Flowdock vs. Project Insight

Flowdock is well suited for small teams and to environments that doesn't need too much reliability. I think it has some management problems that can make your life difficult if you have to manage a big amount of users. If you want just a tool communication with basic features (without using any integration or robust features) it can be suitable for you. You should try Flowdock using its free version for a small team and compare with others similar products. Flowdock delivers team chat and collaboration features, but is not necessarily the best product. Maybe some usability problems that disturb me won't be so relevant to you.

Incentivized

My rating would vary depending on the types of projects that need to be managed. Since I am in software, I don't think it was an excellent fit to manage software projects unless they are small projects with only a few tasks. On the other hand, if you are needing to manage a wide range of departments that are working on a single project with many moving pieces, then I would think that PI might be a better fit. Think of it as a jack of all trades, but master of none.

Incentivized

• Mobile app experience
• Software integrations
• Notifications

• History tracking for any changes made to data.
• Tracks all milestones and retains records for lifetime of account.
• Easy extracting for reporting purposes.

Incentivized

• One thing a little bit annoying is that a lot of links to others Flowdock sections (preferences, external services, etc) will open a new window/tab. Each click may take you to a new window and you can get lost easily.
• There isn't a quick access list to members of your organization to start a private chat. I took a while to find how to do that. The interface and usability could be better.
• There isn't an app for Windows Phone.
• Sometimes you try to load some conversation and it doesn't show anything. It is not frequently but happens sometimes.

Incentivized

• Not a good fit for all types of projects
• Very Complex

Incentivized

I go with the flow because I'm a newer employee and Flowdock works as advertised. If it were my decision to choose a team communciator for the organization, I'd recommend we go with Slack for its robust features and ever-changing/evolving software integrations. Slack is the outright innovator in the space and will continue to hold that role for some time.

I found Project Insight somewhat opaque overall. I thought the training was sparse and answers to questions few and far in between. There was a lot of power there for the dedicated user/administrator. For me, who was a casual user and administrator, I found support lacking. I didn't administer Project Insight much, just some work on integrations with other tools.

Incentivized

Slack is a similar software.

Private chat or channels are well implemented in both softwares and both are also very easy to setup.

Besides of some usability problemas I think Flowdock is still better than Slack in this user experience and design.

The second point is the price. Flowdock is half price of Slack ($3/month). If you are a student or a non-profit organization, you are able to get some special license.

Incentivized

• When I got to the company where I used Project Insight, we had our own custom tool that fit the tasks that it was designed for but wouldn't grow with the company unless resources were put onto expanding capabilities. We needed something more.
• We replaced that tool with Redmine. It worked well and was easy to use, but it looked pretty dated when we got it, and since we didn't have many resources for managing, it looked dated after a few years without receiving upgrades. It was a decent tool for small teams that were focused on similar tasks. Redmine was much more straightforward than Project Insight and felt more reliable since we never had an issue with our internal servers. On the other hand, Redmine felt dated and didn't fit as many of the tasks that were needed. Redmine's price was right if you installed it locally and was probably still cheaper if you used their SAAS version.
• Jira, on the other hand, felt like an excellent tool for software teams. Jira had a great project and task management and felt right for a software team. Jira also had useful integrations, even with Project Insight. Jira seemed pretty unreliable, worse than Project Insight. Our team would have preferred Jira, but I think it didn't work for other teams.

Incentivized

• Our company uses it by default.
• I enjoy the ability to communicate outside of text messages...keeps the conversation on in it's own bucket.

• Reduction in costs on materials (i.e. - paper documentation)
• Improved efficiency given that our field members need to report back on an hourly basis
• Web based platform allows anyone access to the same information

Incentivized