Selecting Tech for Communication

By M Hong

“It’s a crisis and we need some channels that we can rely on to stay in touch with one another.”

Communication Goals/Needs

Before choosing a tool, think about the purpose of the communications you and your people need. You’ll likely find that different tools are best for different types of communications. 

Some example categories:

• Broadcast/announcements
• Coordinating active workflows
• Sensitive/private information

Top Features – what are the most important features? Some questions to guide you:

• Easy for people to pick up – think about who will be using it and what they may find easiest to use; is it familiar, does it require installation, does it require signing up?
• Variable service – how does it behave when your phone does not have service?
• Signposting – how do people find the information they are seeking? Can you create channels, groups, blurbs so people can find their way?
• Moderation/Verification – is there a way for people to verify the source of information? Do people have handles, are there moderators?
• Device resources – does this require a lot of space on a phone or battery?
• Privacy and Security – How sensitive is this communication? How private should the communication be?

Roles – there are lots of jobs for people who are away from the scene and who need roles that they can do from a relatively stationary position (“reach back”). This kind of infrastructure reliability work can be challenging to do if you are doing a lot of face-to-face triage and moving around from place to place. 

Some roles to delegate:

• Admin
• Tech support for new people to join
• Moderation of content
• Organizing information/threads/naming channels

By goals

Broadcast/Announcements – For updates and announcements that are widely findable and readable to large groups of people, look for:

• Familiar/few steps to get started – Places where people already are and where people don’t necessarily need to install or sign up to access information
• Moderated and clear channels – so people know what the purpose of the channel is and where to share/look for information
• Verification – ways for people to verify speakers, and to assess the truthiness of information

Coordinating active workflows – depending on your team size, you will likely require many threaded conversations.

Some of the best tools for managing multiple threaded real-time conversations have:

• Channels/Groups – for specific conversation topics
• Embedded Pointers – so you can describe channels/groups
• Admins – so you can define working groups by members
• Moderators – to help maintain channel clarity

And for sensitive communication that requires privacy while you are communicating and afterwards

Key features for privacy:

• End-to-end encryption for privacy – the kind of encryption where the service does not have keys to unlock messages.
• Admins manage who is there – you’ll want to find a tool that allows you to delegate an admin role that can add/remove people.
• Editing/Delete for everyone – a feature that is nice to have in case you need to edit something you typed out.
• Self Deletion – for ease, self deletion or “disappearing message” settings will help you ensure that copies of messages are not stored past a certain amount of time on anyone’s app. Can’t get around screenshots or photos of screens.