Item: Basecamp
Rating: 9
Author: Ryan Gibson

Overall Satisfaction with Basecamp

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Bascamp across the different departments in our organization. It's been a great tool to keep the different departments in sync while still allowing segmented conversations.

Pros and Cons

Pros

It allows a "not email" place where a team can collaborate on to-do's, file sharing, and conversations. Threads can be archived to keep the conversation moving along.
It integrates with email allowing non technical users to simply reply to a Basecamp notification to stay involved.
Basecamp integrates with other third party services well. Embedding videos or sharing cloud files is easy and useful.

Cons

While Basecamp is geared towards conversation, I'd like to see tools for converting conversations into actionable items (i.e. assigning tickets with priority).

Return on Investment

Basecamp has created a place where threads are simple and engaging, this has increased productivity.
Basecamp has allowed for our non technical staff to give input and it does so in a way that most users enjoy it.
Basecamp could use more tools that control importance of tasks.

Slack has recently become our go-to task management and collaboration. Slack is gaining ground in this arena due to its more forward-thinking conversation structure. Basecamp is beginning to feel more like a forum while Slack feels agile and easy to move from conversations at a fast pace. They are both great, but certainly are different in user experience.

Likelihood to Renew

Basecamp is a comfortable tool that contractors and clients both like. It is easy to use and very attractive. For that reason, I'll continue to use it for clients. There isn't any software that I can think of that allows for such quick project creation and slick communication tools.

Likelihood to Recommend

Basecamp is great for small or large teams. In order for it to work efficiently, the entire team really needs to buy into it. If one member insists on using only email then it could render Basecamp ineffective. Other organizations will find that while it's perfect for collaboration, a separate service may be necessary to create actionable items. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it just means another link in the chain.

Comments

Please log in to join the conversation

I'm a huge fan of Basecamp