10 Productivity Tools To Help You Win At Work
There is no shortage of productivity tools -- some great, some not so great -- to help you get the job done. Life's too short to use bad software. Here are 10 tools to make online life better.
There's no right way to work. We can agree on goals like productivity, quality, and integrity, but we don't have to use the same tools to achieve those goals. Some people are committed to Microsoft Office. Others prefer Google Docs or OpenOffice or something else entirely. Windows fanatics, Mac zealots, and Linux diehards can agree to disagree as long as the work gets done. Use whatever works for your organization and for you. Hopefully, you're allowed some choice.
With that said, I have some recommendations for software that may brighten your day, or in the case of the first app in this collection, your screen.
That Warm Glow
f.lux is a free app for OS X that alters the color temperature of your computer screen to suit the time of day. Graphic designers, you can sit this one out, since messing with the way color gets displayed on screen is a bad idea. But for everyone else, your screen color temperature matters because nighttime exposure to the blue-tinted light of a computer display can affect your sleep. And lack of sleep can affect your health and your work.
If you can somehow manage to avoid staring in your computer screen in the evening, this may not be an issue. But many of us, probably to the dismay of family and pets, stare at our laptops in the evening for work or entertainment.
f.lux makes night time computing less disruptive to your sleep cycle by altering the color temperature of the screen to match the time. In the day, it keeps your computer screen at a daylight color temperature, 6500K. At sunset, it will reduce the color temperature down to 3400K, a shift away from blue toward a yellow tint. Later in the evening, it will drop the color temperature down further, to 1900K, getting rid of more blue. This makes the screen appear slightly orange. It's unexpectedly pleasant.
This may sound like physiological quackery, but there's some science behind it. f.lux can make a difference if your screen time has ever delayed your bedtime. (Also, it helps not to play Call of Duty or the like right before you head to bed.)
[See 11 iPhone Apps To Get Healthy, Wealthy, And Productive.]
But don't settle down just yet. Read on to learn about more indispensible apps. Then let us know what you think. Which ones did we miss? What is your go-to app for keeping productive?
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Among the leading password managers -- 1Password, LastPass, Dashlane, KeePass -- I prefer 1Password because it stores password data in a local database rather than on a remote server. Even if LastPass and other cloud password vaults have better security than most home users, they also represent a more appealing target for hackers, as the hacking of LastPass last year suggests.
Why bother with a password manager at all? It makes life a lot easier, with features like website compromise alerts and the ability to detect weak and duplicate passwords. Password managers save time and grief.
Price: $25 Mac/Windows; free with $10 in-app purchase for access to features on iOS.
Having an on-demand virtual assistant can be really helpful in a limited number of situations. But in the years to come, it's likely to become more broadly useful. Several startups are trying to make the model work; among them are Fetch, GoButler, Magic, Operator, and Scratch, not to mention Facebook M, and Walmart Simple Text. I suggest looking into GoButler because it's free (it plans to make money through referral fees from merchants). There's a waiting list, but at least GoButler doesn't tell you your place on the waiting list. Magic does this. I find having 53,301 people ahead of me to be dispiriting.
Using a service like GoButler is valuable not just for the ability to order a burrito from a favorite taqueria, for example, but to understand where human intelligence is required to deliver personalized service. To scale, these virtual assistant companies aspire to minimal human involvement. But to do more than make online purchases via text message, there are still enough gaps in text parsing and in the way the world is connected that human involvement continues to be necessary. And once you understand the limits of software-driven systems, you realize why Magic+ charges $100 per hour for bespoke service, and why access to an on-call concierge helps justify the $450 per year fee charged for an American Express Platinum Card.
Price: Free
Since its debut in Feb. 2014, Slack has become hugely popular in the business world. It's used by organizations like Comcast, eBay, and NASA for real-time chat and collaboration. There are other tools for this, to be sure, but Slack manages to be both approachable and extensible -- it can be integrated with other popular services. People talk about Slack as an email killer, but that's an exaggeration. Slack may shift some conversations, but email isn't going anywhere. There are times when teams need to communicate in the moment, and Slack shines for quick updates and coordination. It provides a real-time communication channel that's more efficient and manageable than email. Try it out.
Price: $0-$15 per user per month. A higher-priced enterprise plan is coming soon.
I'm not a big fan of note taking apps. But Paper, an iOS app from FiftyThree, is the exception. It combines note taking with annotation and sketching. And it does so with an extremely appealing interface. The absence of a version for OS X is a bit of a disappointment. But for those who do a lot of work on iPhones and iPads, Paper is an appealing, lightweight productivity tool.
Price: Free
Having loaded my Chrome browser with too many ad-blocking and privacy extensions, I've managed to upset Gmail, which now often doesn't respond when I try to open messages. But rather than remove my favorite privacy protections from my browser, I found that Gmail works best wrapped in a native app. Kiwi for Gmail offers the look and feel of Gmail in a standalone OS X app. Sure, I could fetch Gmail messages through Apple's Mail app or Outlook, but I'd lose access to Gmail's functions and settings. If you like Gmail in the browser, you'll like it more in Kiwi.
Price: $10
Numerous is an app that keeps track of certain numbers for you. It updates these numbers in more or less real-time. These can be preset numbers, like the price of oil, bank account balances, or Google Analytics figures, for example. Or they can be user-defined figures fetched from external services like IFTTT, which allows you to trigger certain online services when specific conditions are met. The ability to link to IFTTT data is particularly useful for creating complex (Boolean) trigger conditions related to IoT devices.
Price: Free
Being able to assign automated tasks to a trigger button can be immensely useful. Amazon has done so to some acclaim with its Dash buttons -- $5 hardware pre-wired to place online orders for a specific product. IFTTT offers something similar as an app. The Do Button is simply a way to launch an IFTTT recipe. You can, for example, attach an IFTTT recipe to trigger a compatible home security system.
Price: Free
Do you frequently get to the point where you have so many browser tabs open that the tab graphics disappear? If so, it's time to start using OneTab. The OneTab extension for Chrome and Firefox collapses open browser tabs and records them in a list on a single page in a new tab. It frees up memory while maintaining a history of formerly open tabs that can easily be revisited. It combines bookmarking with tab cleanup. It's indispensable.
Price: Free
Gmail is great, but Boomerang for Gmail makes it awesome. Boomerang, available for free (with paid tiers available), adds new capabilities to Gmail, like scheduled messages, the ability to archive messages and then resurface them at a specified time, conditional response reminders, and client tracking. Paid plans add features like Salesforce integration, recurring messages, and other useful options.
Price: $0-$50 per month
Gmail is great, but Boomerang for Gmail makes it awesome. Boomerang, available for free (with paid tiers available), adds new capabilities to Gmail, like scheduled messages, the ability to archive messages and then resurface them at a specified time, conditional response reminders, and client tracking. Paid plans add features like Salesforce integration, recurring messages, and other useful options.
Price: $0-$50 per month
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