4 Best Employee Apps To Inform, Engage, and Increase Productivity

The need for effective internal communication apps for employees has risen higher than ever— and digital technologies have become the main focus and go-to tool for most companies these days.

The best employee apps incorporate data organization, AI technology, a mobile app, emergency alerts, and more features that help a company optimize its operations.

These types of apps are being created rapidly, with new ones always coming up, giving employers plenty of options to choose from.

Communication throughout a company is so important because it helps every team member stay on the same page about company goals, passions, projects, and the ever-evolving changes.

Table of contents

What is an employee app?

Types of mobile employee apps available

The 4 Best Employee Apps

Tips on how to choose the right employee app for your company

What is an employee app?

Employee apps are digital platforms for internal communications within a business.

These types of apps are usually available on personal and business devices.

A mobile channel is the main one used for employee apps because it is easily accessible to all staff members with a smartphone or tablet.

All that is needed to get started is to download the employee app, log in with your given company credentials, and start receiving updates or alerts wherever you are.

Why companies benefit from using employee apps

• Company leaders find ease knowing that they can say something important to all of their employees without having to hold a mandatory meeting and then making sure that everyone is present to hear the message.
• Employees can be spread across different countries and their managers can still get a message to them, all at the same time through the use of an app on their phones.
• This technology makes internal communication amongst staff, easier and more collaborative.

• Businesses become more tight-knit—with some platforms allowing coworkers to ask each other questions, or learn different skills from the company experts.
• Having a knowledge library feature allows employees to get educated on topics within the company's focus, which causes them to become more independent when finding answers.

Types of mobile employee apps available

There are five main types of employee apps:

• Feedback apps

These apps help you to create surveys, distribute them, and track the results each one accumulates—plus it will show how employee responses change over time.

The surveys, polls, or quizzes in feedback apps are fully customizable, so managers can ask their employees any questions or collect specific numerical data if needed.

These are great for communicating fresh ideas or problems that arise.

• Data Collection Apps

These work similarly to feedback apps, except the responses are anonymous. You can use these apps to track engagement metrics over time.

These apps usually recommend actions your team should take to increase engagement, based on the survey data collected.

• Communication apps

These apps allow coworkers to chat with each other, receive messages from employers, connect through video calls, or screen share.

• Recognition apps

Employees can congratulate and encourage one another through a recognition app.

This app option can help employees feel that their hard work is noticed and appreciated, causing them to work harder in the long run.

Feeling good about their skills helps employees to have fun cheering each other on in the workplace.

This type of recognition feature is important for businesses with several remote workers who might not receive a “good job” remark at the water cooler amongst coworkers because they’re at home working instead of in an office building.

• Informational apps

This type of app is used to inform employees about important company news and even send emergency alerts.

Some employee apps will include only some of the features mentioned above, such as recognition and communication features, while others may include all of the above.

The 4 Best Employee Apps

1.15Five:

A strategic performance management platform that combines AI-powered analytics, 360° performance reviews, engagement surveys, OKR tracking, and manager coaching tools. It helps HR leaders surface data-driven insights while giving managers the tools to support their teams — all in one platform. 

2. Slack:

This is a messaging app for businesses that makes it easy to communicate and collaborate. You can create a channel for each project or task, and add the specifically skilled parties to each one.

Features include search, shared channels and files, tag or nominate collaborators, pinned items, apps and integrations, one-on-one video calls, and thousands of third-party app integrations across the Slack App Directory.

3. DeskAlerts

DeskAlerts is not an engagement app but an employee notification app: the mobile side of a desktop alert system. The company sends an alert from one console and it arrives on the employee’s phone as a push notification – emergency alerts, IT notices, surveys and polls – and the console records receipt once the employee opens the alert in the app. It belongs in this list for the organizations whose first need is getting urgent information to employees, not the social feed; the product page describes the app and the sign-in with Active Directory or Entra ID.

4. Trello:

A visual task management tool that allows you to create teams, manage tasks and share every part of the project creation process with the right team. Quickly set up and customize workflows, such as — meetings, projects, events, or setting goals.

Create a Trello board and fill it up with well-organized lists and cards, of timelines, analyzed metrics, calendars, etc.

Tips on how to choose the right employee app for your company

Ask yourself these questions to narrow down which employee app is best for your specific company needs and requirements.

• What is the price, how much does it cost?
• Will it be voluntary or mandatory to use this app?
• What is the company’s current communication situation?
• What am I trying to improve?
• Where do we have some issues?
• What are the company goals?
• Can the software handle the 100+ employees I have without glitching?
• Is the software enjoyable to use?
• Is the software easy to navigate?
• Check the reviews of the product to make sure the customer and developer support team is rated at least 4 stars and above, if it isn’t— then don’t even bother.
• Can the software track employee engagement?

Pro tip: If it has been hard to build a brand name or company culture because your team is dispersed all over the world— then an app that includes a news feed and the option to set status updates or connect often with other coworkers is very beneficial.

Everyone can get to know one another more which will lead to effective collaboration.

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All in all, employee apps are a great solution for \1 of staff members.

The digital platforms available will keep getting better, and allow for more customizability.

Keeping track of what issues you want to solve — how involved you'd like your employees to be, and the parts of your business that can use improvements — will make it clear what type of employee app you should choose for your specific company needs.

FAQ

What are employee apps?

Employee apps allow companies to keep their workers up to date daily.

They also help to inform everyone of important corporate decisions quickly and effectively.

These are specific mobile channels for communications within a work environment.

What are the benefits of using apps in the office?

Since we use apps for everything else in life, like Facebook and Instacart — it would only make sense that employee apps became a thing.

Now workers can view any company information they need and get answers to corporate questions quickly.

The ease of communication is now brought to the office space, where all staff members can be more collaborative and understanding of their purpose within the company (as an individual and as a whole).

How do I create an employee app?

Most employee app vendors — including DeskAlerts — provide an admin portal where you can customize the app with your company branding, configure communication channels, set up audience segmentation, and define notification types. This is different from building an app from scratch.

If you need a fully custom-built app that requires dedicated mobile development resources. For most organizations, an off-the-shelf solution with branding customization is the faster, more cost-effective path. 

Can anyone build an app?

Most employee apps are designed to be used by non-technical administrators. You don't need to know how to code to set up, configure, or manage a platform like DeskAlerts.

If your organization has specific requirements that go beyond what a standard platform offers, vendors typically provide professional services or API access for technical teams to build custom integrations. 

What should an employee include in an app?

The four features that are usually required in an employee app would be:

• Communication—chat features or instant messaging.
• Interaction—surveys, news feeds, etc.
• Knowledge—ways to learn, or search for answers to questions within the business.
• Services—employee training options, team calendar, etc.