Allo Releases Zoom-Backed Hybrid Working Platform  

A new unified platform for team cohesion  

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CollaborationLatest News

Published: August 9, 2022

James Stephen

Technology Journalist

Allo has released a new unified hybrid working platform backed by Zoom to improve team cohesion.  

The platform facilitates team building, accountability, remote collaboration, project management, and Objectives and Key Result (OKR) goal setting.  

Zoom invested in Allo in December 2021 using the $100 million Zoom Apps Fund it had set up in April that year.  

Ray Hong, Co-founder and CEO of Allo, said: “Hybrid work is great, but most companies find that it also makes it harder for teams to feel connected and cohesive.  

“We designed Allo to help encourage collaboration and make people feel closer to each other, even when they’re physically apart.”  

Allo’s platform consists of a whiteboarding tool, OKR framework, employee profiles, announcements and conversations, and a dashboard.  

The company points to the explosion in hybrid working coupled with the high rate of job burnout as evidence of the need for more physical interactions amongst workers.  

Hong believes that reduced physical presence results in fewer interactions between team members and close to zero means of finding out what they are doing.  

Remote teams, therefore, often feel more disconnected from their co-workers, they cannot see how their work is being utilised within the company as a whole, and it is harder to get help for any work issues.  

Allo’s platform seeks to solve these problems by building what it terms “connective tissue” within companies using “proven techniques from the worlds of online gaming and community building”.  

Allo’s Key Features  

Canvas: A whiteboarding tool for real-time employee collaboration. Canvas allows users to brainstorm, share information, and get feedback from team members.  

OKR: First created by Google, the OKR framework enables teams to set goals and track progress to keep everyone moving forward in unison on projects.  

People: Allo’s People pages allow team members to learn things about one another, such as their interests. The feature can also be used to provide updates about what is happening in employees’ personal lives. Data from elsewhere on the platform syncs to display work-related information, including the people whom an employee works with the most, their workstyle, and the initiative they are contributing to. Customisable achievements can also be earned for making edits to canvases, interacting with other team members, and more.  

Posts: A place for announcements and conversations separate from canvases. Posts are similar to social media feeds but designed to be used by team members who may wish to share updates and questions, receive answers and celebrate successes.  

Dashboard: The Dashboard is a centralised platform area which collects data from all parts of Allo and feeds them into the Dashboard in a simplified format. 

‘Allo is Unique’ 

Allo says one unique selling point for its platform is the integration of its canvases into every part of it.  

Projects, tasks, initiatives, and OKRs all have canvases integrated into them so teams can collaborate throughout all the productivity features.  

The result is project tracking and goals are joined with multimedia assets and collaboration records, making it easier for managers to keep their projects organised.  

The Allo platform costs $9 per user per month, following a free trial period. Each workspace can have unlimited guests to enable outside collaborators and more. Guest will have limited privileges, however.  

Allo was founded in 2017 and is venture-backed with $8.5 million from companies such as Zoom Ventures, Ascendo Ventures, and Smilegate Investment.  

The company is headquartered in San Francisco, USA, and focuses on delivering workspaces for hybrid teams.  

In May this year, Zoom set up Zoom Ventures to invest in companies which add value to its collaboration platform.

 

 

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