It’s more than just a social gathering
On my travels through the blogesphere (looking for something else as it happens), I came across Huddle. Now the name intrigued me because of what it brought to mind.
One definition for huddle is “to gather together privately to talk about or plan something”. I often use it when facilitating in a classroom asking the group to ‘huddle’ around the flip chart to discuss a topic.
The people at Huddle describes it as follows: “With Huddle, you can manage projects, share files and collaborate with people inside and outside of your company, securely. It’s available online, on mobile devices, on the desktop, via Microsoft Office applications, major business social networks and in multiple languages. Simply: if SharePoint was built today, the would have built Huddle.”
Taking a further look around the website, it seems it has a lot going for it to encourage people to work together and learn together more easily and, they stress, securely. I haven’t taken a really close look or opted for the free trial but here’s a low-down on what Huddle offers:
- File sharing and management
Collaboration
Real-time collaboration with web conferencing and phone conferencing
Project management features that sound similar to Outlook
Security features which allow you restrict or open up elements
Customisable for a corporate look and feel
Tracking activity of members and assign individual priviledges and permissions
Individuals have their own profile area
Mobile connectivity across various smart-phones with the ability to access Huddle via other social networks such as LinkedIn
Huddle is cloud-based which means less strain on internal IT infrastructure
With the increase in emphasis on working and learning smarter by enabling channels for collaboration, sharing ideas and best practice, experiential and on-demand learning for improved performance from a bottom-up approach, Huddle may be one solution for organisations out there who see the need for such working and learning practises but are sceptical about using the open social tools.
I’m not so sure they’d be convinced by the name of the product alone. It does seem some social tools out there have been given some strange nom-de-plumes that do little to help sell their benefits to the more serious minded potential user. But that’s a whole different story. If we want to get past the quirky handle, we’re going to have to sell the benefits ourselves.
Huddle, themselves, have given us a good head start.
I was impressed by the list of testimonials and case studies on their site which include organisations who, from my own experience, are very strict about accessibility and security. I’ve taken the list from Huddle’s testimonial page.
- Kia Motors
Akqa
NHS East of England
Dept for Business Innovation& Skills
Kerry
Liberal Democrats
Belgian FPS Social Security
Aggie-Lance
Berkshire Community Foundation
Boots
Rufus Leonard
Bright One
Care for the Family
British Institute for Facilities Management
Cheltenham Brough Council
East of England IDB Ltd
Distinct
Fulham Football Club Foundation
Inform
Government Skills
Plymouth Mind
Post Office
Traffic Management Solutions
University of London Computer Centre
So if you want to get past the sales pitch, how about checking out some of the case studies or even contacting their customers and find out what it’s done for them.
I’ll be very interested in hearing from anyone out there who has implemented Huddle, either tried it out on the free trial or is already up and running with it. How have you found it useful and any tips you might have to help others who are thinking of using this or any similar application.
After I’ve taken a look at the free trial, I’ll share more thoughts here.
