The world’s most frustrating software…ever
In a post-Covid world many interactions between people in business and in their personal lives has become increasingly reliant on what used to be called video-conferencing tools. Generally this has made meetings more efficient, quicker and flexible. At HosPortal we do not mourn the old days of travelling an hour each way and wrestling with hospital parking lots (a special category of hell in themselves) for a 30-minute meeting that - as is always a risk in dealing with doctors - might get cancelled at the last minute.
So it is no wonder that there are so many of these video tools. HosPortal was a bit of a leader in using what was then a fantastic, reliable, simple and free video tool called Appear.in for many years, which had the misfortune to completely change its name in August 2019 to Whereby just in time for its brand to be unrecognisable as every other video tool piled in to the Covid video boom.
We have tried them all in our business: Skype, Zoom, WhatsApp, Google Meet, Webex, GoToMeeting, Slack, and probably others.
But the one that takes the cake as the most diabolical and hardest to access by far is Microsoft Teams. At HosPortal we would go so far as to say it is some of the most frustrating software we ever have to use. And it has nothing to do with the video and audio capabilities of the software itself, which are about the same as all the ones listed above…which is actually pretty good. The issue is actually logging in.
Unlike almost any other software developer these days, Microsoft assumes that you only ever use one set of their tools for all your business and personal needs. So if you have multiple business interests or like to separate your business and personal affairs, you have to tear your hair out every time you prepare for a video meeting, often in the panicky two minutes before you are meant to be smiling on camera:
There are actually two completely different versions of Teams, depending on whether you have a corporate account or a personal account…you cannot even use the same app or website, and you may not know which one you need to log in to until after you have tried your multiple logins.
You cannot be logged in to two different accounts at the same time, so need to completely log out of all your other accounts and log in again. And log back in again to the other one you need next. In other software you just swap browser tabs even if you have to log in twice.
It is not possible to work out in any clear way what account another party thinks you are using, and particularly if you are a host there is nothing that explains in the invitation which account you hosted from.
At HosPortal we solve this sort of problem inherently: all your hospitals and all your roster activity is available on the one login. It does not matter if you work at two public hospitals and five private hospitals across three different private hospitals groups, just log on once and it is all there. Look at your activity at each hospital separately, or combine them all on one screen. And like all of HosPortal’s pages, you can have multiple browser tabs open with completely different settings on each tab if you want. You can even set your logout time on a single device to last as long as 4 weeks.
Opinions in this blog are not endorsed by the management of HosPortal…we hear that some people - both within HosPortal and in the wider community - actually love Teams. Go figure.
