Beekeeper vs Blink in 2026: the buyer's guide after the LumApps acquisition

Every week is EMS Week at Blink — because we care, too

EMS Week may be over, but at Blink, our appreciation for emergency medical professionals doesn’t end with the calendar. For us, recognizing the lifesaving work of EMTs, paramedics, and staff isn’t a once-a-year gesture — it’s a year-round commitment grounded in care.

This year’s EMS Week theme, “We care for everyone,” says it best. EMS teams are there for all of us — and it’s our job to be there for them.

Behind every siren is a team that deserves support

The reality of working in emergency medical services is demanding on every level. Long hours, unpredictable situations, and high-stakes decisions are just part of the job. And for EMS professionals, that job never really stops — holidays, weekends, middle-of-the-night calls.

It’s a role that requires not just skill and courage, but constant coordination, communication, and clarity. And that’s where Blink comes in.

Caring for others starts with caring for your team. That’s why Blink is designed to meet the needs of EMS professionals — not just as employees, but as people.

At Blink, we’re proud to serve thousands of paramedics, EMTs, and staff across some of the country’s largest EMS organizations.

Assisting EMS behind the scenes

We’re proud to work with EMS organizations across the country — from city ambulance services to rural responder units — to help their teams stay connected, informed, and empowered, no matter where the job takes them.

Whether they’re responding to an emergency or prepping for the next shift, EMS workers need tools that work as hard as they do.

With Blink, EMS organizations can:

• Send real-time updates about protocols, routes, or equipment changes
• Deliver training resources straight to mobile devices
• Coordinate shifts and crews with better visibility and fewer delays
• Recognize outstanding work with peer-to-peer shoutouts and leadership messages
• Give employees a voice with surveys, feedback tools, and two-way communication
• Foster connection between teams that rarely see each other face-to-face

Poor communication is the #1 most common stressor for EMS workers (BMC Emergency Medicine)

Built for the field — not just the office

EMS professionals don’t spend their days behind a desk. So why rely on systems that expect them to?

Blink is a mobile-first employee experience platform, built for people whose work happens on the move. We make it easier for EMS leaders to reach every team member — from the newest trainee to the most experienced paramedic — and equip them with the information they need, when they need it.

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Our commitment: Always on

EMS professionals care for everyone with every call they answer. At Blink, we believe the same care should be extended to them — through tools that reduce friction, strengthen connection, and show that their work and well-being truly matter.

We believe EMS teams deserve more than recognition during one week of the year. They deserve better tools, better communication, and better connection — every week.

To all the EMS professionals working tirelessly behind the scenes and on the frontlines: thank you. We see you, we support you, and we’re committed to building technology that helps you do what you do best — saving lives.

Blink. And keep your EMS teams stay connected — every hour, every shift, every week.

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On the hunt for the perfect comms solution for your organization?

Whether you’re looking for a tech to engage a frontline workforce or a modern intranet that puts your organization’s knowledge at your fingertips, we’re comparing techs that can take your internal communication to the next level. 

Today we look at Interact vs. Blink to see which is right for you.

Interact vs. Blink — quick facts

Blink and Interact are modern internal communication solutions suited for enterprise and small organizations. Their intuitive user experience and mobile applications lend themselves to a frontline workforce. 

However, Interact is mainly an intranet replacement with various social employee engagement features. It is an older solution, and some feel that its features are a little old-fashioned. That includes an inclination towards top-down communications and static intranet pages. 

In contrast, Blink packages an intranet with chat, micro-apps, and interactive content management to create an open, engaging digital experience. The priority is on encouraging all employees to participate in discussions and voice their contributions. 

How they’re similar

Mobile-focused

Blink is designed with the mobile frontline worker in mind. That means you can reach everything you’d expect to have access to as a desk worker straight from your phone. The features and design flow seamlessly, no matter the screen size, to unite your organization with one application. 

Similarly, Interact also caters to companies with a significant number of frontline workers. The intranet software is fully responsive and works on both iOS and Android.

Targeted posts

Both internal employee communication tools recognize that the most effective messages are tailored. 

Interact uses “personas” you can define based on qualities you set. More than just dividing workers by role, you can segment your messages based on the training they’ve already received, location, and more. 

Blink also allows you to target posts based on certain teams and work functions. The live feed of employee posts, company communications, and important real-time notifications are 100% customizable for each individual. 

People directory

Both Blink and Interact make it easy to discover and contact any other member in your organization, breaking down communication barriers. 

Blink’s People Directory consists of each team member's photographs, role, time zone, and location.

Interact’s directory adds a bit more content to this directory with customizable bios, interests, and expertise. 

How they’re different

Many features set each communication management software apart. Let’s take a look: 

SMS

Interact adds multichannel broadcasts that include the option to send a text to employees. One reviewer notes how “beneficial a feature like this would be during a pandemic.”

Although Blink can push notifications to each user’s phone, there is no out-of-the-box feature that allows SMS texting. 

Chat

When comparing Interact vs. Blink, one large difference is Blink’s native chat function. Users can start secure group or one-on-one chats. Document-sharing and emoji capabilities also mean your employees have the tools to get their message across, no matter the subject. 

In contrast, Interact only has a tagging function to start conversations and, more often than not, will need to integrate with third-party chat platforms. 

Digital signage

The Interact software includes built-in digital signage capabilities. That gives your team the ability to display updates, company news, and other useful information in break rooms, conference rooms — anywhere with a screen. 

Blink does not offer a feature to create and display digital signage natively in the app but can be configured with integration to serve this purpose. 

Micro-apps

Blink offers deep integration with thousands of apps, acting as your one-stop solution to digital workplace technology. Blink also lets you build out integrations for any app you need through customizable micro-apps.

When comparing the customization of Interact vs. Blink, you are slightly more limited with the latter. Although it also offers several integrations, the Interact intranet does not offer a way for users to add ample features themselves. 

Extranet

Interact offers additional extranet services that provide a communication platform for business partners. External parties can access FAQs, product pages, blogs, answer surveys, and more through a simple login page. 

Blink’s product offering is more narrowly focused on internal communications, so if your team is not looking for an extranet solution, a platform with features solely designed for internal teams may serve you better. 

Feed page

Blink’s feed page provides an engaging, personalized experience that enables a sense of connectedness and omnidirectional communication. 

When comparing Interact vs. Blink’s newsfeed, Interact’s is more focused on activity updates. For example, when a document is updated or a user joins a new group. 

Although users can like and comment, the social aspect is not as prominent. The platform’s forum allows more back-and-forth conversations but does not encourage frequent participation.

Ease of use

Blink takes most of the burden of onboarding and IT off your hands, making it an ideal solution for enterprise companies and lean teams alike. The features are intuitive, requiring little to no training, and once you’re onboarded, Blink handles all the behind-the-scenes IT to keep your hands free. 

On the other hand, learning to use Interact’s intranet does take a bit more time. User reviews say, “Its functionality is difficult to administer and labor-intensive. It is also not very intuitive.” 

One feature that is consistently said to be difficult to use is its forms. “Forms are a great feature to have, but we've found them cumbersome to create and maintain.”

Interact vs. Blink — pricing

Blink offers four levels of paid service based on company size, while Interact’s pricing structure is a bit more opaque. They offer individualized pricing based on your organization’s exact requirements, so you’ll have to request a quote to see how much it may be for you. 

Here’s a look at Blink’s pricing:

• Essential: $3.40 per person, per month
• Business: Price on application
• Enterprise: Price on application
• Enterprise Plus: Price on application

Interact vs. Blink — final thoughts

If you’re looking for a comprehensive, modern intranet with social features, want to maintain a more traditional communication structure, and have the resources to spend a little more time learning how to use the product in the backend, Interact may be the right choice for you. 

However, if you want an intranet with engaging, intuitive features that refresh your internal communications with open dialogue, and you want to be able to fully customize your solution’s features, Blink may be your go-to. 

Determine if Blink is the right solution for you by booking a demo. Try it free for 14 days. 

Looking for more comparisons? Check out Blink Vs Beekeeper

Whenever you place a new hire in a role, you hope they’ll go the distance. But ‘hopefully’ isn’t enough in this challenging recruitment climate.

The first 90 days of employment is an opportunity to set firm foundations and begin the first chapter of a productive, long-lasting relationship. And yet, within the caregiver and healthcare sector, those first 90 days are also where the majority (57%) of turnover occurs.

A small portion of this turnover will come from poor-fit hires and people who are asked not to continue after their probationary period. 95.5% of all hospital staff turnover is voluntary though, so there’s clearly something to analyze here.

To put it plainly, employees who are supported and nurtured through their first 90 days in post become engaged, loyal workers — likely to stay for a year or longer. Those who aren’t, resign.

Let’s look at how you can harness the 90-day retention opportunity for your healthcare organization.

Retention efforts begin before recruitment ends

When we think about retention, we typically think of the employees we’ve already onboarded. And this appears entirely sensible: you can’t retain the staff you haven’t hired yet.

At the same time, we know that the employee experience journey starts way before an official job offer. The ‘moments that matter’ start as early in the lifecycle as first seeing your job advert and visiting your website. 

Candidates are forming an opinion about your organization throughout the application and recruitment process. They’re deciding whether or not they can see themselves staying with you long-term.

At this stage, candidates are looking at factors such as:

• What you ask of them during the assessment process
• How well and often you communicate
• Your employer branding
• What current employees say about your business on social media
• How well your organization is reviewed and how it’s represented in the press
• What your annual reports say about the employee experience, your commercials, vision and values, and position in the marketplace

Not all candidates will deep dive into your organization’s public profile, but some will. And at the very least they’ll be on the receiving end of how you manage the application process. So to start as you mean to go on: to help employees get past the first 90-day threshold, your recruitment efforts need to serve as retention efforts, too.

This can be a challenge for organizations using staffing agencies, who may have significantly less control over their relationship-building efforts. Similarly, US companies deploying CDPAP may find care workers appearing on the payroll without any previous facetime and with limited understanding of the provider that’s hiring them.

The need to deliver retention is pressing even in these scenarios. Attrition is a phenomenal cost burden for healthcare organizations placing employees from any recruitment source. 

Understanding attrition factors

Healthcare workers brought into your organization through traditional means — that is, not CDPAP or staffing agencies — must have been excited about the opportunity enough to accept your offer. What can happen to make them want to leave only a few months later?

Experience versus expectations

Employees come to a new role with a series of expectations. These come from their previous work experiences, your employer branding, and the job description. If their experience is significantly worse than — or even just different to — their expectations, they may decide to move on.

There’s a ‘two-factor theory’ at play here. On one hand, you have hygiene factors, otherwise thought of as ‘causes of dissatisfaction’. These can include issues such as problems with managers, poor working relationships, or a feeling of inadequate health and safety.

Motivating factors are the opposite: they make a worker want to stay. These include opportunities for growth, having a sense of purpose, and feeling recognized for good work. 

If there’s a significant mismatch between hygiene factor expectations and experience, don’t be surprised if your staff start to churn quickly. An absence of motivating factors may take longer to push staff into leaving, but eventually, this will too.

Lack of access to training, resources, and tools

Staff who lack the necessary training, resources, and tools to perform their duties effectively quickly become frustrated and demotivated. They’re unable to enjoy their work or do it well.

This isn’t just an attrition risk. A lack of access like this also creates compliance and patient safety concerns — it leaves your organization open to risk, reputationally and financially.

‘Access’ is the right word to interrogate here. Training might be on offer for healthcare workers, you may have paper copies of necessary resources, and specific tools might have been rolled out to the frontline to support their day-to-day. But if employees can’t access them easily — without disrupting their working day — then they simply aren’t fit for purpose.

Frontline healthcare workers need tools designed to meet their needs. Tools and software solutions originally aimed at office-based workers are unlikely to fulfill this requirement.

It’s also important to recognize the additional administrative burden your employees face during their first 90 days. There’s rarely enough time for thorough onboarding and training before workers are asked to care for patients.

This leaves workers trying to juggle patient care and paperwork throughout their first 90 days. This overload and lack of intuitive tools can mean that aspects of onboarding and training get missed.

Scope of the role

Unsurprisingly, some healthcare roles have higher turnover than others. For example, larger hospitals with more than 500 beds have the highest rates of staff turnover.

Similarly, few new hires are comfortable joining a team that remains understaffed. If the situation isn’t resolved promptly then turnover is likely to be high. 

Contact time

Some frontline healthcare workers spend the majority of their day surrounded by other people — on a busy Accident and Emergency ward, for example, or riding in the ambulance with the rest of their EMS crew. Others work solo. Home health carers can go weeks without seeing another co-worker or connecting with HQ. 

Every frontline worker needs contact time with their manager. They need support, development, and feedback on their performance. They also want to share their difficulties and suggestions, and this contact time is all the more important during their first 90 days when so much of the role is new.

Contact time with co-workers is essential too. Teams need to spend time together to create a sense of belonging. They can share ideas and experiences and provide peer-to-peer support.

Healthcare and home health organizations relying on staffing agencies and CDPAP need to put in considerable extra effort to encourage this kind of culture.

Seizing the opportunity: what makes those first 90 days engaging

Flipping the above on its head, we can now start to assess what a great first 90 days looks like for healthcare employees.

An immediate and thorough welcoming

Employee onboarding plans set the tone across four important Cs: compliance, clarification, culture, and connection.

• Compliance is vital in healthcare. You need to know that new hires understand what’s expected of them to satisfy the necessary criteria and continue with best practice. You should also use the onboarding process to ensure employees go through any required training or certifications before they treat patients.
  
• Clarification is broader than compliance. It helps employees understand what their job role is in detail and by being crystal clear from the off-set you can set them up for success. You might also choose to clarify who they will work with, who they can turn to for questions and support as they learn the ropes, what your organizational goals are, and how much their individual contribution matters.
  
• Culture we’ve mentioned already and it’s where many healthcare organizations start to fall down where retention is concerned. Harvard Business Review data concluded that “Competitive pay and other support options are essential to recruiting caregivers, of course, but organizational culture, including a commitment to excellence, is what makes them stay.”
  
• Connection is rarely ever achieved without the right cultural environment. If culture can be thought of as how you work as an organization, then the way you connect your teams together naturally falls into this category. Remember: just because a healthcare worker is put on a busy ward with many busy co-workers doesn’t make them connected. Connection requires considered effort, from them and from you. And you have the opportunity to lead by example from as early as day one.

Welcoming staff shouldn’t be a one-way process, though. Yes, you will have lots of information you need to pass their way, but the earlier you get them actively engaging the better. 

Run regular onboarding surveys at the end of weeks 1, 4, 8, and so on. And if you have employee groups and communities available to join, make sure your new hires know they are there. These could be around internal initiatives, like digital inclusion, or shared values and characteristics like LGBTQ+. Look for every opportunity to create community, belonging, and psychological safety. The impact on retention and employee wellbeing can be transformational.

An effective onboarding can, according to BambooHR:

• Make employees feel 18x more committed to their employer
• Increase a sense of connection in 91% of employees
• And lead 89% of employees to feel ‘very engaged’ in their work

What could your healthcare organization do with stats like that?

Having the tools needed to succeed

Frontline healthcare workers often have tools extended to them as an afterthought. Whatever their desk-based peers in head office are using is what they are asked to use too. 

But these tools are not fit for purpose for the frontline. Either as a result of bad mobile user experience, requiring multiple log-ins, complicated filing systems and navigation, or all of the above.

Some crucial workflows are still paper-based by default, causing a digital divide to form between healthcare teams. This impacts efficiency and productivity, employee engagement and satisfaction, and the quality of patient care.

By empowering frontline staff with the right tools for the job from their very first day you can greatly reduce attrition risks, solving for the ‘hygiene’ and ‘motivating’ factors we covered earlier on.

A tool that’s built for the frontline first will:

• Be mobile optimized and easy to use on the go
• Facilitate single sign-on and bring all mission-critical apps together in one place
• Allow teams to stay connected to each other and the wider organization

Transitioning from desk-based tools to a frontline employee app will make frontline hires feel valued and invested in. It’ll also keep them with your organization way beyond the first 90 days.

Checking in regularly

It’s no shock to anyone that great relationships rely on effective communication. What’s important is how you make this kind of communication normal for your new employees. 

• Encourage new hires to ask questions, build connections, and proactively seek out the training they need. Home Health Pulse explains it perfectly when they say, “Because inexperience breeds vulnerability, caregivers who feel unsure or underprepared in their position for too long will choose to save their dignity and quit to go where they feel competent.”
  
• Focus on their relationships with co-workers and the first-line managers who lead them. These should be your employee’s first point of contact when they need help, so make it easy for them to ask
  
• Ask for their feedback often. When staff find it easy to talk about the challenges they’re facing, you hear about problems early. This lets you tackle emerging issues around burnout or frustration before it’s too late. 91% of nurses blame burnout, poor working conditions, and pay for the staffing shortage — hear them out on these issues to minimize attrition. Annual healthcare employee surveys are only the beginning.

Offer your new hires a variety of paths to communicate their needs. Blink Pulse surveys let you track feedback from your new hires, opening up the opportunity to optimize and improve your retention rates.

Connecting new hires with your overall purpose and mission

“I’m yet to meet a clinician or caregiver who got into this line of work to be on a computer all day” explains Ian Gordan, former President of Administrative Operations for Elara Caring. 

And it’s true. At the risk of over-generalizing, frontline healthcare workers typically want a sense of purpose in their work — and it pays to provide this sense of purpose as soon as you possibly can.

Unfortunately, it can be difficult to remember this purpose when workers are constantly rushed, focusing on the immediate needs of their patients. Limited contact with co-workers can make this problem worse.

It’s here that tooling becomes essential again:

• A shared news ‘Feed’ allows you to send regular reminders of the company's purpose and internalize those values in new hires
• Building connections and ‘Chats’ between team members provides a collective sense of excellence and dedication to the cause
• Mandatory reads shared in the Feed and then saved in a centralized ‘Hub’  give all staff members a place to refer back to if they ever need a reminder

Rewarding and recognizing key behaviors

Lastly, but equally as importantly, there’s reward and recognition. 

Keep your new hires motivated and enthused during and after their first 90 days by demonstrating a culture of recognition. Reward staff who are doing well early in their time with you. Give them a shout-out on your news Feed or gift them some company goodies. 

It’s a basic tenant of psychology that we should reward the behavior we want to see repeated, but the benefits of recognition programs in the workplace extend far beyond productive behavior. Culture, customer service, and commercial outcomes are all improved when your healthcare workers feel appreciated.

Reaching the 90-day milestone — and beyond

Don’t let the 90-day milestone pass by without at least some form of recognition and check-in. If your employee stays with you past the first 90 days, celebrate that — and them.

If your employee voluntarily leaves before they pass the 90-day milestone then you have an opportunity to learn. Ask your employee why they’re leaving and what could have enabled them to stay.

Consider going further, too. Consider holding regular ‘stay interviews’, offering employees an opportunity to discuss concerns they have with their role and their aspirations for their career.

Blink. And deliver the best employee experience from recruitment to retirement

Blink helps you keep top talent from recruitment to retirement. Our frontline employee app enables and empowers healthcare staff with the tools, resources, and support they need to thrive at work and offer outstanding patient care.

Learn more about Blink for healthcare here.

The line that launched a thousand eye rolls — and how to counter it.

“Can you just send this out?”

Six words that send a chill up any internal communicator’s spine.

And a phrase that indicates how many organizations still view the internal communications team. As glorified messengers, not strategic partners.

This mindset is harming the effectiveness of internal communications and the business outcomes that are linked to it. Think employee experience, retention, and productivity.

Because today’s workplace is noisy. And sending out messages without strategy only adds to that noise. Messages get lost. People switch off. It gets even harder for comms to cut through. 

This was a hot topic in Blink’s recent webinar — Human internal comms: Fueling engagement with authenticity. And here, we’re going to dig a little deeper into why the comms function is so routinely misunderstood — and what we can do to fix that.

Internal communications: The most undervalued strategic function

Internal communication (IC) has long been overlooked and undervalued. And too many communicators are still kept on the sidelines. 

According to recent Gallagher research, 27% of internal communicators say they lack leadership buy-in and are left out of decision-making. They’re relegated to a supporting role rather than a strategic one.

But internal communication sits at the heart of company culture, change, and connection. It’s a direct line to employee experience — especially for frontline employees with limited digital or face-to-face contact.

And let’s be clear: It’s about more than churning out information. Internal communicators shape meaning and build trust. They develop effective ways to really reach and resonate with your workforce.

And this is important. Because your people receive a staggering number of employee communications. Over on the webinar, the panel shared the fact that people receive 121 business emails every day and switch between tools and tabs nearly 1,200 times.

“Internal comms […] are fighting against this noise. People don’t want more information, necessarily. They want more meaningful information and meaningful connections.”

— Blink

Simply “sending this out” does a disservice to employees, organizational goals, and the morale of your IC team.

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How we got here: What’s holding comms back?

So why have some IC teams ended up simply distributing messages rather than crafting a narrative? Here’s what’s standing in the way.  

A misunderstanding of the role

In too many organizations, internal communicators are seen as wordsmiths — a team who’ll polish a piece of text before sending it out to employees. This perception can be hard to shake and leaves IC wading through admin tasks rather than forging strategy.  

Lack of leadership buy-in

Without the backing of the C-suite, the comms team is brought in late — often after decisions are made. This leaves little room for IC to shape the company story or influence outcomes. The impact IC has on business objectives is also underestimated so it’s hard for teams to secure the budget and support they need.

Lack of tools to measure strategic value

It’s a catch-22. Comms teams struggle to get investment for modern tech tools. But without these tools — and their data analytics — it’s hard to prove the worth of IC and justify investment. You need data to show how IC supports big business goals.

Too reactive, not proactive

Many IC teams get stuck in a reactive cycle — publishing company news and chasing approvals. They don’t get the breathing room or support they need to step back, align with business objectives, and plan a comprehensive internal communication strategy.

Siloed working

If internal communications is isolated from HR, IT, operations, and line managers, they miss opportunities to align and embed strategy and share employee feedback. Cross-functional collaboration is impossible and teams miss out on the insights others within the organization can provide.

The cost of staying in your lane

Fail to break free from the messenger role and there are a bunch of risks to contend with. These include:

• Information overload. When messages are delivered without strategy — or a sense of the wider narrative — employees become overwhelmed and switch off from internal communications.  
• Poor employee engagement. Messages don’t feel consistent, relevant, or interesting. Employee engagement suffers, along with employee retention, productivity, and satisfaction.
• IC burnout. Communicators struggle to sustain their morale. Those who enjoy collaborative relationships with the C-suite have 2x better well-being than those with transactional relationships.
• Misalignment. Poor internal communications lead to measurable losses for your organization. These include project delays, compliance issues, and lost productivity.
• Frontline connection gap. Without a clear strategy, deskless workers get stuck with paper notices or word-of-mouth comms.
• Missed impact. If you’re treated like a service desk, your influence is capped. So you find it hard to support business objectives in the way you know internal communications can.

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Redefining the role: What internal communications should look like

A tactical internal communicator wears many different hats. Here’s what a new and improved strategic role should look like.

A strategic partner

Comms teams deserve a seat at the table. When you get a say in company strategy, you can better manage company changes and crisis communication. You get greater control over tech tool selection and have the intel you need to drive company-wide alignment.

A trusted advisor

You act as a comms guru for your organization, training leaders and managers to show up in the right way, on the right communication channels, at the right time. You guide them in open communication and empathy, giving them an effective blueprint to follow.  

An EX designer

When comms gets tactical, you can craft the employee experience journey, rather than simply delivering touchpoints. You can connect messages to meaning more effectively, ensuring that EX talking points are backed by policy and action. 

A community builder  

You don’t just send out top-down messages. You develop interactive, two-way comms that spark conversations and fuel employee engagement. Think polls, Q&As, employee-generated content, and content that inspires comments, likes, and shares.

A creative powerhouse

The best internal communicators aren’t satisfied with sending out text-heavy emails and documents. They keep their finger on the pulse of internal comms trends and create attention-grabbing, short-form, social media-inspired content. We’re talking images, photos, videos, graphics, and short snippets of text.

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So what now? How to shift from executor to strategist

Ready to level up? Here’s how you can move beyond messaging to deliver an internal communication plan with real impact.

Say no to being the messenger

Crafting effective internal communications means knowing when to say no. As Tiffin Jernstedt — former chief communications officer and internal communications expert — puts it:

“You have to say: We know everything that’s going on in the organization and your message doesn’t fit today.”

You can’t send everything. Your job is to prioritize. To help people within your business understand what matters most right now — and how messages fit within a broader narrative, that day, that week, and that month.

Need help pushing back? Try one of these approaches:

• Ask: What outcome are you trying to achieve with this message?
• Suggest: I think that message is most suited to this channel.  
• Offer: We can help shape this message to make it land — but we’ll need to rework it slightly.  
• Explain: We track comms engagement closely. Here’s why timing matters.

Bring data to the table

Authentic internal communication doesn’t just inform. It inspires, connects, and builds trust. To prove that, track internal communication metrics, like these ones:

• Content read rates
• Employee response time
• Behavior change
• Platform adoption rate
• Employee satisfaction
• Employee engagement

Then, link these metrics to overarching business objectives. If you can prove the ROI and impact of your employee communications, you can make the case for a more strategic role.  

Build cross-functional allies

Team work makes the dream work. 

Foster positive working relationships with your HR, ops, and IT teams. You can work together toward shared goals and get well-rounded insight into what employees need.

Not sure where to begin? Start small:

• Start a recurring cross-functional meeting to think through EX gaps and opportunities
• Ask key stakeholders what they wish more employees knew
• Help a frontline leader share a success story
• Share data between departments to build a detailed picture of EX

Push for better tools

The best internal communication tools support you to deliver rich, multimedia messages. They provide the channels and functionality you need to win employee attention, craft compelling journeys, and encourage interaction. 

These digital tools also give you reporting and analytics tools that help you make meaningful internal communication improvements, while also proving your impact and justifying a more strategic role. 

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Raise the bar — and your voice

Internal communications deserves better — and whether you’re a team of one or a team of many, so do the professionals behind it.

It’s time to shift perceptions, get strategic, and fight for a seat at the table. Move beyond simply sending out messages and you can make a real difference to internal communication and the business results that rely on it.

‍Blink. And watch the full webinar here: Human internal comms: fueling engagement with authenticity.

What makes her awesome?

Carla has been with Elara Caring since 2022 as an Attendant Coordinator at the Mount Vernon branch in Texas.

Carla is a wonderful frontline champion at Elara Caring. She is the first to step up to help or train others. Her ability to teach and lead is amazing — CTs and all PCs reach out to her due to her kindness and understanding and compassion. She is a wonderful person and has taken the time to help me and lead me when there was none other.

Carla sacrifices what she wants for others and it's a blessing. People call her from other offices and states for help because they know how valuable she is to this company. Her determination and leadership is what this world needs more of. She doesn’t just do a great job — she touches lives in every way and work and in the client's home.

I have watched her over 6 months of being at this company and thought, “Wow, we have a jewel!” She deserves to be recognized for her greatness and champion spirit. Elara Caring is better each day due to the fact we have a champion on staff — Carla Brewer is a great person, a great employee, and a treasure to this world.

How has Blink helped in her role?

Carla is a master at Blink and often helps with training. She uses it to talk with the attendants and takes the time to go slow so all learn how to use it.

What does she want to do next?

I believe that Carla wants an environment where all feel valuable and like they have a place. She uses her life to bring light to stressful places and I believe she will only soar in this next level in her life and this company.

Nominated by: Sissi Watts, Attendant Coordinator

What are the best Microsoft Teams alternatives in 2026?

Microsoft Teams is a powerful tool for messaging, meetings, and document collaboration—especially if you're already invested in the Microsoft 365 ecosystem. But for many organizations, Teams is clunky, overcomplicated, and poorly adopted by employees who aren’t sitting at a desk.

It’s not built for frontline workers. It’s not intuitive for non-technical users. And it tries to do too much—without doing any one thing particularly well.

Whether you're looking for a cleaner UX, faster communication, mobile-first design, or just less frustration, here are the 12 best Microsoft Teams alternatives in 2026 to consider—ranked and reviewed for ease of use, collaboration, and adoption.

#1. Blink

Best for unifying internal communication across the entire workforce

Blink is an employee experience platform that offers real-time chat, announcements, document sharing, scheduling, and forms—all in one simple, mobile-first app. Unlike Teams, which struggles with adoption outside of office environments, Blink is designed for everyone, from corporate HQ to field teams and shift workers.

Why Blink is better than Teams:

• Intuitive UX—no training required
• Works seamlessly across desktop and mobile
• Built-in tools for messaging, alerts, surveys, and forms
• Designed for high engagement and daily usage

Ideal for: Companies that want all employees—desk-based, remote, and frontline—on the same page.

#2. Slack

Best for real-time team collaboration and integrations

Slack is the original team chat platform that changed how businesses communicate. It’s fast, intuitive, and integrates with almost every productivity tool you can name.

Why teams choose Slack:

• Channels for projects, teams, and topics
• Powerful third-party integrations
• Searchable message history
• Simple, user-friendly interface

Limitations: Can get noisy at scale; no built-in video calling beyond basic functionality.

#3. Zoom

Best for video-first collaboration

Zoom rose to prominence during the pandemic as the go-to platform for video meetings. While it lacks native chat and file management, it’s ideal for high-quality video calls, webinars, and virtual events.

Best features:

• Reliable, high-definition video
• Breakout rooms and whiteboarding
• Webinar hosting tools
• AI summaries and recordings

#4. Google Chat & Meet

Best for Google Workspace users

Google Chat and Google Meet are tightly integrated with Gmail and the broader Google Workspace ecosystem, making them a natural fit for organizations already using Google Docs, Calendar, and Drive.

Why it's better than Teams (for Google users):

• No need to switch platforms
• Simpler UI for messaging and meetings
• Seamless calendar and doc collaboration

#5. Cisco Webex

Best for secure video collaboration at the enterprise level

Webex offers a suite of tools including messaging, calling, meetings, and event hosting. It’s often favored by large enterprises in finance, healthcare, and government.

What sets it apart:

• Enterprise-grade security and compliance
• AI features for transcription and noise removal
• Contact center and webinar add-ons

#6. Discord

Best for informal, community-style collaboration

Originally designed for gamers, Discord has evolved into a powerful chat and voice platform for startups, education, and tech teams that value speed and informality.

Why it works:

• Always-on voice channels
• Threads, emojis, and community features
• Free for most use cases

Limitations: Not built for enterprise or regulated environments.

#7. Mattermost

Best open-source alternative to Teams and Slack

Mattermost is a secure, self-hosted messaging platform used by teams that need full data control, including developers and government agencies.

Key benefits:

• Open-source and customizable
• On-premise or cloud deployment
• DevOps and workflow integrations

#8. Flock

Best for small teams that want simplicity

Flock is a lightweight collaboration tool with messaging, video calls, and productivity tools baked in. It’s a simpler alternative to Teams, especially for startups and growing businesses.

Top features:

• Shared to-dos and reminders
• Notes and polls
• Lightweight video calling

#9. Rocket.Chat

Best for companies needing full control over data

Rocket.Chat is another open-source platform used by privacy-conscious organizations. It offers messaging, video conferencing, and multi-channel communication with full customizability.

Why it’s chosen over Teams:

• 100% data ownership
• Omnichannel support (email, WhatsApp, SMS)
• Developer-friendly APIs

#10. Chanty

Best for team chat with built-in task management

Chanty offers a focused chat experience with integrated task tracking. It's ideal for teams that want to combine communication and lightweight project management in one place.

Why it's appealing:

• Tasks and Kanban view
• Threaded conversations
• Budget-friendly pricing

#11. Zoho Cliq

Best for businesses already using Zoho

Cliq is part of the broader Zoho productivity suite and integrates seamlessly with other Zoho tools, offering team chat, calls, and app integrations.

Strengths:

• Role-based access
• Video calls and bots
• Custom workflows

#12. RingCentral MVP

Best for unified communications at enterprise scale

RingCentral MVP combines messaging, video, and phone in one solution. It’s ideal for enterprises looking for an all-in-one UCaaS platform with robust admin controls.

Key features:

• Cloud-based calling and messaging
• Enterprise security
• Integrated analytics and call routing

How do you choose the right Microsoft Teams alternative?

Microsoft Teams can be powerful—but for many companies, it’s simply not the right fit. Cluttered UX, low mobile adoption, and integration complexity make it a poor choice for fast-moving teams and distributed workforces.

The good news? There are plenty of modern alternatives—whether you need internal messaging, video conferencing, or an all-in-one platform.

Need one app for comms, docs, alerts, and tools—without the sprawl?
Blink delivers a beautifully simple platform that your whole workforce will actually use.