6 ms·

Show HN: Daily email summaries to keep up with your team

12 points by nickkthequick 13y ago

fenguin 13y ago
Thanks for checking us out! We're trying to stay away from trying fruitlessly to track individual productivity (it's exceedingly inaccurate, not to mention creepy) and focusing on overall team progress instead. We don't aim to replace daily standups, just supplement them. Let us know if you have any concerns or suggestions!
abuehrle 13y ago
I like the idea. One quick suggestion is to replace "Superpower". You're trying to use it as a verb, but it isn't (usually used as) one.
speg 13y ago
I have a similar project, https://teamtracker.io https://teamtracker.io but it is more of a manual entry thing. Looks like this is automated, pulling info from various services? Neat!
nickkthequick 13y ago
We're super excited to launch this and itching to get some feedback. Please let us know here or through email (founders@overseer.io) and we can set you up with a free account in exchange for helping us test everything out.
jp1989 13y ago
Seems cool, this looks more impressive though - http://www.usepeak.com/ http://www.usepeak.com/. What are the main differences?
- bjansn 13y ago
  This looks more like a webservice that provides a feed. Looks like Slack: https://slack.com/ https://slack.com/
- fenguin 13y ago
  We've seen Peak, and it's encouraging that there are others in the automated productivity space. There are a few major differences between us and them, however: Peak focuses on the individual. We focus on the team. There was an excellent article today (http://marcgg.com/blog/2013/11/12/peak-productivity/ http://marcgg.com/blog/2013/11/12/peak-productivity/) discussing the issue with ranking team members based on their output, especially when information is far from complete. We're trying to boost productivity by demonstrating momentum, instead of by micromanaging individual players. We are not a destination site; we're a passive email that does not interrupt anyone's workflow. Just check your email (on the phone, even) and you'll know what's going on with your team -- you don't have to keep a tab open and keep checking back to find out what's going on. Finally, we're engineers, not a design firm. We move and ship very fast. We will respond to changes in user needs and behavior instantly, releasing/changing/removing features and applications as necessary.
  - jp1989 13y ago
    Good answer :)
bjansn 13y ago
Somehow, and I know it may sound nitpicky, when you make a point about privacy and then require me to 'connect with google' to create an account, doesn't feel good. I'm not that big on privacy, but perhaps this might be an example of a webservice that should provide at least a way to create an account without connecting to any other service (google / facebook etc). I'd expect a bit more visualization or explanation on what info the e-mail would provide me with. From my standpoint, someone that works with people with their own schedule spread over different locations this looks useful.
- fenguin 13y ago
  Thanks for the feedback! Would you feel better if we had a (semi-functioning) demo app for you to play around with before signing up? Since we aggregate information from all your team applications, your email would be empty without connecting at least one account.
  - bjansn 13y ago
    I think the flaw here is that I won't use Google to import data for the email. But would want to connect Basecamp for example. Now I first need to connect Google (for which I have no purpose other than accessing the service) and then connect Basecamp. Doesn't make much sense.
    - nickkthequick 13y ago
      Yeah that's a good point. Although, we don't make it very clear, you can connect your Google account and then opt to only get changes from your Basecamp account. But yes, you would always need to sign in using your Google account. Thanks a lot for the feedback.
      - bjansn 13y ago
        Perhaps create somekind of call to action that's more like this: 'Connect your Basecamp account', they end up by creating a normal account and then after that the first step is to connect their Basecamp account. This gives you a way to learn what webservice people would connect first. But hey, enough ideas. It's all about execution. Good luck!
jaxomlotus 13y ago
Seeing a demo email would be incredibly useful. As it is, I don't understand what it will show me and wouldn't sign up without knowing that information.

12 points by nickkthequick 13y ago

Thanks for checking us out! We're trying to stay away from trying fruitlessly to track individual productivity (it's exceedingly inaccurate, not to mention creepy) and focusing on overall team progress instead. We don't aim to replace daily standups, just supplement them. Let us know if you have any concerns or suggestions!

abuehrle 13y ago

I like the idea. One quick suggestion is to replace "Superpower". You're trying to use it as a verb, but it isn't (usually used as) one.

speg 13y ago

I have a similar project, https://teamtracker.io https://teamtracker.io but it is more of a manual entry thing. Looks like this is automated, pulling info from various services? Neat!

nickkthequick 13y ago

We're super excited to launch this and itching to get some feedback. Please let us know here or through email (founders@overseer.io) and we can set you up with a free account in exchange for helping us test everything out.

jp1989 13y ago

Seems cool, this looks more impressive though - http://www.usepeak.com/ http://www.usepeak.com/. What are the main differences?

bjansn 13y ago
This looks more like a webservice that provides a feed. Looks like Slack: https://slack.com/ https://slack.com/
fenguin 13y ago
We've seen Peak, and it's encouraging that there are others in the automated productivity space. There are a few major differences between us and them, however: Peak focuses on the individual. We focus on the team. There was an excellent article today (http://marcgg.com/blog/2013/11/12/peak-productivity/ http://marcgg.com/blog/2013/11/12/peak-productivity/) discussing the issue with ranking team members based on their output, especially when information is far from complete. We're trying to boost productivity by demonstrating momentum, instead of by micromanaging individual players. We are not a destination site; we're a passive email that does not interrupt anyone's workflow. Just check your email (on the phone, even) and you'll know what's going on with your team -- you don't have to keep a tab open and keep checking back to find out what's going on. Finally, we're engineers, not a design firm. We move and ship very fast. We will respond to changes in user needs and behavior instantly, releasing/changing/removing features and applications as necessary.
- jp1989 13y ago
  Good answer :)

bjansn 13y ago

Somehow, and I know it may sound nitpicky, when you make a point about privacy and then require me to 'connect with google' to create an account, doesn't feel good. I'm not that big on privacy, but perhaps this might be an example of a webservice that should provide at least a way to create an account without connecting to any other service (google / facebook etc). I'd expect a bit more visualization or explanation on what info the e-mail would provide me with. From my standpoint, someone that works with people with their own schedule spread over different locations this looks useful.

fenguin 13y ago
Thanks for the feedback! Would you feel better if we had a (semi-functioning) demo app for you to play around with before signing up? Since we aggregate information from all your team applications, your email would be empty without connecting at least one account.
- bjansn 13y ago
  I think the flaw here is that I won't use Google to import data for the email. But would want to connect Basecamp for example. Now I first need to connect Google (for which I have no purpose other than accessing the service) and then connect Basecamp. Doesn't make much sense.
  - nickkthequick 13y ago
    Yeah that's a good point. Although, we don't make it very clear, you can connect your Google account and then opt to only get changes from your Basecamp account. But yes, you would always need to sign in using your Google account. Thanks a lot for the feedback.
    - bjansn 13y ago
      Perhaps create somekind of call to action that's more like this: 'Connect your Basecamp account', they end up by creating a normal account and then after that the first step is to connect their Basecamp account. This gives you a way to learn what webservice people would connect first. But hey, enough ideas. It's all about execution. Good luck!

jaxomlotus 13y ago

Seeing a demo email would be incredibly useful. As it is, I don't understand what it will show me and wouldn't sign up without knowing that information.