When productivity is important, the system or process you have in place must keep up with your demands. For the mobile professional, carrying a laptop doesn’t always work and is rarely the most convenient way to maximize your productivity. As for paper planners and to-do lists, their volume and limited capabilities quickly slow down even the best-designed plans.
Fortunately, the evolution of smartphones has reached a turning point. Much more than a mobile communication medium, smartphones are a powerful and effective means of maximizing your productivity. I have explored and experimented with various smartphones and have landed directly on the Android operating system. Not only to manage my communication needs, but also to help design and implement my organizational and productivity system.
As a small business owner of a part-time business, sales manager for a Fortune 250 international corporation, civil servant in my hometown, husband and father or two, my time needs to be maximized, productive, and organized. With the help of some apps on my Android phone, I can perform all the tasks that I need for my business life and still have a lot of quality time for my personal life.
This is how I do it.
Google apps
The Android operating system integrates seamlessly with many of Google’s free applications. The most important for productivity are Google Calendar, GMail, Docs, Tasks and Voice. Each of these applications is free and only requires setting up a Google account.
Google Calendar integrates and automatically updates my Android phone’s calendar wherever it is. With the additional ability to share my calendar, my business partner can view, edit, and add events to my calendar. These changes are synced directly to my phone. Since I’m rarely in my office, having live updates through the Google Sync app on my phone allows me to have the confidence that I’ll always know what my ever-changing day is like.
The built-in email inbox on Android phones is capable of managing various of my business and personal emails, including my GMail account. I have my Gmail inbox separate from my other accounts, as I use this account for personal use only. Keeping personal and business separate is a wonderful productivity enhancement made easy with the Android operating system.
Google Docs allows me to store files for future review, as well as share files for collaboration. Responding to my clients is critical in my field and having the ability to receive collaborative files sent directly to my phone has given me the ability to respond to clients quickly and accurately.
Google Voice is by far my favorite Google app. The Google Voice app, which is free to download from the Android marketplace, works perfectly with my Voice account. Not only can I receive my voicemail transcripts via email directly to my phone, but I can also set up multiple outgoing messages. I have specific messages for clients, my business partner, family and friends, as well as strangers. The level of personalization is incredible, and if used creatively, it can make an important customer feel like the most important person in the world. Being able to manage and edit all my Google Voice features from my phone is a powerful productivity enhancement that I now depend on for my business.
For those trying to use all of Google’s free apps, Astrid is a simple yet effective app that is free to download. With its ability to sync with your account at “Remember The Milk.com,” the Astrid app can automatically back up and sync directly to and from your Android phone. Astrid provides a different level of control over Google tasks and its simple and clean interface makes managing projects or to-do lists enjoyable.
Since I have used or owned many different smartphones, I feel confident when I say that the Android operating system and the myriad of Android apps provide the most powerful and effective combination of productivity enhancement available. Although there are many other applications for the Android operating system and other smartphones, this combination has worked wonders for me and my business. Also, all the apps I listed here are 100% free!