Transform workplace updates with asynchronous collaboration for flexible communication. Learn how async messaging can boost engagement and clarity.
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Access NowInternal communication is a vital part of any organisation. But let's face it, the way it’s carried out is often inefficient, frustrating, and outdated. Endless meetings that drain energy, tangled email chains, and overlooked chat messages often leave teams out of the loop while eating up valuable time.
According to Gallup’s 2025 State of the Global Workplace report, 85% of employees are not engaged or are actively disengaged at work.
Statistics from State of the Global Workplace: 2025 Report
This disengagement is often due to poor internal communication and can harm employee satisfaction, retention, and reputation. In a world where technology and recruitment intertwine, clarity and relevance in workplace communication have never been more critical.
As Jim Harter, Gallup’s Chief Scientist of Workplace Management and Wellbeing, states, “the health of the world's organizations depends on getting employee engagement right -- and that begins with fixing the problems within our performance management systems.” In an article, Dismal Employee Engagement Is a Sign of Global Mismanagement, he maintains that there is evidence that the way global engagement is managed is misfiring.
“When we get performance management right, engagement will naturally rise. And the potential impact on the bottom line is significant. When compared with business units in the bottom quartile of Gallup's database, those in the top quartile of engagement realize 10% higher customer metrics, 17% higher productivity, 20% higher sales and 21% higher profitability. Organizations at the top achieve earnings per share growth that is more than four times that of their competitors.”
Jim Harter
So what can you do about it?
One potential method is by leveraging asynchronous communication.
Asynchronous collaboration is a way of working together that doesn’t require everyone to be online or available at the same time. It allows teams to share updates, give feedback, and move projects forward on their own schedules, without the pressure of instant replies or constant meetings.
Where something like a video call is synchronous communication (requiring everyone involved to be online and in the call), a dedicated update channel on your employee intranet that people can check at will would be asynchronous, or async for short.
Some of the common tools that support asynchronous collaboration include email, project management platforms, and shared documents. What’s more, technology like AI enhances asynchronous collaboration by making communication, coordination, and productivity more efficient, especially when team members work across time zones or schedules. Grammarly’s 2024 State of Business Communication AI’s potential to turn overload into impact in part explores the impact of generative AI on communication and productivity and states that:
“Younger workers benefit more from using gen AI. Gen Z knowledge workers who use gen AI at work estimate saving 9.35 hours each week, or approximately 23% of the workweek, thanks to gen AI. This is twice as much time as baby boomer knowledge workers save (4.76 hours).”
Grammarly
When we think about the problems with synchronous communication, we usually think about the challenges of getting everywhere in the same place at the same time. But this isn’t the only challenge. Some other problems include:
Think about your last all-hands meeting. Everyone is there, but it's often the case that some of the information discussed could've been absorbed beforehand. Usually, people arrive unprepared, waiting to be informed when they could have come ready to contribute.
Synchronous communication often leaves gaps where crucial details can be missed, lost, or not fully understood. This leads to frustration and a lack of clarity and accountability.
Do you still rely on mass emails or large group meetings to share updates? Many teams do.
Here’s the problem with that: over time, people tune out because the updates don’t feel relevant to them. Asynchronous communication tools make it easier to segment messages, so the right people get the right information when needed.
Your inbox pings with yet another email. A slack notification pulls your attention. Just as you settle into a task that needs your full focus, a video call interrupts. It’s exhausting, this expectation to stay “on” for every message, even when your real work demands concentration.
It’s such a problem now that many people are choosing to mute these channels. According to a LinkedIn poll of 715 people involved in HR, People Management magazine found that 66% of people turn off notifications to avoid distractions while working.
Systems put in place to facilitate asynchronous collaboration let staff choose when to catch up, meaning they can approach information with a clear mind, ready to engage with what truly matters.
The modern workplace isn't just diverse in culture and expertise—it's fragmented across time and space. This fragmentation creates real pain points that traditional synchronous communication wasn't designed to solve.
Picture this: your field technicians troubleshoot equipment in noisy environments with spotty connectivity while office staff expect immediate responses on Slack. Or your sales team is presenting to clients while headquarters schedules an "urgent" update call. The field-office disconnect leads to fractured information, duplicate work, and frustration.
Asynchronous communication bridges this gap, allowing field personnel to document findings or questions when they can, and office teams to respond thoughtfully rather than demanding immediate attention that pulls people away from on-site work.
"I'll just catch you up next shift" are words often followed by information falling through the cracks.
For healthcare workers handing off patient care, customer service teams managing ongoing issues, or manufacturing crews continuing complex processes, critical details get diluted or lost entirely in hurried handovers.
Asynchronous documentation creates a reliable record that doesn't depend on memory or availability, ensuring continuity regardless of who's on the clock.
The mental whiplash is real. You're deep in solving a complex problem when the calendar reminder pops up — another update meeting pulling you away just as you were making progress. When you return to your original task, that hard-won mental state is gone.
Asynchronous updates respect the natural flow of work, allowing team members to process information when it makes sense for their day, not when the calendar dictates.
We've all been there — bleary-eyed at 6 am or struggling to stay alert at 10 pm just to make the "convenient" team meeting. For one person's reasonable 2 pm, another is sacrificing sleep or family time. While remote communication at least resolves the issues of location, it doesn’t help with the difference in time.
And let's be honest — no one brings their best thinking to these compromised hours. Asynchronous collaboration liberates everyone to contribute during their peak hours, ensuring ideas aren't limited by whose time zone happens to be prioritized.
It’s not just location that impacts communication. Often, it feels disconnected because we're dealing with up to four generations at work, each with their own preferences and expectations.
While every individual is different and won’t necessarily fit into these broad norms, unclear communication seems to impact the younger generations the most.
We’ve highlighted some of the issues — let’s take a look at how async collaboration can help transform updates from white noise to something you want to hear.
We've all felt that automatic eye-roll when another company-wide email lands. We assume it doesn't apply to us, and often, we're right. Modern asynchronous tools, when paired with the right internal communication channels, allow for surgical precision in message targeting. People receive only what's relevant to them.
Compare the following two communication techniques:
It’s clear that the second option leads to less time wasted, all while promoting a better understanding of what actually matters to each department.
Synchronous updates force-feed information at a pace that suits the presenter, not the audience. Some team members need more processing time. Others want to dive deeper on specific points. Many need to research background context.
Asynchronous communication respects these different learning styles. People can engage with content when they're mentally ready. This results in better understanding, more thoughtful questions, and higher-quality contributions from everyone involved.
How many decisions get made in passing conversations that others never hear about? How many brilliant ideas are forgotten because they were mentioned in a meeting with no follow-up?
Dedicated internal communication channels create a searchable repository of organizational knowledge. Transcription tools can automatically capture meeting discussions and turn them into searchable content. That explanation you gave last month isn't lost in someone's memory or hastily scribbled notes. Instead, anyone who needs it can reference it with ease.
Modern asynchronous tools go beyond simple read receipts. They provide meaningful insights into how information flows through your organization. Not only can you track engagement — for instance, many platforms show when someone’s opened a file, read an update, or left a comment — but you can also see which updates resonate.
With this data to hand, you can identify which communications generate questions and determine which might need clarification. You can see what timings are best for engagement, and what channels your team prefers. This helps you refine your communication approach over time.
The way we share updates at work is long overdue for change. Endless meetings, bloated inboxes, and generic broadcasts have numbed teams to communication that should actually inform, align, and empower. Asynchronous collaboration offers not just a more efficient alternative — it offers a smarter one.
By embracing tools and habits that allow people to contribute in their own time, receive relevant updates, and focus without constant disruption, we build a culture that respects attention, encourages ownership, and values clarity over noise.
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