Communications
Note: Data in this section last updated July 3rd, 2022
What are Communication Tools?
Strong communication is critical to the success of any organization. It is needed to spread the mission, brand and values, ensure employee engagement, solve customer problems, define strategy and coordinate work between multiple departments.
Unfortunately, it’s rarer than one would expect, even in the corporate world. Often referred to as “herding cats”, successful organizations must harmonize team members with different skills, personalities, strategies and motivations. This exercise becomes even more difficult when dealing with multi-generational and geographically diverse workforces.
According to David Grossman, poor communication cost businesses nearly $40B a year, with an average cost of $62.4 million.
Poor Communication Results in Billions in Losses
This does not bode well for DAOs who are already at a disadvantage in this area as they have no formal management structure, no physical location and a transient workforce.
In order to get ahead of these challenges, DAOs need to adopt accessible and scaleable communication platforms. The best of these will offer:
Communication Tools: Tools that allow members to share files and communicate remotely via text messaging, voice chat and video chat
Shared Workspaces: Cloud-based storage solutions that workers can use to save files online and access them from anywhere
Knowledge Repositories: Shared storage spaces to file key organizational documents including the onboarding procedures, tribal knowledge, key analytics, FAQs and the DAOs mission, vision and values
Project Management Software: Tools used for project planning, scheduling, resource allocation, metric tracking and product delivery
While not every tool has all these benefits, one that is becoming very popular in the DAO world is Discord – a communication platform that allows members of an organization to communicate over chat, voice and video.
How do Communication Tools Work?
Founded in 2015, Discord is quickly becoming the tool of choice for many DAOs and web3 organizations to facilitate internal discussions, interact with their communities and coordinate operations.
The platform is organized into servers – invite-only spaces for users to chat, hang out, do business and have fun. An organization can create a server for virtually any type of community – from a company to a non-profit to a book club.
The BanklessDAO Discord
Each server is broken up into several channels, each focusing on a functional area of the organization. For example, the BanklessDAO Discord has over 100 channels, including:
Announcements: Pertinent information related to the DAO
General: Includes general information about the DAO, FAQ and a book club
Governance: Forum to discuss ideas and proposals
Developers Guild: Space for developers to work together and solve problems
Marketing Guild: Channel for marketers to plan, coordinate and execute strategies
Treasury Guild: Forum to discuss key issues related to treasury management
Water Cooler: Open forum to discuss anything, hang out with other DAO members and have fun
There are also dedicated voice channels and a function to allow private messaging.
In theory, Discords are “invite only”, but in practice many DAOs make their communities easily accessible by posting an open invite link on their twitter. For example, you can join Bankless DAOs Discord simply by clicking the discord.gg/bankless link provided on their Twitter.
The platform is particularly useful for DAOs when paired with Collab.Land, a tool that provides “token-gating”, allowing DAOs to restrict access to token and / or NFT holders.
Discord has 150 million MAUs and generated $130 million of revenue in 2020.
What are Popular Communication Tools?
In addition to Discord and Collab.Land, some of the most popular communication tools include Telegram, GitBook, Notion, GSuite and Asana.
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