In the new normal, business success relies heavily on effective and efficient collaboration and communication within remote teams. After all, the COVID-19 pandemic has made remote work a part of the norm, and even though companies are able to bring their employees back into the office, many are choosing to stick with decentralized teams. Why? There are many business-boosting reasons behind it, but for the most part, it’s all about the work-life balance, lower financial waste, and higher productivity and output.To achieve any of this, though, you need to set the right pillars for effective remote work, and that means utilizing your Google Workspace to its full potential. By using the tools within properly, you can grow and outgrow your business quickly and create a thriving workforce that will take you to new heights of success. With all of that in mind, here are the five tips you can use right now to turn Google Workspace into the most valuable asset for your employees.Sharing, storing, and editing files in Google DriveFor personal use, Google Drive is a functional tool mostly used for freeing up space on your PC and external drives. In business, though, Google Drive is a far more powerful, multifunctional collaboration tool that not many companies use to its full extent. When you’re managing remote teams, Google Drive is the central hub for your employee collective, offering numerous programs and functionalities that allow decentralized teams to work together seamlessly in the cloud.Yes, you can use it to store files of various types, but you can also use the platform for effective real-time or asynchronous collaboration. Your team members can work together on documents, slides, and spreadsheets, leave comments and action items, assign team members, chat within the document, and manage important business documents with ease.To do any of this effectively, though, your team members need to know how to use Google Drive and you should help them familiarize themselves with all of its features.Communicate effectively with Google Chat and MeetGoogle Chat and Google Meet have been around for a long time, and they are the main communication tools within the Google Workspace platform. Google Chat allows your teams to communicate via direct messaging, group messaging, team chat rooms, and more. But beyond that, Google Chat is synced with your Google Workspace, and so it allows everyone to quickly share Google Drive content within the app.On the other hand, you have Google Meet, which your teams can use to conduct high-quality video conferencing in the new workplace. The app allows you and your team members to communicate effectively via video calls, share your screens and enter presentation mode, chat with team members within the app, and more. Together, these two apps offer all the communication features a decentralized workforce needs to eliminate communication bottlenecks and stay on top of work.Share your Google Contacts seamlesslyGmail is essential for all companies, and is effectively the main email platform across the business sector. Everyone uses Gmail nowadays, and for a good reason. The platform is reliable, secure, full of great features, and it integrates perfectly into the Google Workspace system to facilitate seamless communication and collaboration. Gmail syncs your contacts from your Google Contacts manager and hence both work hand in hand to provide you a seamless experience. But there’s one thing you can’t do within Google Contacts or in Gmail – share your contacts with other team members, which is essential for collaboration between teams.This is where the leading tools like Shared Contacts for Gmail® come in, as you can use it to share Google Contacts quickly with all your colleagues, employees and other stakeholders using Google Workspace or Gmail, so that every team and individual can have access to the same information and it is synced and updated for all of them. This allows different teams to work off of the latest contact data to generate qualified leads, or continue leading the customer towards a sale. Sharing Gmail contacts is also crucial for all your follow-up campaigns, and for maximizing the value that each customer brings to your company. Once a customer has bought something from you, you have to make sure to stay in touch with them and nurture your relationship in order to inspire repeat purchases.Use Google Calendar for more effective scheduling

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Google Calendar is one of the most underutilized tools in the Google Workspace suite, but when used properly, it can help you organize your workday better, but also improve your scheduling and workflow. The tool is actually optimized for team use and the business environment, so it has all the features you need to organize and share events, create reminders, share and view calendars, access notes and various tasks, and much more.You can use the app to take team management to the next level, and control every aspect of every event and task. Do you need your team members to stick to a formal dress code for the next meeting with your clients? Put it in a note attached to the event in their calendars that everyone will be able to see. Going out of town and you need everyone to know you’re not available? Put it in your shared calendar and everyone will be notified instantly. Save time and other resources with Google SitesGoogle Sites is one of those tools that can save companies thousands of dollars, and allow teams to collaborate more effectively on bringing amazing digital experiences to life. The tool allows you to create internal project hubs, team sites and public websites, and more, all within the Google Workspace platform. Google Sites has various collaborative features and drag-and-drop functionalities to make website building a quick and seamless process, and the site is stored in Google Drive so that you can share it with the rest of the team. You can invite team members to review and edit your site, make comments and add tasks, or make changes directly in the design. Needless to say, the tool is a lifesaver for small businesses that need a new website or want to revitalize an existing site without breaking the bank. Over to youIn the end, it’s clear that Google has been working hard over the years to bring a comprehensive collaboration platform to the modern business sector. In the post-COVID-19 world, the features in Google Workspace will become essential for decentralized teams, so make sure to use these tools to take your business forward in 2021 and beyond.