Facebook is testing "Working Facebook", which will be launched in the next few months

This afternoon, an industry source confirmed to me that Facebook is indeed testing "Facebook at Work" for corporate collaboration. The source also told me that the working version of Facebook will be launched within a few months.

We reported in June Facebook in the development of a product called "working version of Facebook" enterprise collaboration products , "Financial Times" this morning also reported that the product of the same name, it seems the rumors to be true.

Here are some of the things we learned:

Although Facebook officially declined to comment on the matter, the source said that Facebook's enterprise collaboration tool has been tested inside Facebook for six months and is now being tested in a small group of companies. The source declined to disclose the name of the company that was tested first, and declined to reveal the appearance of the final product, but Facebook will definitely launch the tool in the near future.

According to the source, “Working Facebook” will be hosted separately to ensure the security between the personal version and the working version of Facebook.

According to my source, some reports claim that "Working Facebook" will provide cloud-based file sharing, which is not true. “There is false rumors that Facebook is developing a cloud document sharing system,” they said. Instead, they hinted that Facebook is developing a file collaboration feature, not necessarily competing with Google Drive or Office 365. Back in 2012, TechCrunch's correspondent Josh Kang Siding (Josh Constine) reported the Facebook group to increase the "good enough" file sharing , and Colin Taylor (Colleen Taylor) also in the spring of 2012 reported The group integrates the file sharing capabilities of Dropbox .
People familiar with the matter told me that Facebook is using this tool internally to collaborate. They said: "We use Facebook groups internally, which is a very powerful knowledge dissemination system." They said that Facebook has become a tool for orchestrating knowledge, allowing project staff to get help, while Messenger can make group members convenient. Communicate.

In fact, it is said that Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz left Asa a few years ago to create Asana because he couldn't stand Facebook's slow progress in corporate collaboration. Since then, Facebook has become very serious about using group products internally. Most employees join a dozen groups that are work-related, allow only employees to join, and groups that employees across the company can join.

The new enterprise collaboration tools are similar to the personal Facebook page, with message streams, Messengers, and groups, but are completely separate from the user's personal Facebook to prevent confusion. In other words, the work content does not appear in the user's personal message stream, and personal content does not appear in the work message stream. This kind of privacy is essential for all parties to trust it.

Enterprises have long recognized the value of enterprise collaboration tools. Although it has improved communication and easier sharing and testing of ideas, as a default knowledge base for employees and flattening levels, corporate collaboration tools have not become popular among companies. .

Facebook is still silent on corporate collaboration tools, which is a bit ironic, because companies that tried to sell corporate collaboration tools long ago called themselves "Facebook in the corporate world."

It is almost certain that people have not adopted enterprise collaboration tools over the years because other tools force users to learn new ways of working. Everyone uses Facebook and is familiar with it. If Facebook can use this familiar look and feel for work, employees will get used to it, and corporate collaboration tools will become popular.

It is not wrong to make such an inference. The question is, will the corporate IT department trust Facebook and be willing to use it as a corporate collaboration tool to share all important company information?

According to sources, although there is no advertisement in the beta, Facebook does not charge for it, but it is not sure what the final product will be. It is not sure whether the final product will be released for free download or will be sold directly to the IT department. All these details have not yet been finalized.

Corporate social tools have been around for many years. When I asked why Facebook is developing this tool now, the source said that it is because Facebook's current infrastructure is in place to support the system.