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Remote work is taking over the world. Although there are so many pros to working remotely (not having to commute being a big one for me), there are still a few challenges that come up. One of the big challenges that we faced as a remote team was maintaining the "collaborative office culture" that we had while working together. Luckily we found Jamm, a video collaboration app that helps remote teams work together more effectively.
What is Jamm
Jamm is a lightweight voice and video chat for teams. You can see what everyone is working on, and with one click, hop on a video call with them. There are a few other key features that we'll outline below that make Jamm a tool that remote teams won't be able to give up once they start using it.
The Benefits of Using Jamm
As a team that works across multiple time zones, we saw the benefits of Jamm within the first day of use. Here are the top 3 benefits we saw when we started using Jamm:
Build a Better Remote Culture
We primarily use Zoom for our meetings, scheduling things in advance before hopping on a call. With Jamm, we started hopping on more impromptu calls and even left the call running while we all worked on other things. We would never do this with Zoom, but the ability to do this with Jamm reminds us of how we used Tandem similarly.
Jamm lets you create spaces within the app. Our team got to define the purpose of these spaces and we basically used them to mimic conference rooms and hangout areas that we used to have back when we all worked in the same physical location. We had a separate area for our sales and product teams as well as a general common room for everyone to hang out. Although we did host serious meetings on Jamm, the majority of our time on Jamm was used to hang out with each other and bounce ideas off our team members, kind of water cooler type conversations. Jamm is a great way to build the company culture that usually gets lost when a team becomes remote, and keep newer members engaged.
Keep Everyone on the Same Page, Without Extra Meetings
One of the coolest parts of Jamm is that you can record and share any conversations that happen on the app. Not only can you record the entire meeting, but you can also record short clips from the meeting. This is really helpful if you just want to capture the highlights of the meeting and send them to relevant parties that may have missed the meeting or need a recap.
The sharing also works with people that don't have Jamm installed, which is a big bonus for us since we work with a lot of vendors and clients. We don't necessarily want to invite all of them to our company Jamm workspace but still need to share recordings with them from time to time. We take meeting notes in Notion, and being able to paste a link to a relevant clip from the meeting into our notes has been very helpful in providing context.
Bridge the Time Zone Gap With Meeting Highlights
The ability to record short clips from the meeting (meeting highlights) is a huge deal for us since we're a team that works across multiple time zones and continents. It is often the case that at least one person can't make a meeting due to time zone differences, so being able to record the meeting or send relevant highlights cut down on the extra meetings that would usually happen to update that one person that missed the meeting.
Features Built For Remote Teams
One thing we love about Jamm is the selection of features they built into the app.
They've included screen sharing into the video chat, even allowing you to see cursors move in real time. You can even create events in advance and attach them to emails/calendars. Thanks to these features, Jamm has replaced Zoom for our internal meetings.
As mentioned above, you have the ability to record clips from the meeting and share them with anybody (including people not using Jamm), additionally notifying you when your clip has been viewed. Jamm replaced Loom, which we used to create and share screen recordings both internally and externally. A history of your recordings are available within the space or private chat as well.
As a bonus, it even has built in whiteboarding, which was useful for our product and sales team to make quick diagrams for explanations on the fly.
Jamm vs. Tandem
This isn't an article comparing all of the many remote workspace and collaboration tools that have sprung up recently (if you'd be interested in such a comparison, let us know at resources@aloa.co). But as we were reviewing Jamm, we couldn't help but draw comparisons to Tandem.
Our team found that the feature we wished for the most in Jamm was how Tandem would integrate with your Google Calendar and automatically create Tandem "rooms" for each upcoming meeting. Not only did it make it impossible to miss a meeting, it also eliminated the need for you to send your team the Zoom link (we've all been there) or ping your team asking "which room are we using for our meeting?"
This calendar meeting integration made it clear to all attendees exactly where they should go for the meeting. We no longer had to perform the "Zoom dance" where multiple users would send links to different Zoom meetings and half the attendees would join one and the other half would join the other.
But the feature of Jamm that made it stand out from Tandem was the ability to selectively record highlights within a meeting, for later use as action items or documenting decisions. This feature was especially important to us because it allowed us to have asynchronous conversations and the meeting highlights provided the context needed for anyone who wasn't in attendance.
You Should Use Jamm If You Are a Remote Team, Especially If You Work Across Time Zones
We recommend trying Jamm if you are a remote team, especially if you work across multiple time zones. Jamm helps remote teams improve their remote culture through more casual and spontaneous chats. It also allows your team to streamline their workflow through features like built-in meeting recordings and whiteboarding. If your team is struggling to stay connected and efficient while remote working, you should definitely give Jamm a try.
