Productivity Tools I've Used

I am a junkie for trying to increase my productivity. Why? Because it’s so low in the areas I really want it to be high in. I know deep down that it’s just a lack of motivation, but I’ve always been this way. I’ve always put off important things to the very last minute and spent time frivolously on unimportant things. The biggest problem I face is that things have naturally come so easy to me that I haven’t learned the skills necessary to cope with things that I don’t instinctively know already. In college I got an A+ in Digital Forensics without even trying. I studied for hours each day and got a C- in Accounting 1. If it doesn’t hold my interest, I’m useless. But anyway, here is what I have tried in the past:

Using a calendar/schedule

I used Google Calendar for this in the past. I’m using Outlook now. What I tried to do is schedule specific times for things to be done. This hour I will devote to to Project X. This hour will be for cleaning the kitchen. These hours are for sleeping.

The problem I quickly ran into is time management. It would take me 45 minutes to get into Project X, and then I was so on a roll that I could not stop when it was time to clean the kitchen. Oh well, cleaning can wait. But now I’m butting up against the time devoted to laundry and I don’t have anything to wear to work now. And doing laundry takes so long that now we’re pushing into the “sleep now” time of my calendar. If I want to get a full night’s sleep, I will have to push back “go for a run” at 6am. Oh well, I’m not a morning person anyway. I’ll go for a run tomorrow during the “study for accounting final” time slot.

Rewards/punishment

If you study for the accounting final, you can go to John’s party! Yeah right. I can go to John’s party anyway. Nice try brain. Just for that, I’m going to drown you in Southern Comfort and orange juice.

Task lists

Here’s one that I still do in some form. Writing this blog post, for example, is only four days overdue on my reminders app.

Trello

I really wish this was in the “things I’m doing now” section. I do. I really enjoyed using it. It’s just a glorified task list though. If I had everyone on my team using Trello, it might be a different story. It was really useful, though, to look at the board and say “here is everything I need to do”. Maintaining it myself got to be too much. Actually now that I’m writing this and now that I work in a different job than when I last tried it, I might just try it again.

What I Use Now

Toggl

I’m a consultant. I need to track my time. I use Toggl to do this. My biggest problem with tools that will be a part of my workflow is, they need to work fricken everywhere. I need to be able to use it from Linux, Windows, iOS, Android, and a Windows Tablet. I need to be able to access it on the web and natively. It has to the be the ultimate in cross platform. The minute I’m using a device where I can’t do something on your application/service, your application/service gets dropped from my workflow. Toggl is the only free tool that I’ve found that works fricken everywhere. So I use it.

HabitRPG

Yeah it’s a task list. Yeah it’s reward/punishment. But it’s kind of cool. I’m trying it out. I have a hard time with the concept of their dailies though, as there are few recurring things that I must do daily. The only things I have that I do every single day is floss and read before bed. How their dailies work, though, is if you don’t check them in that day, you lose points. I lose points on those all the time because I don’t use my computer or phone before bed. I floss and read and straight to bed without a backlit screen. This might end up getting dropped from my workflow because it doesn’t work on a Kindle, and I don’t want to check in flossing and reading before I actually do those activities. And if I don’t have a daily, there’s no punishment, only reward.

Shame and peer pressure

But this only goes so far. My friends are used to me saying “I’m going to write a 1000 page novel!” then not doing it. They’re also used to me saying “I’m going to make a movie!” then actually following through with it and making a movie. So when I make a declaration that I will do something, no one holds me to it. Except my boss and my coworkers. They haven’t seen my YouTube series yet. They will learn as time goes on though. They’ll learn.