &ldquo;Workplaces have a responsibility to make sure that the experience that people have at work is a positive one.&rdquo; To achieve that, operations must embed company values into processes and policies, and through it, into people.&nbsp;
<h2>The people behind operations</h2>
This outdated perception also risks dissuading people from starting a career in operations. However, it&rsquo;s all about how you approach the role, whether you chose to focus on the analytics and processes or more on working with people so they achieve everything they set out to do. According to Strange, operations is a people-orientated role, it&rsquo;s about asking the right questions and listening to the answers. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s people over process.&rdquo;&nbsp;
Verstraete tells us that to be successful in operations you need to be curious, you have to find problems and find creative solutions to solve them. And Kelsey Traher, COO of Marvel App adds &ldquo;you have to firefight in the moment, while also keeping one eye on your long-term plan and the big picture&rdquo;.&nbsp;
So, for those considering a career in operations, we can conclude that every day will be different and it won&rsquo;t always be plain sailing. However, there can be no doubt that operations now play a critical role in the success of almost any business, enabling everyone to work at their best. And, as work continues to become more complex, we&rsquo;ll need them more than ever.
To watch the episode, visit <a href="https://language.work/documentary/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=qatalog&amp;utm_campaign=LW-documentary&amp;utm_content=Operations-nation-blog" rel="follow">language.work</a>

The second episode summary of a documentary series on the staggering pace of change in the workplace. Visit language.work for more!

Operations Nation documentary | Qatalog

Shining a spotlight on the critical role of operations in helping to drive growth and build culture in today's workplace.

Operations Nation

Qatalog recently launched a mini-documentary series examining the staggering pace of change in the workplace and sets out to find better ways of working along the way.&nbsp;
The first episode is an expos&eacute; on the chaos of the modern workplace. It takes a look at how the very tools designed to make us more productive are achieving the exact opposite.
Visit <a href="https://language.work/documentary/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=qatalog&amp;utm_campaign=LW-documentary&amp;utm_content=Productivity-paradox-blog" rel="follow">language.work</a> for the full episode, or read below for a quick summary of what we learned.
<h2>The evolution of work</h2>
It all started with the industrial revolution, which caused an irreversible shift in our understanding of what work is, and how to go about doing it. We went from thousands of years of subsistence-based work to mass production and swapped farms for assembly lines and offices. While our setting and type of work changed, everything was still in person, and getting context on what was going on at work was simple &ndash; you just had to ask the person next to you.&nbsp;
However, no one really came prepared for what happened next, when we swapped our physical offices for virtual ones. According to Tariq Rauf, Qatalog&rsquo;s founder and CEO, &ldquo;...the way in which we work is largely still influenced by the industrial revolution. We work 40 hours a week, we don&rsquo;t work weekends.&rdquo;&nbsp;
&ldquo;This is all a function of the production line. But the way we work today is very different from how we used to work in factories. You&rsquo;re working in 17 different locations across seven different time zones&rdquo; - he continued.&nbsp;
The advancements in technology combined with the rapid adoption of new productivity tools, a trend accelerated by the pandemic, have together outpaced the speed at which workers can adapt. And this newfound complexity comes at the peril of our attention and focus.
<h2>The rise of productivity apps&nbsp;</h2>
We now have thousands upon thousands of these apps. But most of the ones we have today were built with little respect for how we actually use them &ndash; in tandem with each other. This critical flaw has left workers at the mercy of an ever-expanding digital ether. Rauf explains this phenomenon as &ldquo;the sea of apps we use to keep on top of our work that we end up drowning in&rdquo;. Try to find anything and you&rsquo;ll have to battle through a maze of productivity apps, all fighting for our attention, making it harder to do the work we want to do.&nbsp;
<h2>Today&rsquo;s chaotic workplace</h2>
So the app boom hasn&rsquo;t been the silver bullet that we hoped for. &ldquo;People are working in digital silos&hellip;as a consequence, there's a lot of information pushed into apps, documents, files, and folders all over the organization with very few people knowing exactly where they are. Access to this information is getting more and more fragmented and people are losing their sense of context&rdquo;, Rauf goes on to say.&nbsp;
Qatalog partnered with Cornell University to understand the impact of productivity software on the way we work &ndash; and its researchers found that we waste 59 minutes every day just trying to find information trapped in apps, laying bare the enormous cost of the productivity paradox we find ourselves in.
Hema Thanki, VP of Product Marketing at Qatalog, says this impairs our ability to work effectively. &ldquo;Information is locked in people&rsquo;s heads making it very difficult to make the right calls, make the right decisions, and actually do your job.&rdquo;
But it&rsquo;s not just productivity we have to worry about, many workers are also suffering from burnout. Cognitive capacity during the workday is a finite resource. Different apps that incessantly demand our attention end up abusing it, promoting an always-on culture that causes real damage to our mental health. Employers can&rsquo;t afford to turn a blind eye for much longer, as employees won&rsquo;t hesitate to leave a workplace that doesn&rsquo;t support their mental wellbeing.&nbsp;
<h2>Reimagining the modern workplace</h2>
The modern workplace is now digital. It is a collection of people working on their own terms, anywhere they want, and on their own schedule, but this is only possible with a foundation of trust and openness.&nbsp;
The endless pings, meeting requests, and notifications have turned into a crescendo of distractions. And unless a new, more intentional framework for collaboration and communication is introduced to workplaces, it will be deafening.&nbsp;
Thanki closes the episode with a word of warning to managers. &ldquo;If you&rsquo;re stuck in old ways and haven&rsquo;t realized that this shift is happening you&rsquo;re really going to be left behind&rdquo;&nbsp;
To watch the episode visit <a href="https://language.work/documentary/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=qatalog&amp;utm_campaign=LW-documentary&amp;utm_content=Productivity-paradox-blog" rel="follow">language.work</a>

The first episode summary of a documentary series on the staggering pace of change in the workplace. Visit language.work for more!

The Productivity Paradox documentary | Qatalog

An exposé on the chaos of the modern workplace and how the very tools designed to make us more productive are doing the exact opposite.

The Productivity Paradox

With more companies prioritizing remote and hybrid work, it doesn't mean you don't share time in person, but it increases the importance of optimizing those human interactions. Offsites can be messy, expensive, and hard to prioritize, so we wanted to share some best practices on how to execute one seamlessly, and focus on making it a key part of your overall employee experience
With the aid of Qatalog our Chief of Staff, Marta, we were able to seamlessly plan and execute a company offsite to a British countryside retreat for 43 employees. This involved the team getting together from 11 different countries, many requiring visas, accommodation, and extensive long-distance travel.&nbsp;
<img src="https://cdn.buttercms.com/TH0Ykoa2QZSmWgw7h1L3" alt="undefined" width="967" height="476" />
I spoke with Marta to get the low down on how she was able to plan such a complex trip, filled with team-building activities, in record time.&nbsp;
<h2>Five tips for planning your next company offsite</h2>
<h3>1. Collect everything in a shared Project</h3>
Creating a central location for all your documentation, resources, updates, and tasks is invaluable in providing context to everyone involved. Everyone gets excited about the potential of an offsite, leading to a large number of questions and information that needs to be shared to help people prepare.
Include information about the location, visa application deadlines, processes for booking flights, and directions to the venue. Other company-wide information like travel insurance policies and expense policies should also be interlinked. You currently might have this information housed in an intranet or an HR system &ndash; Marta had everything easily accessible, in one place, through Qatalog&rsquo;s Company pages. The aim is to get anything offsite-related under one roof and in the same work tool. This allowed Marta to not repeatedly answer the same questions, and more importantly give employees a single place to find information, get their questions answered, and provide feedback. Keeping the employees fully informed and part of the transparent process.
<h3>2. Put processes in place&nbsp;</h3>
You will need to collect a lot of information from attendees so make sure you have a process for gathering, tracking, and storing it all.&nbsp;
Marta had to ensure she had information from everyone on the big things, like flight bookings and visas, all the way to the more intricate details like dietary restrictions and swag requests.&nbsp;
This was also a great opportunity to ask others for recommendations on the team-building activities &ndash; &rdquo;If you had a magic wand what is something you would like to do or see at the offsite?&rdquo; Her favorite responses: bread-baking, karaoke, and petting zoo.&nbsp;
Marta delivered all three.&nbsp;
You can gather all of this through either email communication, type forms, or follow Marta&rsquo;s lead, and use Qatalog&rsquo;s no-code Workflow function.&nbsp;
<h3>3. Organize and prioritize your tasks&nbsp;</h3>
Keep on top of your tasks, break them down into smaller, actionable subtasks, add deadlines, and delegate where possible. Make sure stakeholders are aware of progress or risks and setbacks.
Some examples of the tasks on your to-do list: book venue, plan meals and menu, plan activities, order equipment&hellip;
&hellip;and most importantly: bring spikeball.&nbsp;
Qatalog provides a quick and easy way to manage and assign all the to-dos &ndash;&nbsp;gantt charts and kanban tasks allow you to track what needs to be done, and stakeholders get visibility into progress without having to ping you for updates.&nbsp;
<h3>4. Set timelines for communication</h3>
Don&rsquo;t overwhelm participants with information overload in a single email or multiple hard-to-follow threads in Slack. Divide your communication about the event into 3 clear phases, Marta&rsquo;s phases were as follows:
<ul>
<li>1st phase: share details about the location and date</li>
<li>2nd phase: share information about activities</li>
<li>3rd phase: share the agenda, and make it available for team members to refer back to during the event.</li>
</ul>
Once Marta was ready to share details of the offsite with the wider company, rather than using email she consolidated everything into Posts. A key benefit of Posts is that everyone involved in the Project gets notified, and Marta gets insight into who has read them through real-time read-receipts. The Post can always be found within the offsite Project itself, which acts as a single source of truth and prevents scrolling back through multiple different threads or seeing outdated decisions or announcements.&nbsp;
<h3>5. Re-use previous work</h3>
Here&rsquo;s the real secret! She&rsquo;s been reusing this same structure for every offsite, saving herself from having to start from scratch every time.&nbsp;
Through Qatalog&rsquo;s structured hub, once work has been created, all of it can be duplicated and repurposed for your next initiative. Marta simply duplicates the Project every 6 months, with all the relevant company policies, the same Workflows, the same Tasks, and even the same collaborators.&nbsp;
Co-ordinating distributed team events is becoming a common scene across most ops teams. They build a strong working environment, increase employee retention and allow employees to know the people they work with. Learning about fellow team members outside of work can help develop and demonstrate empathy for them when they need it most. This ultimately leads to a better culture.
Thankfully the ability to collaborate asynchronously on such initiatives, scale them as the company grows, then watch it all fall into place come the event has never been easier&hellip;as long as you have a framework to help you out.&nbsp;
Ready to start centralizing the planning of your off-site on Qatalog? We can get this set up for you in minutes. Get in touch <a href="https://qatalog.com/contact/demo/">here</a>.

Five tips for planning your next company offsite.

How to plan an offsite | Qatalog

5 tips for planning a successful offsite.

How to plan an offsite

There are lots of<a href="https://qatalog.com/blog/post/what-is-asynchronous-work/" rel="follow"> advantages to an asynchronous working culture</a>, which allows people to work when they&rsquo;re most productive and improves wellbeing. However, it&rsquo;s still a relatively new way of working, and as <a href="https://language.work/research/killing-time-at-work/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=qatalog&amp;utm_campaign=killing-time&amp;utm_content=blog6" rel="follow">our latest report</a> in partnership with GitLab revealed, it&rsquo;s not always straightforward to make the change.
The research found that the two main barriers center around the culture of an organization and the use of technology. To help organizations overcome these barriers, Qatalog and GitLab put together a guide with practical tips to go async-first.
<a href="https://language.work/research/killing-time-at-work/?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=qatalog&amp;utm_campaign=killing-time&amp;utm_content=blog6#async-guide" rel="follow">Download the guide here</a> - or check out the 12 recommendations below.&nbsp;
<h2>How to build an asynchronous culture:</h2>
<ol>
<li>Communicate proactively The first step in the process is to talk to your employees and explain why you&rsquo;re making a transition to a new way of working. Tell them about the benefits you expect to see, both in terms of business performance and staff wellbeing. Alongside this, you should also communicate the types of work that should be done asynchronously vs. synchronously, while giving each team some flexibility to set their own guidelines.&nbsp;&nbsp; </li>
<li>Focus on output&nbsp; Asynchronous working is about moving away from measuring time spent working, to measuring output and value creation. To align this with your culture, set clear objectives and deadlines, and let people manage their own time to achieve them. This allows everyone to focus on getting their work done, rather than presenteeism. It&rsquo;s critical this is reflected in reward and recognition schemes. </li>
<li>Model the behaviors No matter what it says in the guidelines, employees will always take cues from their managers when deciding how they should work and what is expected of them. To affect change, leadership and line managers need to lead by example and model the behavior they want to see. This might not be easy if you are used to working in a certain way, so discuss it together and try to identify potential barriers, so that these can be tackled collectively.&nbsp; </li>
<li>Set expectations early Talent acquisition is time intensive for all involved, so you want to get it right the first time. To reduce the chance of bad hires, clearly outline the way you work as a company in your job descriptions and discuss it during the hiring process to ensure new joiners know what to expect and are comfortable working in this way. &nbsp;&nbsp;</li>
<li>Hold people accountable&nbsp; Culture doesn&rsquo;t work if it&rsquo;s just words on the page and there will inevitably be some people who either don&rsquo;t want to change the way they work, or find it difficult. In these scenarios, as hard as the conversation might be, you need to hold people accountable to your company values and agreed ways of working, from new hires up to the C-suite. </li>
<li>Be deliberate In many organizations, meetings are the default mode of communication when decisions need to be made or a progress update is required. For async to work, synchronous communication should be used sparingly and deliberately for specific use cases. This might be for consolidating work that&rsquo;s already been done, or for social activities.</li>
</ol>
<h2>How to get asynchronous technology right:</h2>
<ol>
<li>Create guidelines To avoid digital presenteeism, you need to set clear guidelines. These should include expectations for the different technology and tooling you use (e.g. response times) and specify whether each one should be used asynchronously or not, and in what situations. This helps to avoid situations&nbsp; </li>
<li>Minimize distractions There are plenty of tools out there, but not all are right for async. Where possible, choose tools that genuinely support asynchronous work and aim to minimize unnecessary distractions and interruptions. </li>
<li>Take ownership The default settings for most productive software are designed to keep users constantly engaged, to the detriment of their productivity. Encourage and empower employees to take more ownership of their tech and empower them to disable or modify notifications. To help speed up this process, make sure line managers ask their team if and how they have done this, to ensure they feel comfortable making the changes.&nbsp; </li>
<li>Documentation is key Documenting everything is key to building async workplaces that are scalable and don&rsquo;t collapse under pressure. Ensure employees know how to properly document their work and decision-making, so that knowledge and context aren&rsquo;t lost. Templates and examples of documentation done well can help people understand what they should be aiming for. </li>
<li>Make information accessible Utilize tools that make information and processes visible and accessible (asynchronously) to as many people as possible. The aim should be to minimize or even eliminate the need to ping someone to find a document or get status updates. This becomes even more important for distributed teams across multiple time zones, as otherwise work can quickly become blocked.&nbsp; </li>
<li>Optimize offices Many organizations use a hybrid model, which can make async harder. For those with office space, ensure you create an environment that provides space for focused work, not just open floor plans, which can often be distracting.</li>
</ol>

Find out how to build an asynchronous culture and how to get asynchronous technology right with this 12-step guide.

How to become async first

Our 12-step guide to becoming async first.

New research shows workers would look for a new role if their ability to work flexibly was limited. Insights from the report await you here.

Employers can’t afford to get flexibility wrong

Research reveals broken workplace technology is to blame for an always-on culture and rising digital presenteeism.

Technology failed to create a better way of working

Technology has failed in its promise to create a better way of working

Study shows old habits from the physical office were carried into the digital workspace. Read why digital presenteeism is a growing problem.

Why digital presenteeism is a problem | Qatalog

New research from Qatalog shows old habits from the physical office have been adopted in the digital workspace. Read to find out why digital presenteeism is becoming a big problem.

Why digital presenteeism is a big problem in the workplace

You don’t need to be an engineer to create standardized company processes. Read how to get started with no-code Workflows.

Standardize company processes | Qatalog

You don’t need to be an engineer to create standardized company processes

Check out the most recent product updates from Qatalog: Workflow updates, in-product Templates, Dashboard filters.

What’s new on Qatalog: July 2022

Read all about what asynchronous work is, why it is an improvement on the status quo and how to make the transition.

What is asynchronous work | Qatalog

Expectations around flexibility at work have changed. We now expect more freedom to choose not just where, but when we work. Read more about what asynchronous work is and why it is an improvement on the status quo.

What is asynchronous work? (And how many of us are doing it?)

Research shows a new era of flexible working is upon us. Read more about the next big shift from 'how' we work to ‘when’ we work.

A new era for flexibility at work | Qatalog

A new era of flexible working is upon us. Read more about the next big shift from 'how' we work to ‘when’ we work.

This is a new era for flexibility at work – and workers know it

Qatalog and GitLab study reveals a pervasive culture of digital presenteeism that makes asynchronous work almost impossible.

Study: Async work prevented by digital presenteeism

Qatalog and GitLab study reveals pervasive culture of digital presenteeism

Should you take a pay cut for happiness? Read about the price of happiness at work in Qatalog's workplace trends blog series.

Not happy at work? A pay cut might help | Qatalog

We discuss the price tag on happiness at the workplace in our new bi-weekly series focusing on workplace trends.

Not happy at work? A pay cut might help

Check out the most recent product updates from Qatalog.

What’s new on Qatalog: June 2022

Are we using too many tools at work? Qatalog research suggests we are, and it's become a barrier to collaboration and communication.

The unholy trinity of work tools

The tools designed to boost productivity and collaboration are driving us apart. Learn how to build a common language and create a new way of work.

When collaboration tools become barriers to collaboration

A complete guide on how to improve the employee experience. Learn how to drive workplace engagement with Qatalog.

Improve digital employee experience in 5 steps | Qatalog

We answer what employee experience is, why it’s important and how you and your team can create a stellar one in 5 key steps.

Improve the digital employee experience in 5 steps

Check out monthly product updates from Qatalog: centralized documentation and streamlined onboarding.

What's new on Qatalog: May 2022

Read to find out how to turn two weeks of onboarding into an afternoon with Qatalog’s Workflows feature.

How to create a seamless onboarding experience

Follow these five steps and turn two weeks of onboarding into a single afternoon.

Research shows collaboration tools are scarcely used by client-facing teams. Read to find out why that's a mistake and how a Work Hub can help.

Survey shows project collaboration is stuck in the past | Qatalog

We share some of our survey results on how client-facing teams are collaborating currently and explain ways a modern-day Work Hub can help them do it better.

Say what now? You still use email to collaborate?

Industry leaders explain what DesignOps is and why it matters. Read our highlights from Qatalog's DesignOps Assembly panel.

DesignOps in the new world of work

What is DesignOps and why has it become more important in this new world work.

A collection of feedback and reviews from our customers. Find out how businesses and teams are getting the most out of Qatalog.

Qatalog reviews: What our customers are saying

Read all about how our customers and their teams are getting the most out of Qatalog.

What our customers are saying

Blueprints for a new way of work. Qatalog founder and CEO, Tariq Rauf tells us  about his journey from architecture into software.

The story of Qatalog and its founder & CEO, Tariq Rauf

Blueprints for a new way of work. The story behind Qatalog and its founder, Tariq Rauf.

The story of Qatalog and its founder, Tariq Rauf

What's new on Qatalog: April 2022

Qatalog’s all-in-one, unified workplace Search gives you relevant results at lightning speed, helping teams to collaborate with context. Read how we did it.

How Qatalog built its unified Workplace Search

How Qatalog’s all-in-one Search gives you relevant results at lightning speed, helping teams to collaborate with context.

How we built our all-in-one Search

An 8 step guide on how to set company rituals and overcome the culture challenges of remote work.

Rituals for building remote team culture

A guest post written by the team at Running Remote on how to overcome the culture challenges of remote work and create shared values and trust through company rituals.

What do Project Managers do? Kumaran and Varun tell us about their work and how Qatalog can help others in this role.

Making the Product Management role easier | Qatalog

Product Directors, Varun and Kumaran, explain what Product Management is all about and how Qatalog can help people in their role.

‘It’s hard to imagine working without it’ - how Qatalog makes the Product Management role easier

Want to effectively align on goals with your team? Tired of using spreadsheets? Learn how to plan and bulk-create OKRs using Qatalog.

Goal alignment and OKR planning | Qatalog

OKRs demystified and how bulk-adding your goals into Qatalog can save you time and uplevel your team collaboration.

Goal alignment and OKR planning made easy with Qatalog

Check out our monthly product updates from Qatalog: quarterly goals, coordinated workflows, improved workplace search.

What's new on Qatalog: March 2022

Qatalog's 2022 survery on meetings concludes that there’s still too many in our calendars. Read for how to have fewer, better meetings.

Too many meetings | Qatalog

We asked 700 knowledge workers about their online meeting habits and how they felt about them. The verdict: they want fewer and better.

Qatalog survey shows there's still too many meetings

Find out how Hire Black Now is shaking up the recruitment industry and using Qatalog to help it scale.

Hire Black Now is disrupting the recruitment industry | Qatalog

Hire Black Now is disrupting the recruitment industry by making jobs accessible to all

Visualize your company’s reporting structure with Org Charts.

Qatalog Org Charts, all from one place

Qatalog now let’s you see your Company’s Org Chart, all from one place

What's new on Qatalog: February 2022

We go over the great resignation and the era of empowered employees working where their balance best suits their lifestyle.

Welcome to the era of the empowered employee | Qatalog

After seeing how flexible companies can be while still exceeding profit margins, many employees are no longer willing to sacrifice work-life balance.

Welcome to the era of the empowered employee

Dana Gagnon, CMO of Everee, spoke with us about 2022 marketing trends and how marketing audiences have changed since working model shifts.

Dana Gagnon 2022 marketing advice | Qatalog

We spoke to Everee CMO Dana Gagnon about customer journey, strategy shifts, and what she’s learned in the last year.

Dana Gagnon on connecting with today’s B2B audiences

The new way of work is shifting to a people-first workplace that is rooted in trust, flexibility, and focus. These three areas all level up to belonging.

The importance of belonging at work | Qatalog Blog

Feeling like you belong is important, even at work

What’s new on Qatalog: January 2022

This interview first appeared on Webrazzi, the the leading Turkish technology publication. Ekrem is the Head of Design at Qatalog and, like

Meet Ekrem Elmas, our Design Lead

Design Lead, Ekrem Elmas, talks about why he joined Qatalog, working in a distributed team, and why design offers so many opportunities.

Meet Qatalog's Product Design Lead, Ekrem Elmas

Company wikis are used to share information throughout a company. A work hub does the same thing, while integrating other useful tools.

Company wiki vs work hub | Qatalog blog

Companies have a lot of information. Documents. Messages. Files. Decks. Code. Emails. If you keep digging, it goes on and on.

Deciding between a company wiki and a connected Work Hub

Documentation and productivity apps play a vital role in the workplace. Learn how a Work Hub connects your existing apps.

Work hub vs. Documentation apps | Qatalog

Documentation apps come with organization and context-switching challenges. Solve them with a work hub.

Best documentation software for modern teams

Qatalog's design team is fully remote. Here's how we collaborated on revamping our design system.

How Qatalog’s design team builds a strong design system | Qatalog

A design system is a set of standards intended to manage design at scale using reusable components and patterns (N/N group).

How Qatalog’s remote team builds a strong design system

We’re excited that 5,000 businesses (and counting) have adopted Qatalog.

5,000 businesses choose a different way of working

Qatalog launches Tasks to simplify your project management experience and allow collaboration at every step.

Qatalog launches Tasks | Qatalog blog

Unify all your project ingredients in a single place.

Qatalog launches Tasks to simplify project management

Qatalog Workflows now allow sharing with external partners. Streamline production with an agency, contractors, or freelancers.

Qatalog Workflows now simplify collaboration with external partners

Qatalog users can now have external partners outside of their Qatalog Work Hub fill out forms, request approvals, send emails, and trigger activities across apps like Asana, Slack, and Trello.

Customer growth accelerates at Qatalog, as 5,000 businesses use the work hub to coordinate teamwork and scale operations as flexible work go

Qatalog lands 5,000 customers, announces streak of product launches

Customer growth accelerates at Qatalog, as 5,000 businesses use the work hub to coordinate teamwork and scale operations.

I’ve always liked work in December. Projects are wrapping up and we start thinking about goals for the new year. At a startup, this can be e

What’s new on Qatalog: December 2021

How is Qatalog different from team instant messaging and chat apps for teams like Slack or Microsoft Teams?

Work hub vs. Team instant messaging apps | Qatalog

A work hub is a vital addition to your team’s instant chat.

Team instant messaging apps vs. work hub

Digital dexterity means being adaptable to new and upcoming technologies. Here are five ways to prioritize digital dexterity in your org.

What is digital dexterity? | Qatalog blog

Digital dexterity has been and will continue to be the measurement that distinguishes successful businesses from those that fail.

What is digital dexterity and why does it matter?

How Qatalog integrates our Node.js config loader with GCP's Secrets Manager (complete with Joi validation)

A GCP-secrets integrated config loader for Node.js

We're big fans of GCP at Qatalog, so of course we store all our production secrets in GCP Secret Manager. And as our backend runs on Node, we were looking for a good config loader that integrates nicely with Secret Manager. But we couldn't find one that worked how we wanted, so we built our own instead and have released it under an MIT license.

Qatalog survey of 2,000 knowledge workers uncovers a crisis of trust within the modern workplace. Read more in the press release.

Workplace trust crisis press release | Qatalog

We published a survey of 2,000 knowledge workers which uncovers a crisis of trust within the modern workplace.

Qatalog releases data on trust gap at work

Trust and visibility impact the workplace by allowing your employees and coworkers to collaborate effectively. You need both in hybrid model

Putting trust back into teamwork | Qatalog blog

Hybrid hasn’t been the solve-all solution we were hoping for.

Putting trust back into teamwork

Your remote onboarding experience should enable connectivity and trust from day one. Here are some remote onboarding best practices for 2021

How do you onboard new joiners remotely? | Qatalog

Your remote onboarding experience should enable connectivity and trust from day one.

How do you onboard new joiners remotely?

Building strong connections has been a key focus at Remote, says CEO Job van der Voort.

Future of Work with Remote | Qatalog blog

Job van der Voort, CEO of Remote, saw a missed opportunity to hire workers on a global scale. Now, his company operates on a remote-first basis.

Job van der Voort on building strong connections remotely

This month, we released a collection of updates that will continue to help you build context around your workday.

What’s new on Qatalog: October 2021

A roundup of new features and capabilities our team has been working on.

Zoom fatigue. We've all had it at this point. But Zoom is far from the only tool that is leaving us exhausted and burnt-out.

Tool exhaustion doesn’t stop with Zoom fatigue

Unlocking creativity in the workplace requires focus, trust, and a work hub that enables collaboration. Eliminate context switching and get that deep work done.

Tools that unlock creativity | Qatalog blog

Focus is about unlocking our creative potential. Deep work begins when we’re immersed in something challenging. And it's often where we master our craft and produce work of real value, the stuff we’re proud of that brings us back to the job.

Tools that unlock creativity

Learn how to shift to a people-first way of working using trust, flexibility, and focus in place of legacy working model thinking.

Distributed work and collaboration advice, curated by Qatalog

Tools that changed the world (of work)

Transform a traditional organizational chart into a strategic business tool

What’s new on Qatalog: August 2022

Operations Nation

The Productivity Paradox

How to plan an offsite

How to become async first

Get started with your
single source of truth for work

Distributed work and collaboration advice, curated by Qatalog

Tools that changed the world (of work)

Transform a traditional organizational chart into a strategic business tool

What’s new on Qatalog: August 2022

Operations Nation

The Productivity Paradox

How to plan an offsite

How to become async first

Get started with yoursingle source of truth for work

Get started with your
single source of truth for work