## Choosing the right tools for efficient communication can provide a massive productivity boost.
Communication consumes a [huge fraction of
time](https://blog.rescuetime.com/slack-and-email-cost/) in an organization. [A
recent
survey](https://www.grammarly.com/business/Grammarly_The_State_Of_Business_Communication.pdf)
found that knowledge workers spend half of their work day on communication, yet
72% of business leaders observe that their team struggles to communicate
effectively. [The
report](https://www.grammarly.com/business/Grammarly_The_State_Of_Business_Communication.pdf)
estimates that businesses lose an average of over $1,000/month *for each
employee* due to ineffective communication.
One of the most impactful ways to improve communication in your organization is
choosing tools that enable efficient communication.
**We created Zulip to empower teams to collaborate effectively**, so that they
can accomplish amazing things together. As you’ll learn below, Zulip’s organized
team chat app makes communication dramatically more efficient than other popular
apps like Slack and Microsoft Teams, which push teams towards chaotic and
disruptive communication patterns.
Switching to Zulip is thus one of the best ways to **increase the overall
productivity of your team**.
> Zulip is everything Slack is, but it's smarter and more powerful.
>
> — [Zulip review in The Register](https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/28/zulip_open_source_chat_collaboration_software/)
## Zulip’s unique topic-based threading model makes efficient communication possible. Here’s how.
In Zulip, **streams** determine who gets a message. Each conversation within a
stream is labeled with a **topic**, which keeps everything organized.
You can read Zulip one conversation at a time, seeing each message in context,
no matter how many other conversations are going on.
If anything is out of place, it’s easy to move messages, rename and split
topics, or even move a topic to a different stream.
## Zulip makes it easy to follow relevant conversations.
With well-organized chat that shows each message in context, it’s easy to stay
informed and connected. Everyone can follow and contribute to discussions that
matter to them, without wasting time reading every message, or stressing about
missing something important.
> “Slack’s interface was too slow and clunky, and the more channels you’re in,
> the harder it is to use. Zulip’s UI makes it easy to access all the information you
> need.”
>
> — Jon Jensen, CTO of [End Point Dev](https://www.endpointdev.com/about/) software
> consultancy ([case study](/case-studies/end-point/))
- **Read each message in context.**
With each conversation in its own space, you can coordinate multiple projects,
hold a virtual standup, and plan the next team social — all in one place. No
more scrolling up and down through dozens of messages to track down all parts of
a conversation. No more context-switching again and again as you catch up on
your chat messages.
- **Find the conversations that matter to you.**
Conversations are well-organized and labeled, so you will never again wade
through hundreds of messages to avoid missing the few that are important.
Leaders and cross-functional collaborators can quickly review busy communication
channels for places where their input is needed.
- **Never miss an important message.**
New messages will pop a long-running thread to the top, rather than languishing
in a forgotten sidebar. You’ll never create a new channel (and later forget to
check it) because your team’s main channel is busy — a busy stream
works just fine in Zulip! For timely messages, Zulip alerts you with [fully
customizable](/help/stream-notifications) mobile, email and desktop
notifications.
> “With Zulip, I can manage hundreds of participants across two communities
> extremely efficiently, and I don’t feel stressed.”
>
> — Dan Allen, [Asciidoctor](https://asciidoctor.org/) open-source project lead ([case
> study](/case-studies/asciidoctor/))
## Zulip empowers teams to work flexibly anytime, from anywhere, without interruptions.
With organized team chat that is designed for both synchronous and asynchronous
communication, everyone can be included in decision-making without being online
at the same time. Team members can focus when they need to, and contribute to
discussions asynchronously without interrupting their flow.
> “Zulip lets us move faster, connect with each other better, and have
> interactive technical discussions that are organized, recorded, and welcoming
> to other people.”
>
> — Josh Triplett, [Rust Language
> team](https://www.rust-lang.org/governance/teams/lang) co-lead ([case
> study](/case-studies/rust/))
- **Take advantage of everyone’s expertise.**
Zulip’s topics make it easy to pick up a conversation thread hours (or days!)
later. With other chat tools, being unavailable when a discussion is happening
often means your perspective will never be heard. Zulip enables asynchronous
participation — feedback from team members who were in a meeting or work
from another time zone is seamlessly incorporated into the discussion.
- **Create focus time.**
Zulip removes the stress of needing to respond to chat messages right away.
Rather than task-switching each time a new message comes in, you can focus on
your work for a few hours, and then follow up asynchronously on conversations
you’d like to participate in. Knowledge workers will be happier and more
productive when only truly urgent messages interrupt their flow.
- **Integrate feedback from leaders.**
Since Zulip works great for asynchronous follow-ups, leaders with busy schedules
can weigh in easily and effectively when they are available. There is no need
for a barrage of @-mentions to get leaders’ attention, and the full context for
the decision is right there in the conversation thread for everyone's quick
reference.
> “Using Zulip significantly increases the size of the team for which a manager
> can meaningfully know what’s going on.”
>
> — Gaute Lund, co-founder of iDrift AS company ([case
> study](/case-studies/idrift/))
## Zulip helps you make better decisions, faster.
With an integrated communication hub that works great for everything from quick
check-ins to collaborating on the most challenging problems, you can make
decisions without the inefficiency of time-consuming group meetings, chaotic
chat channels, or clunky back-and-forth over email.
> Zulip’s topic-based threading helps us manage discussions with clarity,
> ensuring the right people can pay attention to the right messages. This
> makes our large-group discussion far more manageable than what we’ve
> experienced with Skype and Slack.
>
> — Grahame Grieve, founder of [FHIR](https://www.hl7.org/fhir/overview.html)
> health care standards body
- **Have substantive conversations over chat.**
With Zulip, there’s no longer a reason to email your teammates — you get the
organization of an email inbox together with all the features of a modern chat
app, like instant delivery of messages, emoji reactions, typing notifications,
@-mentions, and more.
- **Reduce reliance on meetings.**
Using Zulip, you can discuss complex topics and make decisions with input from
all stakeholders, without the overhead of scheduling meeting. Your team's
time and energy will be spent focusing on their work, not dialing into calls.
- **Understand past decisions.**
With conversations organized by topic, you can review prior discussions to
understand past work, explanations, and decisions — your chat history becomes a
knowledge base. If a conversation shifts to a new topic, it’s easy to reorganize
by moving messages to a different [topic](/help/move-content-to-another-topic)
or [stream](/help/move-content-to-another-stream). There is no more rifling
through unrelated chatter to find the context you need. You can even [link to a
Zulip
conversation](/help/link-to-a-message-or-conversation#link-to-zulip-from-anywhere)
from emails, docs, issue trackers, code comments, or anywhere else.
> “Switching to Zulip has turned out to be one of the best
> decisions we’ve made.”
>
> — Nick Bergson-Shilcock, [Recurse Center](https://www.recurse.com/) co-founder
> and CEO ([case study](/case-studies/recurse-center/))