It can be incredibly easy to get lost in the hustle and bustle of everyday life. Between work and leisure, it’s often difficult to find enough breathing room to get a spare moment. Technology surrounds us in every facet of our lives, but we don’t always use it in the ways most beneficial to us. If you’re looking to make up a little ground in your schedule, here are the seven most effective ways to improve productivity with technology.
How to improve productivity with technology
1. Automate What’s Essential
There’s bound to be some services you just can’t live without. Whether it’s your email, word processor, or Powerpoint for creating presentations, some things just have to get done. However, working smarter not harder is always the goal. Certain services can be made to work together seamlessly with tools like Zapier. If your most frequently used applications can pass data between each other, you’ll find your days getting less stressful as a result.
2. Manage Your Time with a Calendar App
If you’re already familiar with how to install apps on your smartphone then you should definitely look into using a calendar app Google Calendar. Keeping events, meetings and dates all on schedule can help keep you from getting blindsided by important happenings.
3. Keep Your Passwords Organized
How many times have you wasted 5 to 10 minutes trying to track down or reset a password for a website you haven’t logged into in forever? It’s a hassle, and even if you think you’ll remember it next time, chances are you’ll just be in the same predicament again. Using a tool like Lastpass can keep your passwords for everything automatically and reduce the headache of trying to organize it yourself.
4. Be Mindful of Your Usage of Tech
Sometimes there’s a faster way to do something, and if there is, chances are technology is involved. If you can narrow it down, try finding an app or program that can achieve similar results or reduce the effort you’re putting in. Even if the perfect solution doesn’t exist, just searching can lead you to a better path to your existing workflow.
5. Set Clear and Simple Goals
Goals can keep you more focused and on task than you might think. They’re a quick and powerful way to ensure you’re getting what you need to accomplish done and taken care of. Tracking your to-do list with an app like Wunderlist and setting reminders is a good way to start increasing your productivity. Having reminders go off every day, week and month for minor and major tasks can keep you from getting swamped when the unexpected turns up.
6. Improve Upon What You Use Most
You might already be doing everything you should be doing to keep your productivity high with technology, but don’t let that stop you. If you use an email client religiously,.see what add-ons and extensions it has available. Same for your web browser like Google Chrome. If you can expand the capabilities of what you use every day and reduce the amount of time to do tasks, you can begin to accomplish more in the same time.
7. Reduce Your Tech Usage
This sounds completely contrary to the other tips, but sometimes it’s absolutely necessary. Sometimes we already have the perfect workflow, but our dependence on technology causes us to check our phone, respond to an email or get distracted another way. Going for extended periods of focusing on work can be helpful. Just make sure you’re actively getting what you need to get done done.
Having technology work for you instead of working against you is imperative to keeping your life and schedule intact. With your time better managed, your productivity will improve, as well as your handle on technology in your everyday life.
In what ways do you try to improve your productivity with technology?
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