TECH TALK
5 Apps Every Project Manager Should Use
“Productivity is being able to do things that you were never able to do before.” — Franz Kafka
No matter what the others tell you, productivity does matter. Nowadays, we live in such a quickly changing world that we can barely keep up. A lot of harried professionals crave for productivity, they need productivity apps to help manage everything from meeting project deadlines to picking up the milk. The huge demand of productivity apps accordingly stimulates the constant creation in the market.
However, there’re are too many fish in the sea! Choosing the right ones for you may actually take up a lot of time. At the end of the day, you wind up getting the very opposite of whole concept of productivity. Therefore, I’ve narrowed the top list of productivity apps down to 5 so you can skip the duds.
1. Evernote
If you walk away from this article not seeing Evernote, you might not be happy. As a project manager, sure there’s a lot of going-ons in your mind, the flash-by ideas and epiphanies. It may be difficult for us try to hold on to “the moment”, but the elephant never forgets.
Features: Not only can you write down notes and collect articles, Evernote also enables you to collaborate in real-time and to transform notes into slides. However, among many features, cross-platform synchronization surely is the Ace.
Ideal for: Adapting to all platforms, Evernote is the killer app for those who needs cross-platform synchronization all the time, especially those who own a Mac and a Surface Pro. Also, I see Evernote being useful for people that dig the aesthetic of simplicity and people who are not demanding on deep-editing their collections.
Platforms:Windows, Mac OS, iOS, Android PC, Blackberry, Palm, Windows Mobile etc.
Price: Plans range from free to $49.99 per year or $120 per user/per year(Business)
2. Wunderlist
Most of the project managers lead hectic lives, sometimes we may forget our little mentally prepared to-do list. Have you ever blamed yourselves for a few seconds for forgetting to reply to an important email or phone call? Well, Wunderlist provides you the solution of that.
Features: Besides the basic features such as planning and getting reminders, Wunderlist allows you to access your to-do lists from almost anywhere. It is especially helpful when you need to collaborate with someone else. But best of all, it’s very intuitive to use, you can get your things done in “never more than a tap or two away.”
Ideal for: Someone who wants a good mood looking at its visual-appealing backgrounds but doesn’t wanna spend too much time planning and editing their plans for the day (which makes almost all of us).
Platforms: Windows 8, Mac OS X, Android, iPhone, Android Tablet, iPad, Web, Apple Watch, Windows Phone, Windows 7, Chromebook
Price: Plans range from free to $4.99 per month or $49.99 per year.
3. Sunrise Calendar
Project managers got their calendars stuffed like turkey at Thanksgiving, they need a productivity powerhouse that offers a ton of app integration. With its neat visual design and powerful calendar features, Sunrise Calendar allows you to easily organize your time.
Features: Sunrise syncs provides background syncing, reminders, timezone support, accepting and sharing appointments etc. However, the killer feature of Sunrise Calendar is its way of playing well with sharing extensions for a variety of other productivity tools, namely LinkedIn, Facebook, Evernote, Trello, and Foursquare etc. Calendars apps are everywhere, but assembling all of your events into a single form is why Sunrise Calendar stands out.
Ideal for: Someone who has a lot of appointments and invitations from different platforms but still wants a simple, streamlined interface that’s easy to use. Especially for those that are concerned with productivity and app integration over anything else, Sunrise is one of the best options available.
Platforms: Desktop, iPhone, iPad and Android
Price: Free
4. Casual.PM
Project Managers are usually required to make endless task lists, create complex charts, or use visual but limited boards. However, for the teammates who are not tech savvy, they may not be comfortable with the complicated Gantt charts and need a while to get familiar with the pro management stuff. That’s not very productive or efficient, right?
Features: The cloud-based project management tool allows users to draw their plan as a flow of tasks. Users get a superb bird’s-eye view of all tasks and dependencies, so no more confusions on who’s doing. Also, this tool is highly visualized. But above all, the key strength of Casual.PM is simplicity, it’s incredibly intuitive to use for the first time. With groupings of visual icons replacing the charts, Casual.PM makes it easy for your team to grasp it with one glance.
Ideal for: Small and growing project teams, non-professional project managers and anyone who manages similar and repeatable projects because it’s simple and intuitive. Especially useful if your team is made up of visual people that can comfortably transfer and understand using visual tools, I’d seriously recommend check out Casual.PM
Price: The plans range from $2 per month (Personal plan, up to two users) to $189 per month (Enterprise-up to 50 users)
5. Asana
“A team — whether across the street or across the world — is a group of people simultaneously work together to a common purpose. ” As a project manager, you are often required to pay attention to team collaboration. By putting communications, task management, project tools and more all under one roof, Asana surely is the clear winner for best team collaboration category.
Features: The killer feature is that it puts your team’s project management and communications all in one place. Besides that, Asana users can create projects, assign tasks to individuals, set deadlines and more. It allows project managers to view progress reports, check what’s done and efficiently share ideas and comments with the team. The embedded-within powerful search engine and push notifications on your phone are also its applauded features.
Ideal for: Small to mid-sized companies that are looking for all-in-one solution of undisturbed team communication and efficient collaboration.
Price: Free forever for up to 15 members, upgrade to Premium for $10 or less per user.
Here, you’ve seen a list of a few productivity tools that feel indispensable, each has it’s distinct purpose and they won’t clutter my tray. If you feel there’re other tools that can save your time and seamlessly integrate with your life, of course you’re welcome to share them with me ;)
