Mobile devices are having the same revolutionary effect on our working lives that the advent of the computer had decades ago. Rapid advances in technology mean there is now a wide range of hardware and software to help organise and streamline one’s working life.
There are many apps available that can be put to good use by employees in the modern working world. For employers, the key to harnessing these tools and boosting productivity lies in fostering harmony between your people and the technology you provide them with to perform the best.
As job becomes remote and mobile job searching soars, Senior Vice President Christine Wright said that job seekers increasingly choose to use a Smartphone to search and apply for jobs anytime, anywhere. When job seekers have secured the job they want, the use of mobile apps does not stop there; it extends into the everyday working life of the majority of employees.
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Whether you are an employer or employee looking to boost productivity at work, here are our top picks of apps that have free trial and/or free version to consider:
An instant messaging program that can be used on any device, allows employees to communicate without the need for texting or emailing. It allows you the choice of either communicating with a group (openly or privately) or speaking with a colleague directly. Slack enables you to, “centralize all your notifications, from sales to tech support, social media and more, into one searchable place where your team can discuss and take action on each”.
A password manager which remembers everything by securely encrypting all your passwords in a private account. With cyber-attacks becoming increasingly common, it makes sense to store all of your precious passwords in a safe place – only accessible by fingerprint.
Describes itself as, “the productivity app that keeps your projects, ideas, and inspiration handy across all of your digital devices”. It is useful for recording information (whether regular text, a photograph, a voice memo etc), which you can then access across all of your devices. Once saved you can either painlessly search to bring up past ‘notes’ or share ‘notes’ with colleagues.
Allows you to track your progress and productivity – or lack thereof – throughout the day. The program runs in the background on your device and tracks the time spent on various applications and websites, giving you detailed reports on your activity.
Connecteam allows business leaders and managers to put their business processes on autopilot and focus on business growth. For employees, Connecteam can free up time, allowing you to be more productive, flexible, and happy. How are these possible? Connecteam saves and increases productivity with mobile-first custom checklists, forms, and reports. Scheduling shifts and tracking work hours are also easier with a GPS time clock. All in all, you can simplify your communication, enhance professional skills, manage daily tasks, and so much more, all in one app.
An app that allows you to access all of the files you have stored on your computer remotely by gaining access to that specific computer, rather than a storage cloud. This is particularly useful when you’re outside of the office and have forgotten to send yourself a file for a meeting.
Perhaps the most widely used, it’s the perfect platform for collaboration with colleagues; allowing you to create and edit web-based documents. It’s very simple to use and you don’t need a manual to start using. It is suitable for every device, smartphone, laptop, tablet, pc computer, and all. Google doc also has this feature called History which enables you to see all the history of a document, changes that were made to a document and who made the changes.
This is an alternative to traditional conference call programs. The app positions itself as the “stress-free conference call”, as it doesn’t require the user to enter two or three different pins, and it also displays who is talking at all times, avoiding crossover conversations.
Pocket allows you to bookmark interesting articles so you can access them later on when you have a spare moment to read them. It’s great for stockpiling interesting news stories and motivational pieces while on your commute.
The ultimate PDF management tool gives you the ability to not only open, edit, annotate and save PDF documents, but also to rearrange pages, extract pages as individual files, import pages from other files and split documents.
Maintaining a healthy work-life balance is vital to boosting productivity and Mindfulness Daily can help you keep your cool through meditation before, after or even during your working day. It allows you to choose specific times of the day when you’d like to practice your meditation and sends you a notification for when it’s time to begin. It also provides soothing soundtracks, lessons and imagery to help you get in the zone.
Read also: Interesting Tips to Help Maximise Productivity
