What is an intranet? Definition, examples, and tools for 2026

Collaboration starts at the top

Picture an orchestra. The musicians are world-class. The music is tried and tested. The venue is sold out. But the conductor?

If the conductor doesn’t show up and lead the way, each musician does their own thing. The strings speed up. The brass drags. Percussion is having its own little party in the back.

The same thing happens in the workplace.

You can hire the best people, invest in the smartest collaboration tools, and launch a jam-packed schedule of team-building activities. But without a leader actively bringing people together — and modelling the kind of team collaboration you want to see — you fail to see the desired results.

Collaboration is a by-product of consistent leadership behaviors — along with the right systems and practices. Find out what you can do to encourage your people to work together and stop going it alone.

Leaders are a catalyst for collaboration

There’s a strong link between internal communication and collaboration. When workplace communication is open and effective, collaboration comes much easier.

The right comms tools take you part of the way. But it’s leaders who decide the style and tone of communication. They set the stage for how information is shared, decisions made, and conflicts resolved.

Most importantly, they shape psychological safety within your organization. This is the belief that it’s safe to speak up, challenge ideas, and share new perspectives — all of which are vital to effective collaboration.

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Common collaboration blockers: Where leaders are going wrong

Collaboration brings many benefits — including increased efficiency, productivity, and employee engagement. But you may be missing out on all the above if leadership is displaying the following collaboration-blocking behaviors.

Playing favorites

When leaders give certain people or teams special treatment, everyone sees it. Opportunities, information, and recognition flow toward the chosen few. Other employees stop bothering to contribute. Over time, trust erodes and people assume collaboration is shorthand for helping someone else to shine. 

A closed leadership style

When leaders are reluctant to share information or delegate tasks, when they struggle to admit mistakes or ask for help, they model a non-collaborative style of leadership and communication. Employees are likely to follow suit, gatekeeping workplace knowledge and keeping their guard up.

Siloing teams

Failing to encourage cross-department collaboration creates silos. Projects are contained within one team. This limits the sharing of ideas, causes duplicate work, and prevents teams from seeing the bigger picture. Collaboration becomes the exception, not the rule.

Leading only through email or announcements

Relying solely on email or one-way announcements leads to poor comms engagement. It’s then hard for leaders to convey information — on corporate strategy, common goals, and company culture — and to encourage the two-way communication you need for effective collaboration.  

Not inviting feedback from all levels

Leaders who only hear from their inner circle miss out on well-rounded insights. If you don’t proactively seek perspectives from every level, you risk building strategies in an echo chamber — and making it clear to certain groups of workers that their contribution isn’t valued.

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Leadership behaviors that encourage collaboration

We’ve looked at what could be going wrong. Now, let’s look at what leaders can do to get it right. To improve teamwork in the workplace, good leaders consistently demonstrate these collaborative behaviors.

Modelling open communication

Collaboration thrives when leaders share information openly and honestly — and when they create opportunities for employees to respond, ask questions, and contribute ideas. Acting on feedback is also important. It shows that employee input is valued. And that leadership isn’t afraid to adapt and admit mistakes.

Consistently demonstrate this style of communication and employees will adopt these behaviors as their own, helping you pave the way for effective collaboration across the organization.

Recognizing and celebrating cross-team wins

If a joint project succeeds, shout about it. Not just in the quarterly meeting, but in the moment. Share teamwork achievements in real time, and allow employees to add their congratulations, too.

When praise comes from the highest levels of your organization and is amplified across the organization, employees see that working together is valued and celebrated.

Showing up regularly and authentically

Only picking up the microphone when there’s big news to share? Then you’re missing out on opportunities to engage and align your workforce.

Show up regularly on the communication channels your employees like to use and — once you’re there — be yourself. Share an unpolished video message. Tell stories about real people.

By going beyond formal emails and announcements, you make yourself visible, approachable, and aligned with the day-to-day work of employees. Again, this is great for building psychological safety and setting norms around workplace communication.

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Embedding collaboration into company culture: 6 practical tips

Beyond individual leader behavior, the right systems, policies, and practices can bake collaboration into company culture. Here’s what leaders can do to make teamworking an expected and celebrated part of the workplace.

#1. Make cross-functional projects the norm

Cross-functional collaboration helps you solve problems faster and more effectively. When launching a new project, consider which teams should get a seat at the table. Then, give these teams the time, support, and tools they need to work together.  

#2. Providing tools and spaces (digital + physical) for collaboration

The right supportive environment makes all the difference. Breakout spaces encourage collaboration within your physical workplace. But you need digital collaboration tools too. That might mean creating a central hub of resources and information — where everyone, from remote teams to frontline crews, is kept in the loop.

#3. Set collaboration as a performance metric for managers

What gets measured gets managed. You can encourage managers to develop teamwork skills by evaluating them on collaboration outcomes. Recognize the joint projects and information sharing that goes on under their watch, and they’re more likely to encourage collaborative behaviors.

#4. Provide training

Collaboration relies on soft skills, like open communication, active listening, empathy, and negotiation. These skills don’t always come naturally, so it pays to provide training. With the right support, employees have a better understanding of collaborative behaviors, and managers know how to encourage them.

#5. Ask for employee feedback

Regularly seek feedback from employees and you show them that their opinions and ideas matter. To build trust and psychological safety even further, close the feedback loop. Whether you’re surveying employees on the state of internal communication, their engagement levels, or the latest shift swap policy, share survey results and the action you plan to take.

#6. Regularly revisit and refine collaboration rituals

The needs of your teams are liable to change. The collaboration tools that worked two years ago might feel clunky now. The teamwork strategies you put into play may no longer feel relevant to the makeup of your teams. Leaders should make it a habit to review and refresh the collaboration rituals they’ve established to ensure that teamwork remains effective.

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How the right collaboration tools can help

Leaders have a huge impact on workplace collaboration. They set the tone. But with all the will in the world, dispersed teams will find it hard to collaborate without the right digital communication tools. You need collaboration software for remote teams, frontline workers, and office-based staff to facilitate knowledge sharing and project management. Here’s what to look for.   

Centralized communication platforms

Updates, files, and conversations scattered across multiple apps? Then you’re creating friction and encouraging siloed working. A tool like Blink puts all internal communications and essential files in one centralized hub. As a mobile-first tool, these resources are available to any employee with a smartphone. So everyone is kept in the loop.

Real-time feeds, stories, and live updates

Leaders can use digital channels to reinforce collaborative behaviors daily, not just at once-in-a-blue-moon meetings. You can use a Story, a live update, or a recognition post to highlight teamwork lessons and wins. In doing so, you show that collaboration is happening — and that it’s valued.

Integration with existing systems

The best collaboration tools don’t expect people to drop what’s working. Instead, they connect the dots. Blink integrates with your other workplace software — so employee communications, collaboration, and project management can all live in one place. Teams don’t have to hop between apps — instead, they can focus on tackling the task at hand together.

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Lead the way: Make collaboration part of your day-to-day

If you’re committed to improving collaboration in the workplace, you can’t be the conductor who hides in the wings.

Leaders have to be visible and present. They need to use every update, recognition post, and meeting as a chance to model the teamwork strategies they want their workforce to follow.

Because collaboration is built by leaders who demonstrate collaborative behaviors themselves. By leaders who listen as much as they speak, who establish a culture of psychological safety, and who welcome the input of employees from all levels of the organization.

Combine a collaborative leadership style and the right teamworking tools and you give employees everything they need to achieve more, together.  

‍Blink. And use leadership comms to supercharge collaboration.

What makes him awesome?

Grant has been with Brighton & Hove for 37 years and now he organizes the buses run out for us.

He is in at 04:00 every day and is never sick. He liaises with Engineering for available buses, plans the run out order, and keeps our bus board updated. He will make sure that the buses run out smoothly and on time and helps all of the drivers as well as the coach drivers, with any queries or if they need assistance with maneuvering, etc. He assists us Supervisors where required with ticket machine problems etc and willingly takes ownership of the state of the garages.

Grant is a true frontline hero and we don’t always show our appreciation enough  Thank you Grant!

How has Blink helped in his role?

Grant uses Blink to communicate with the other departments, drivers, and supervisors to ensure that all relevant information is passed on.

What does he want to do next?

Grant has found his niche and is happily counting the days until he can retire.

Nominated by: Wayne Henty, Supervisor

When executives at Nokia Bell Labs brought engineers and scientists together from separate teams, their experiments led to the invention that we know as the vacuum tube.

Since then, the product has transformed hundreds of industries and solidified Nokia’s place in the telecommunications technology space.

The global revenue of their network infrastructure has been increasing by 22% year after year, and for the quarter ending March 31, 2021, it was €1.7B.

That’s the power of cross-functional collaboration. Many of the problems organizations face today need not one, but multiple teams or departments to work with one another. And in a survey of more than 2000 professionals, LinkedIn has identified cross-functional collaboration as a key leadership skill.

That’s why in this post, we’ll take a look at the meaning of cross-functional collaboration, its advantages, and best practices to facilitate cross-functional collaboration at work.

What is cross-functional collaboration?

Cross-functional collaboration refers to the concept of employees from different operational areas of a company working together as a team to complete a project or solve a problem. For example:

• Ecommerce website designers, developers, and copywriters may join forces to deliver a cohesive user experience.
• Sales, customer support, and marketing teams may engage in cross-team collaboration to create a uniform customer journey.
• Manufacturing floor staff and procurement managers may collaborate to reduce excess inventory and ensure stock availability.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. Cross-functional collaboration has endless applications and possibilities depending on the business requirements.

Importance of cross-functional collaboration

So why would you want different departments to collaborate? The future belongs to cross-team collaboration. According to Deloitte, “We’re seeing a shift from hierarchies to cross-functional teams. Adopting team structures can improve organizational performance, while not doing so puts you at the risk of falling behind.”

We’ve covered some use cases above but the benefits of cross-functional collaboration go beyond that. These include:

Increased innovation

When you involve people from different parts of the business, you get different points of view. The combination of these unique perspectives can lead to creative ideas for solving problems and lifting production.

Better efficiency

Cross-functional collaboration can make your business operations more efficient. The more different departments collaborate, the more their workflows will evolve and improve.

For example, if a manufacturing company suddenly loses its regular supplier, sales representatives, the ordering department, and the warehouse manager can unite to find a new vendor.

With this cross-team collaboration, they have a high chance of quickly finding a new supplier that satisfies the criteria established by all three of them.

Faster acceptance and implementation of change

When you involve people from different spheres in a change initiative from the beginning, you also get their empathy, buy-in, and trust. And they spread this acceptance to other people in their respective teams.

The result? Everyone’s on the same page, and there are fewer delays in execution. For example, some companies have orientation programs where a new employee is required to spend some time in each department.

This leads to a better understanding of the challenges and decision-making processes in different parts of the business. So whatever team the employee ends up with, he’d still be able to welcome changes introduced by other teams. 

Enhanced organizational knowledge

This one’s a pretty obvious benefit of cross-team collaboration. When you collaborate with other departments, you also get to know the tools, processes, and best practices they are using.

The inner workings of a different department help you learn lessons that you can implement in your own team. For example, they might be using a better tool for data visualization which is also cheaper than yours.

Plus, you get a better sense of how your work and the other team’s work fits into the bigger picture.

Ways to streamline cross-functional collaboration

As you can see, solving problems that affect multiple teams or departments goes a long way in giving you an edge against the competition.

You may think that bringing people together from different teams would be easy, since they’re all part of the same company. But that’s often not the case, especially in medium and large-sized businesses.

Different departments may have conflicting agendas, values, goals, and priorities. And these differences prevent them from progressing on cross-functional projects.

So let’s see the core steps you can take to improve cross-functional collaboration in your business.

Have a clear vision

30% of employees worldwide cite inadequate vision as the reason for the failure of projects in their companies.

Image Source: PMI

If that’s the case for regular projects, you can imagine how high it would be for cross-functional projects.

When you don’t share a concrete reason for the existence of a cross-functional project, why would anyone prioritize it over the tasks within their own team?

Be transparent with the teams involved about why you started the project. Tell them why they were chosen for it. And clarify what’s the end goal.

For example, if you are launching an onboarding program with a mentor from each department, the vision could be to quickly transform new hires into long-term assets.

The more open your communication, the more invested different departments will be in the project’s success.

Gather the right team members

How you build your cross-functional team plays a big role in your project’s success.

For example, having a finance expert in the team will be crucial for a cross-functional project that involves cutting energy costs and becoming a more eco-friendly company. Plus, you’ll also need PR experts that can spread the story in news outlets and give the whole thing a positive spin.

When putting together a cross-functional team, also consider the diversity and influence exerted by every member within the organization. People who are well-liked and respected even outside their immediate departments make perfect candidates for cross-functional initiatives.

Clarify roles and responsibilities

Do any of these ring a bell?

“I thought he/she was going to do it.”

“I keep butting heads with someone in the other team doing my job.”

“I am reporting to two managers from different teams with different ideas on what my job is.”

If you don’t clear up the expectations from each cross-functional team member, your team will remain confused about what exactly they should do, and who will carry out each task.

Remember, employees with clarity on their roles report a high level of satisfaction (75%), effectiveness (86%), and productivity (83%).

Image Source: Effectory

So when engaging in cross-team collaboration, make sure to clearly organize both individual and collective tasks for your workers. Every employee should know what tasks they are supposed to do on their own, and what is to be done in collaboration with other team members.

Put up roles for everyone else to see

A study of American workers across many industries found that 20% end up duplicating the work of others. The reason? Not being able to reach the concerned coworker.

Image Source: Panopto

So while it’s good to clarify roles and responsibilities for each team member, they must also know what everyone else is doing and responsible for. This will help you in two ways:

• There will be no repeat or duplicate work. If someone is already handling a task, another person will not take it up.
• When a team member runs into a problem or needs some information, they’ll know who to reach out to.

The basic information you should openly display for each team member includes:

• Full name
• Department name and job title
• Role within the cross-functional project
• Contact information

‍ A great way to streamline this process is to use an employee directory. Blink, for example, is an internal communication app that offers this feature.

It lets you create a directory where information about each worker can be displayed. Plus, employees can search or reach anyone in the directory via instant messaging. 

Ensure clear and regular communication

The ability to communicate the goals, status, and outcome of your team's work is crucial for cross-functional collaboration. When cross-functional teams don’t discuss project updates and requirements with one another, they cannot realize their full potential.

But cross-functional communication can be tricky. People are occupied with projects within their immediate teams, and no one may be willing to go the extra mile to communicate with other departments.

A great way to make communication easy for everyone is by implementing simple communication channels. Even better if you can provide a designated space for employees to share updates, exchange messages, and share documents.

That way, you make it easy for different departments to share information without switching between multiple apps.

Another thing you should do is to create a concrete communication strategy for your cross-functional project. The communication strategy will clarify how and when to send updates, and set communication expectations for the teams involved.

Create comprehensive documentation

Cross-functional projects are usually big, and big projects are scary. There are many moving parts that can overwhelm the teams involved. They may not know where to begin, how to carry out a task, or whom to ask.

In such a situation, documenting every aspect of the project can be a huge help. It clarifies processes and boosts productivity in both the short and long term.

Documenting involves writing down details about the project goals, baseline measurements, ongoing tasks, expected results, and more. Then making all this information available to the departments that have a stake in the cross-functional project.

You can begin by creating a project timeline to set and communicate the main tasks and a schedule based on when they should be completed as well as establish a project baseline.

Take construction projects, for example. These are typically complex cross-functional ventures because they require the design, procurement, and construction teams to collaborate deeply with one another.

And they have many tasks and subtasks to be managed on a strict timeline, as delays can lead to increased costs. Here’s what a project timeline might look like for such a project.

Image Source: GanttPRO

This level of detail in your documentation goes a long way in showing both the big-picture view and small tasks associated with the project, making the project vision easy to digest for all the team members.

Conclusion: how to streamline cross-functional collaboration

Cross-functional collaboration can be daunting, but its potential for your business can’t be ignored. It’s an opportunity to leverage the leadership, communication, and problem-solving skills from all corners of your company and use them to drive powerful results.

So use these strategies to set a solid foundation for cross-functional success. As your teams start collaborating, encourage them to keep adjusting and learning from the experience. Because these lessons will help you improve your organization’s ability to facilitate cross-functional collaboration even further.

And if you’re looking for a tool that can help enhance cross-functional collaboration at work, look no further than Blink. Request a free demo today.

Today’s employees routinely use digital tools to manage their personal lives — for banking, shopping, fitness, and even dating — and now expect a similar level of convenience and connectivity in their professional environments.

Forward-thinking organizations are meeting these expectations through employee experience software platforms that transform how teams communicate and engage. Solutions such as Blink’s employee experience platform enable staff to feel more connected, motivated, and loyal to their company by simplifying communication and recognition.

Frontline teams, in particular, benefit from a unified employee experience solution. The “frontline connection gap” often leaves these employees isolated from leadership and peers, reducing both satisfaction and retention.

A mobile-first employee experience platform, such as Blink, bridges that gap by bringing everyone together wherever they work. It gives each employee a stronger sense of belonging, supports regular recognition, and creates continuous communication that makes work more fulfilling.

This guide from Blink outlines some of the best employee experience software platforms available today — helping you identify the right solution to connect your workforce and elevate engagement across your organization.

Whether your organization has frontline, desk-based, or hybrid teams, an employee experience software platform like Blink’s employee experience platform helps you meet and exceed modern employee expectations and deliver measurable improvements across engagement, operations, and culture. Here’s what effective employee experience software can help you achieve:

Enhanced employee engagement

Low employee engagement costs the global economy $8.8 trillion, according to Gallup. Employee experience platforms like Blink enable two-way communication, recognition, and collaboration that increase loyalty, satisfaction, and productivity.

Streamlined HR processes

The best platforms automate repetitive and time-consuming HR tasks such as time tracking, performance appraisals, and routine communication. By handling these automatically, HR teams free up time for human-touch, value-add work that improves the overall employee experience.

Improved talent management

Around 65% of frontline employees are unsure how to progress in their careers. Employee experience software provides continuous feedback, coaching, and development tools that help managers identify high-potential talent and guide employees toward advancement.

Data-driven insights

Comprehensive reporting and analytics capabilities enable organizations to measure engagement, sentiment, and performance. Blink’s platform, for example, supplies real-time insights that support better decisions, highlight trends, and surface issues early.

Employee recognition and empowerment

Employee appreciation and self-service tools make staff feel valued and informed. Access to essential information anytime, anywhere fosters a sense of support and connection across the organization.

A positive company culture

Transparent communication and meaningful connection — both core features of leading platforms like Blink — build positive company culture. When employees feel proud of where they work, satisfaction rises, churn decreases, and employer branding strengthens.

Key things to look for when choosing an employee experience software platform

Now that the benefits of an employee experience software platform are clear, it’s important to identify the key capabilities that define an effective solution. When choosing your platform, consider these essential features — many of which are core to Blink’s employee experience platform:

User-friendly interface

The best employee experience platforms minimize the learning curve. They should feel intuitive and familiar from day one, encouraging quick adoption across all teams.

Personalization and customization

Every organization is different. Choose a platform that lets you tailor tools and workflows to your company’s structure and employee needs.

Employee self-service

When employees can access the information and tools they need independently, HR teams spend less time handling routine requests and more time on strategic, people-focused initiatives.

Integration capabilities

For a seamless employee experience, ensure your platform integrates smoothly with existing business systems — from scheduling and payroll to communication tools. Blink, for example, integrates across multiple systems to provide a unified digital workplace.

Mobile accessibility

Frontline workers and remote employees often lack equal access to company tools. A mobile-first platform like Blink enables engagement and communication anywhere — whether on the shop floor, in the field, or during a commute.

Analytics and reporting

Select software that delivers robust analytics on engagement, satisfaction, and retention. Data-driven insight helps HR teams make informed decisions and address trends early.

Comprehensive feature set

To reduce the need for multiple apps, look for a platform that combines employee engagement, feedback, rewards, performance management, and learning and development. Blink’s platform consolidates these into one accessible hub, simplifying management and improving the overall employee experience.

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15 best employee experience software platforms

1. Blink

Blink is a leading employee experience app and communication platform purpose-built for frontline teams. As a mobile-first solution, Blink unifies dispersed workers and connects them with leadership through an intuitive, easy-to-use interface.

Users can quickly launch pre-loaded or custom employee surveys, add mandatory reads to a shared company news feed, recognize colleagues for outstanding work, and access real-time insights on engagement, satisfaction, and retention.

Built around frontline accessibility, Blink’s Hub centralizes essential information, including pay stubs, schedules, and key documents. Its interface encourages high adoption and consistent daily use — ensuring every employee stays informed, valued, and connected.

Key features

• News feed
• Employee surveys
• Employee recognition
• Secure chat function
• Content hub (Blink Hub)
• Insights and analytics
• Integrations
• Mobile-friendly design
• Content translation

Even after identifying the right employee experience management software, securing senior leadership buy-in remains essential. Before presenting your case, gather evidence and insights in the following key areas — all central to the successful implementation of a platform like Blink.

Developed by the team at Blink, the platform brings together communication, engagement, and HR functionality in one secure space. It’s designed to strengthen connections and alignment across all levels of an organization while reducing the administrative burden on HR teams. The essential guide to executive buy-in for frontline employee experience

Scalability: Evaluate how your chosen platform will adapt to your company’s future needs, including long-term growth and an expanding workforce. Blink’s platform is designed to scale seamlessly as organizations expand, supporting larger teams without adding administrative complexity.

Implementation: Assess how straightforward it is to deploy your software and integrate it with existing systems. A solution such as Blink simplifies this step with pre-built integrations and guided onboarding.

User adoption: An employee experience platform only delivers value when employees actively use it. Confirm that your software has a proven record of adoption. For example, 97% of employees at Care Synergy now use the Blink app, demonstrating how intuitive design drives engagement.

Vendor reputation and support: Review customer testimonials and case studies to verify a provider’s reliability and service quality. Blink’s long-term partnerships and customer success programs help ensure ongoing performance and satisfaction across industries.

Case study: Elara Caring

Elara Caring employs more than 32,000 caregivers who provide in-home and hospice support to patients across the United States. The organization faced a significant communication and coordination challenge:

• Without company-issued phone numbers or email addresses, caregivers felt disconnected from both colleagues and headquarters.
• An outdated manual scheduling process left hundreds of shifts unfilled each week.
• The existing HR platform failed to meet employees' operational and engagement needs.
  

To close these gaps, Elara Caring implemented Blink’s employee experience platform, developed by joinblink.com. The mobile-first platform unified essential communication, scheduling, and feedback tools into a single, secure, accessible application. Managers and caregivers could now share updates through a company news feed, manage shifts in real time, and recognize great work — all from their smartphones.

The impact was immediate. Workforce efficiency improved, communication bottlenecks were eliminated, and employees felt more connected to both their teams and leadership. Ninety-five percent of employees now report stronger connections to Elara, and 96% would recommend Blink’s platform to others in their field.

Read the full Elara Caring case study on joinblink.com

2. Culture Amp

Culture Amp is an excellent choice if you want to improve your performance tracking process. You can set and track employee targets, create personalized L&D plans, and access historical conversation and 1:1 data so managers can provide actionable feedback.   

This employee experience management software also gives you access to a ton of data. This provides a great basis for analysis and insight. And the platform even does some of the hard work for you too, using employee engagement stats to predict staff turnover.

Key features

• Reporting and analytics
• Turnover prediction tool
• Performance reviews
• Goal tracking

Pricing

Contact sales team for prices

3. Bonusly

Bonusly is a great option for employee recognition. Employees meet personalized targets and build up points, which they can then use to claim a selection of rewards,  all via the platform.

Whether you want your team to go above and beyond for customers, meet their sales quota, or simply engage with a request for employee feedback, Bonusly helps you to promote and recognize the employee behavior you most want to see.

Key features

• Peer-to-peer recognition
• Employee rewards
• Goal setting
• Reporting and analytics

Pricing

• Core: $3 per user/month
• Pro: $5 per user/month

Contact sales team for custom plans

4. Lattice

With Lattice, you’ll find it easy to launch employee surveys, celebrate employee wins, and get real-time experience data with the help of the platform’s Pulse feature and sentiment analysis. Lattice also supports employee development opportunities. It connects individual work to business outcomes so employees can view their progress easily.

Key features

• Reporting and analytics
• Employee surveys
• Employee recognition
• Goal management

Pricing

• Performance Management + OKRs and Goals: $11 per user/month
• Engagement: +$4 per user/month
• Grow: +$4 per user/month
• Compensation: $+6 per user/month

5.  Qualtrics XM

Qualtrics XM offers several products, one of which they’ve designed specifically for people teams. The employee experience platform uses AI and automation, so you can continually gather and assess employee feedback and get to know employee views at every point in the employee life cycle.

Data analytics tools help you to connect employee feedback to customer experience and business outcomes – so you can target employee experience improvements where they stand to make the most difference.  

Key features

• 24/7 technical support
• Automation tools
• Analytics and reporting
• Action plans

Pricing

Contact sales team for prices

6. Workhuman

Workhuman is built around social recognition. Team-based social feeds support peer-to-peer appreciation. Employees gain recognition points, which they can exchange for personalized and locally sourced rewards. And an AI-powered Inclusion Advisor gives real-time feedback on recognition posts to prevent unconscious bias and promote a culture of belonging.

Key features

• Employee recognition
• Performance management
• Translation into 34+ languages
• Community building

Pricing

Contact sales team for prices

7.  Mo

Mo is one of the best employee experience software platforms for team communication and appreciation. It allows you to share successes, recognize results, and reward good work.

Standout features include the Mo assistant, which helps people managers to remember work anniversaries and prompts them to appreciate employees who haven’t had a pat on the back in a while, and the social feed, where you can start conversations, prompt employees to start conversations, and ask for employee feedback.

Key features

• Team appreciation
• Social feed
• Employee feedback
• Insights

Pricing

• Starter: $3 per user/month
• Level Up: $5 per user/month

Contact sales team for custom plans

8. Motivosity

Motivosity provides tools for every stage of the employee journey. From recruitment to onboarding to development to career progression and even an employee’s company exit experience. The basic plan gives you access to a company social feed, great for important announcements and getting to know co-workers. Add-ons include Recognition and Rewards, Manager Development, and Employee Insights.

Key features

• Social feed
• Employee recognition
• Manager training
• Surveys and insights

Pricing

• Motivosity: $2 per user/month
• Recognition and Rewards: +$2 per user/month
• Manager Development: +$2 per user/month
• Employee Insights: +$2 per user/month

9.  WorkTango

WorkTango (formerly Kazoo) allows you to highlight the strengths and skills of peers and employees, while a points and rewards system incentivizes key behaviors. It’s one of the best employee engagement platforms for teams who want to make recognition an integral part of their company culture.

Key features

• Employee recognition
• Goal setting and feedback
• Surveys
• Analytics and reporting

Pricing

Contact sales team for prices

10. 15Five

15Five is one of the best employee experience software options if you’re looking to connect employee work with business objectives. Managers and employees can create career paths that motivate performance. Employees can identify their strengths and how these align with their goals.

Key features

• Goal setting tools
• Feedback
• Employee recognition
• Manager coaching

Pricing

All of the following prices are billed annually:

• Engage: $4 per user/month
• Perform: $8 per user/month
• Focus: $8 per user/month
• Total Platform: $14 per user/month

11. Leapsome

Leapsome is a solid employee engagement software, particularly if you’re looking for a solution that can scale with your company. You can select the modules you need, adapting the software to the size and budget of your organization. With Leapsome, you can run meaningful, well-structured meetings. You can also congratulate co-workers publicly and share private feedback too.

Key features

• Employee feedback
• Learning and development
• Goal setting
• Employee competency framework

Pricing

Pricing starts at $8 per user/month with the option to add on the extra features you need

12. BambooHR

BambooHR provides a huge range of HR tools. Teams can use it to track payroll, hours worked, and paid time off. The platform offers recruitment and L&D tracking tools.

As well as making life easier for HR teams, BambooHR has a couple of features designed to improve the employee experience. Wellbeing and eNPS surveys help teams to understand the employee perspective, while performance tracking tools support employee progression. 

Key features

• Performance reviews
• Time tracking
• Payroll management
• Applicant tracking system (ATS)

Pricing

Contact sales team for prices

13. Officevibe

If you’re looking for an easy and effective employee survey tool, Officevibe is an excellent choice. Officevibe is just one of the HR products available under the Workleap umbrella and this offering is laser-focused on employee experience.

The platform gives managers tools to become better leaders and build happier teams. Pulse and customized surveys, peer-to-peer recognition, and 1-1 meeting tools that guide meaningful and productive conversations are all at a manager’s disposal.

Key features

• Surveys
• Employee feedback
• Employee recognition
• Performance tracking

Pricing

• Free: $0 per user/month
• Essential: $5 per user/month
• Pro: $8 per user/month

14. Workvivo

Another good employee experience management software, Workvivo helps organizations streamline their communications and showcase their company culture, even when teams work remotely. When posting on the social feed, employees can link their posts to company values and goals. And with the Badge Feature, managers can recognize employee achievements publicly.

Key features

• Social feed
• Employee recognition
• Content hub
• Analytics & insights

Pricing

Contact sales team for prices

Read more: Workvivo alternatives

15. Jostle

An intuitive platform with a quick and easy setup process, Jostle is another popular employee engagement platform. It works to connect everyone within an organization, providing a social feed and a space for shared documents.

Managers can set tasks and then use built-in chat functions to track progress. They can also separate the social feed by location or team, ensuring that the right information reaches the right people.

Key features

• Social feed
• Surveys
• Peer-to-peer recognition
• Document and policy sharing

Pricing

Prices depend upon the number of employees you have. For an organization with 15-50 employees, prices are as follows:

• Bronze: $5 per user/month
• Silver: $9 per user/month
• Gold: $12 per user/month

Smaller organizations can expect to pay more per user. Larger organizations can expect to pay less. Prices for the Platinum plan are available from the sales team.

Additional considerations for HR teams

You may already be sold on a particular employee experience management software, but getting senior leadership buy-in is a vital next step. Before entering conversations about the type of tool you’d like to implement, be sure to gather information on all of the following:

Read more: The essential guide to executive buy-in for frontline employee experience

• Scalability – Find out if and how your chosen platform will respond to your company’s future needs, considering long-term company growth and an increase in the number of employees.
  
• Implementation – Determine how easy it is to implement your chosen software and whether it integrates with your other existing systems.
  
• User adoption – An employee experience platform provides very little value if employees don’t use it. Check whether your chosen platform has a user-friendly interface and a history of high adoption rates. We’re proud that 97% of employees at Care Synergy are now using the Blink app. Find out more by watching our on-demand webinar.
  
• Vendor reputation and support – Take a look at customer reviews, testimonials, and case studies to find out whether your software provider has a good track record in terms of product quality and client care.

Case Study: Elara Caring

Elara’s 32,000 carers spend their workdays caring for patients in their homes or in hospice settings. The company faced a million-dollar communication problem:

• Without company phone numbers or email addresses, carers felt disconnected from their co-workers and head office
• Carers wanted shift opportunities but an inefficient manual system meant hundreds of shifts went unfilled each week
• The company’s existing HR platform was failing to meet the needs of employees and the wider organization

Elara saw a solution in Blink. Our platform gathered all the information and tools that employees needed in one easy-to-use platform that everyone could access from their smartphones. Employees and managers had access to a social feed, shift scheduling, employee feedback and employee recognition tools.  

The result? Improved workforce efficiency and streamlined communications. Thanks to Blink, Elara has transformed the employee experience. 95% of employees now feel more connected to Elara and 96% would recommend the platform.

Read the full Elara case study.

London, 1 November 2023 – Bus operator Abellio London has rolled out Blink, a mobile app that connects management with frontline, or deskless, workers.

Abellio, which operates bus services on behalf of Transport for London and serves 430,000 customers across Greater London every day, will connect its 2,800 employees across six depots and Transport UK Rail Replacement services through Blink’s super-app. Employees can connect, share information and communicate with each other wherever they are which, until now, had been impossible.

Abellio’s investment in Blink gives every worker digital connectivity to the organisation and each other, improving convenience, flexibility and inclusion. This investment forms part of Abellio’s ongoing initiatives to support inclusion within the business and tackle the national bus driver shortage. Transport for London recently revealed they were operating with a shortage of 2,510 drivers, and nationwide, many operators are still experiencing significant staff shortages, with bus vacancy rate at 6.8%, resulting in recent calls for bus drivers to be added to the Shortage Occupation List so operators can recruit drivers from abroad.

Due to the nature of their work, frontline teams – such as bus drivers – are often subject to manual processes and paperwork. They might not have immediate access to some of the tools or information that support them to deliver a positive experience to customers. Across the UK, frontline teams can feel disconnected from the rest of the workforce and, in some cases, undervalued: recent research found that only 39% of frontline workers feel heard, and that 42% are considering quitting their job.

Blink tackles these issues head-on. Beyond communication, the Blink app provides seamless, always-on access to external applications across any device. Abellio’s bus drivers only need to sign into Blink once via secure Single Sign On in order to gain access to all the key systems and information needed for their roles, including the driver allocation system (DAS); payslip information and payslips; and company updates and information that have traditionally been shared by depot notice boards, social media groups or via their line managers.

Previously, drivers needed to access multiple systems to complete certain aspects of their role which was time-consuming and required  different passwords and/or access to a computer. Mobile-first with desktop capabilities,Blink brings everything together in one super-app for Abellio’s drivers and management team. Drivers can complete their day-to-day tasks or reports via their phones in real-time and are kept in the loop at the same time as everyone else in the organisation. Crucially, they are able to directly communicate and share feedback with their senior leadership team, giving them a greater say in what’s happening.

“Abellio actively champions inclusivity, as a business that employs 43 different nationalities,  we have always prided ourselves on our inclusive culture,” commented Abellio Operations and HR Director, Lorna Murphy. “Differences are very much valued, and our company's success depends on it.  We needed an inclusive and simple way to bring our teams together and wanted to offer greater access to information and process for our frontline drivers.

“Blink fosters inclusiveness because everyone in the organisation has a mobile phone, meaning they can log in and access everything they need from wherever they are. It enables two-way conversations and brings connectivity to everyone in the business.”

Sean Nolan, CEO and Co-Founder of Blink, added: “Abellio London is on a mission to put a stop to the frontline worker gap and bring a sense of belonging to employees wherever they are. It recognises just how much an engaged frontline directly impacts how successful they are as a team. Amongst our customers we have seen that by fostering a more engaged and inclusive culture, productivity, quality, care, commitment, and retention will surely follow.

“The company is doing this by putting better company information at their drivers’ fingertips, while giving managers real-time access to frontline intelligence on employee performance and engagement. This will save them hundreds of hours, which they had been previously losing to disparate communications channels.”

The Blink app will also replace all the paper-based forms that currently require drivers to return to depot to complete. Thanks to the app’s intuitive interface, drivers can manage their schedules, payment information, and form-filling from wherever they are and whatever their technical ability.

Murphy added: “Using Blink, Abellio bus drivers can access a system of simple pathways that makes it easy for them to report issues, start a conversation with management or colleagues, or go about their day-to-day tasks such as checking shifts and accessing payslips, reconnecting them back to the organisation they work for via one simple, easy-to-use app.

“At a time when recruitment and retention in the industry is paramount, we hope that Blink, and tools like it, will support teams to feel connected to the business. Blink will help us to create a vibrant and open culture that champions better employee engagement, and give our drivers a channel through which they can voice their queries, ideas and concerns.”

As well as providing company-wide communications, Abellio can use Blink to create specific groups for supported work conversations, something that has been proven beneficial for employee wellness. Blink’s frontline intelligence and analysis capabilities will also help the leadership team to understand what employees need to perform, and how best to deliver it.

Blink has been proven to reach 95% of employees and reduce employee turnover by 26%. It also triples response rates, sees five times the number of adoption of tools thanks to its single sign-on(SSO), and gets a nine out of ten ‘ease of use’ rating from end users.

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Press contacts

For more information or interviews, please get in touch with kate@transatlanticent.com | 07980 921961.

About Abellio

Abellio London is part ofTransport UK and operates 55 bus routes in the capital on behalf of Transport for London (TfL), plus rail replacement and event services across the UK.

The business operates around nine percent of London’s bus network, running over 800 vehicles and employing 2,500staff across six depots in Central, South, and West London. Abellio is a pioneer in EV public transport, operating over 100 no-emission fully electric buses in London.

Abellio London was a double winner in the 2021 Bus and Coach Awards and is a finalist in the British QualityFoundation’s EFQM Excellence awards, following a 5-star rating in the BQF Recognised For Excellence assessment. In 2020 it was named Operator of the Year at the London Transport Awards and also helped bring the first Caetano electric single-deck buses to the UK, which were the safest in London with the inclusion of TfL Bus Safety Standard measures. Since 2019 it has held Earned Recognition status with the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA), which recognises it as an exemplary operator, and in 2023 earned ISO 45001 accreditation across all six depots.

About Blink

Blink is the world's best super-app for deskless workers, with a mission to revolutionise work life for the frontline, closing the digital divide and enabling distributed organisations to communicate effectively and engage together like never before. Blink is used by over 200,000 frontline workers at industry-leading companies including Stagecoach, Elara Caring and Domino’s. Each user opens the app an average of seven times a day, helping lower frontline attrition by up to 25%.

Founded in 2015 and with offices in London, Boston, and Sydney, Blink is a Leader in the G2 Grid® for Best EmployeeEngagement Software and named in the 2022 Deloitte Technology Fast 50.

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This article is part of Blink’s “frontline first” series: content created specifically for leaders of deskless or distributed teams. We know that the job of frontline leadership is entirely different from managing ‘desk-based’ teams, so this is for you and your unique set of challenges.

It's somehow nearly the end of 2022, which means it's high time to start looking ahead to the year ahead.

For leaders in frontline organizations, this can be more than a little daunting. After two years of challenges caused by the pandemic and the Great Resignation, the looming prospect of a recession promises yet more adapting and innovating in order to survive and thrive.

So we'd like to help.

After working with hundreds of frontline organizations, we've created a short guide that breaks down the core principles to building a stable and successful frontline workforce for 2023 and beyond.

You can download a copy for free here or by clicking on the image below - we hope you find it useful and inspirational as you look to the new year.