I work in the IT department of a pretty large company. I have started to use Basecamp to manage my projects and think the software and the idea behind it is great.

However I have to deal with a lot of other departments throughout the company and getting some of these people to logon and use basecamp is difficult. When it comes to technology and communication they are so accustomed to email / telephone and it has become a mindset of how they work.

How can I sell basecamp to these people and get them actively logging onto and using the system?

anyone had this problem before?

We’ve been using Basecamp for nearly two years now and some of our employees still refuse to use Basecamp. People will either use it and really get it – or they will ignore it and continue about their business. And in my experience, forcing people to use something they won’t ever get is almost always counter-productive.

I work for a medium company and they refuse to buy in basecamp because of the fact that is is a hosted app. I do use basecamp for my side projects.

I too have had difficulty getting people on board because it’s hosted. The people I’ve demoed it for have been very enthusiastic until they found out it was hosted.

It’s the second time I’ve had an opportunity to get a bunch of people to use Basecamp. The next opportunity I’m going to start with a small team of maybe two or three people on one project, then add a couple people when another project arises. Hopefully the direct connection between project and users will help.

This ties into an article I just wrote on how I use Basecamp where I go over what’s worked and what hasn’t – including getting people on board.

... refuse to buy in because it’s a hosted app …

I make available a short ‘About’ document (every basecamp site has a common globally accessible project that hosts similar ‘Help’ and ‘About’ documents) that briefly summarizes the problems we were having trying to corral all the cats from different companies (respective firewall woes ad infinitum) and how the basecamp app helps us coordinate and collaborate regardless a person’s location, be it at their office, a client’s office, a construction site, via a hand held (e.g. black berry) or from their home.

As well, each project sports a splash page (in the ‘Overview’ page via settings when you’re logged on as an administrator) that has a reminder (I apologize if this code gets pooched, cannot edit from Internet Explorer):

<div class="Sidebar">
    <div class="dashannouncement">
        <p align="center">
            <strong>
                <p>
                    Welcome to the ProjectName Project
                </p>
            </strong>
        </p>
        <p>
            This project site will ensure communications and schedules 
            related to the <strong>ProjectName</strong> are centralized, 
            organized, archived by date and topic, and accessible from 
            any computer with a modern web browser and internet connection.
        </p>
    </div>
</div>

After all this if a candidate is still reluctant it’s their problem as I’ve done my due diligence to attempt to illuminate the benefits. Thankfully there have only been a few people that haven’t adopted the tool enthusiastically.

=)

This may not work for you, but I got people to use it just by using it. I am a 1 person company. I have a handful of designers that work with me and my customers. I simply post everything to Basecamp, add them to my projects and they have no choice but to click the link in their email and go there. Once they are there they all use it. I haven’t had a single person not be able to figure it out or choose not to use it. My use is fairly confined to posting images and messages, receiving feedback about the images and instructions from customers. When my designers collaborate on projects with me and with each other it’s the only way to have all the information in one place – the only workable solution.

One of the things I stress with my customers is that all the information is located in one place for all to see. Theres no back and forth, no searching for emails, or wondering what’s happening anywhere in the project.

I agree with ‘Photobookmemories’ that just using it is highly effective. But I’ve tried to move things along in a couple of other ways too.

1. Put your company logo up there – I’ve had comments about how cool this is from people who don’t use such words.

2. I gave it a name… Mine is ‘<company name> Central’. Makes it distinctive and easy to refer to by all (in and out of the office) rather than ‘that basecamp thing’ or ‘that place where we look at the projects’

3. A new person joined the company in a key position and just took to it. She accepted that this is how I wanted to work and because she is central to what goes on useage has moved to a new level.

Hope that helps!

Oh, and one other thing (maybe two)...

I pointed a spare company URL at it, so no complicated web addresses to remember. Plus when someone joins the company I set up Basecamp as their homepage. They can change it of course but my new work buddies don’t seem to..!

I copy and paste direct emails into basecamp and reply in there. Clients get it after awhile.

like pbm, we started to use for everything – posting files, messages, copy writing, the works and clients quickly get the fact that all project info is one place. worth spending time working with one person in the client organisation on basecamp’s versatility and then letting them spread the word. it has worked in every case so far!

The best way to get anyone to buy into something is to show them the true value. And the best way to show that is just to start using it. It will either show it’s value quickly or or won’t show it at all, but at least you’ll know by experience. That’s the best way we’ve heard to introduce Basecamp. Just introduce it and use it on a small project first. Then see how it goes.

I work in the IT department of an architecture firm in Chicago and I would love for Basecamp to be used for the IT department’s projects. Unfortunately, Company policy prohibits proprietary data from going outside of our firewall. I also am working on a Ruby on Rails website with 2 college buddies of mine on the side. One of them lives in Japan and does the artwork, and the other 2 of us live in Chicago. I showed my friends Basecamp and they love it. We basically use it as a virtual office. The writeboards, project management, and communication structure in Basecamp just works so well. We use campfire for our business meetings. Its a great product, Jason, DHH, and the rest of the 37signals.com crew. Keep it up!

I keep all our customers inventory on Basecamp and use it for all correspondence. It’s my only copy of the files that are there so if someone asks for info that is there, I tell them where it is. If they (a customer) wants it emailed, I send a link. Eventually they get it. For those who don’t use it enough I may take it easy on them but for the daily or weekly users, that’s it. Its value is apparent. Every time I answer a question I refer to Basecamp. I will even sometimes say “I’ll be in the office later and call you or you can just go to Basecamp and its right there”.