Collaboration Done Poorly Will Kill the Enterprise: A Conversation with Ivan Zhou, CEO of Notion

Ivan and the Notion team have spent the last several years developing a new approach to the core components of team collaboration—documents, project management, and knowledge sharing between teammates. In their own words, “communication is the whole game,” and what will make or break companies in the new, remote-first normal. Their approach is unique—consolidating common tooling and data that often lives in disparate, rigid systems into an incredibly flexible “all in one” place for teams to work from. The following is a conversation with Ivan about his thoughts on collaboration, enterprise technology as a sector, and what’s coming next.

Tell us who you are and a little about the company you’ve built.

I’m Ivan Zhao, CEO and Co-founder of Notion, an all-in-one workspace for teams to collaborate on notes, documents, project management, and wikis. I’ve been working on the company since about 2013. In college, I would spend a lot of time helping friends build their own websites. I thought to myself, what if everyone could easily build their own site? Just like making a page? That idea has since turned into something bigger as we’ve introduced databases, project management, tools to make it easier for companies to run their wikis. Notion is now a full system to connect and run a cross-functional team or company of many people. You can still use it to publish websites, but it’s more powerful than that - especially now as remote work has become more prevalent, it’s truly a digital workplace that brings together you and your team. 

We hear a lot about “workflow management” and how it’s changing. Why is workflow and program management in the Enterprise important, especially in light of changes due to C19?

Workflow management has become the difference between which companies make it during this very hard time and which don’t. Communication is the whole game. The larger the team or company, the more complex communication becomes. What we’ve really noticed is the importance of asynchronous communication. You need a place where you can collaborate and really converse about work that doesn’t require talking in real time. And a place where you can have the conversations you need in the work itself - not separate. We’ve seen those things make a big difference for companies.

Can you talk a bit about why Notion was designed to be an “all in one” solution when there are so many competitors focused on doing one specific thing well? What is the benefit of this approach?

Notion is built for cross-functional work—a place where teams can work together exactly the way they want to work. There are very few tools out there built for this—that actually make information across a whole team or company accessible and discoverable for everyone. Usually design has its own tools, engineering has its suite, and so on. Planning largely takes place out of the view of people whose help is needed to ship great things. By bringing planning, project management, and documentation back into one place, Notion makes it possible for everyone to stay informed and contribute.

Can you talk a little about how to quantify the value and impact of good workflow and project/program management for those who are hesitant to move off spreadsheets or their legacy tools?

We ran a survey of teams using Notion recently, and the top benefits cited were time saved, efficiency gained, fewer emails sent, and tools replaced. 98% of them said that Notion saved them time communicating between people and teams. 26% said they sent and received fewer emails. 70% of users said they replaced more than two tools with Notion. And 32% said they had sped up project completion.

What sets Notion apart as an online work collaboration tool?

Our key differentiators are the consolidation and customization Notion makes possible. We bring together more essential work tools in one spot and make them even more flexible so teams can truly make them their own.  

What does inclusion on the Enterprise Tech 30 mean for Notion?

We’re excited to be in such good company. As we’ve seen, most companies use dozens and dozens of tools - so to be high on that list is very meaningful.  

What’s the future of enterprise software going to look like from Notion’s POV?

People are going to expect a lot more customization from their tools. We’ve all been using dozens of fairly rigid, single-purpose tools - I saw a survey that the average company uses something like 88 tools just to do their daily work. All of those only do one thing and come with their own subscription fee. In the future, we believe companies, are going to want to work in one place with their teams so that information is no longer siloed or hard to find. And they’ll have high standards around how they can tailor their tools to fit their exact needs and processes. That’s the future we’re building right now with Notion. 

In the spirit of businesses that support businesses, what enterprise technology does your team at Notion rely on?

Our number one go-to is Figma. That’s where we do all our design work - and it’s so accessible that it’s easy for people across the whole company to contribute to design work.

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.