mirror of https://github.com/zulip/zulip.git
89 lines
4.4 KiB
Markdown
89 lines
4.4 KiB
Markdown
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[Semsee](https://semsee.com/) is a technology startup in the commercial
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insurance space, building intelligent software that digitizes slow manual
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processes. Originally based out of an office in New York, Semsee moved to a
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remote-work model during the pandemic, and now has several satellite teams
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across the US.
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Semsee adopted Zulip early on in its journey. “We didn’t plan to be remote,”
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says James van Lommel, [Director of
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Engineering](https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-v-91a65219/) at Semsee. “But now
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that we are remote, it’s good to have a communication tool that really backs
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that up.”
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> “Now that we are remote, it’s good to have a communication tool that really
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> backs that up.”
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>
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> — James van Lommel, Director of Engineering at [Semsee](https://semsee.com/)
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## Looking for something better than Slack
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James van Lommel joined Semsee in 2018 to lead the engineering team. At the
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time, the company was using Slack. James knew his choice of communication
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platform would have broad implications: “Communication helps feed the type of
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culture you have at a company,” James says.
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James had used Slack extensively in his prior work experience. “Seeing how Slack
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gets used, especially as a company grows larger, I knew I wanted something
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better,” he recalls. “If you are not using Slack *all the time*, you can’t keep
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up with what’s happening.” James wanted a chat tool that would create breathing
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room for focused work, in-person conversations, and different work schedules.
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> “Seeing how Slack gets used, especially as a company grows larger, I knew I
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> wanted something better.”
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>
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> — James van Lommel, Director of Engineering at [Semsee](https://semsee.com/)
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In addition, as a security expert, James was interested in a self-hosted
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solution. “There is so much sensitive data that goes into a chat tool,” he says.
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“When we self-host, the messages don’t live on anyone else’s cloud.”
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When James discovered Zulip, the topic-based threading model piqued his
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interest. “I didn’t want Mattermost or another self-hosted Slack clone,” he
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says. James quickly set up a Zulip server — he found that the instructions for
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self-hosting were easy to follow, and worked without a hitch. After trying Zulip
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for a few days with some coworkers, James was convinced that Zulip was the right
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choice for Semsee. “We need our employees to be able to come to the right place,
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and have a conversation about one thing,” he says. “Zulip solves that pain
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point.”
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## An efficient way to organize communication
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These days, Zulip is at the core of company communication at Semsee. Email is
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rarely used for internal communications. For jumping on a call, Zulip’s native
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call integration is an easy starting point. System monitoring and software
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development processes are integrated with Zulip via the API. For example, a
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custom integration sends logging data from Semsee’s product into Zulip, with a
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stream and topic configured based on the deployed environment.
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New employees adapt easily to Zulip’s organized conversations. By reading
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ongoing discussions, they quickly get an intuition for when to start a new
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topic, and what kinds of topic names work well. “Once they get used to Zulip,
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they are just rolling with it, and I don’t hear any complaints,” says James.
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With conversations organized by topic, “people don’t have to scroll through and
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cherry-pick out the messages they need to read,” James says.
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Semsee invites customers to join the company Zulip chat as guests. “Our
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customers just see one stream with one or two topics, so it’s very easy for
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them,” James explains. On the flip side, when Semsee employees are invited to
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join customers’ Slack chats, they miss Zulip. “I don’t like going back to Slack
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now. It’s just not as efficient a way to organize communication,” says James. “A
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few users from an extensive Slack background have told me: ‘Zulip is just
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better.’"
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> “I don’t like going back to Slack now. It’s just not as efficient a way to
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> organize communication.”
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>
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> — James van Lommel, Director of Engineering at [Semsee](https://semsee.com/)
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---
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Check out our guide on [using Zulip for business](/for/business/). You can also
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learn how Zulip is being used at the [Atolio](/case-studies/atolio/) startup,
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the [iDrift AS](/case-studies/idrift/) company, the [End Point
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Dev](/case-studies/end-point/) software consultancy, and the [GUT
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contact](/case-studies/gut-contact/) support agency.
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