This month’s April Toolbox features team building, task completing, e-signing and news reading. We look at four tools that may improve your life or business in an age of paperless and remote work.
Let’s ride, shall we?
Get your tasks DoneDone
Now matter how many tools I look at, I still struggle with my task lists. Sure, I know, there are tons of task lists and project management systems out there, but they always seem to be more than I need.
I decided I wanted to keep the user interface more simple and not be overwhelmed.
Frankly, I just wanted to get my tasks done. Done.
That’s when I came across DoneDone.
After all, I don’t have a team. I am a solo professional, so I need something to help me navigate tasks I need to do in the immediate week or two.
I operate almost exclusively from the Weekly Todo list (see below), but the other ones help me keep things segmented.
I can link tasks to projects and other tasks to help me keep them categorized.
The big issue I had early was that I had tasks that were not being completed in a week, so I moved them to their own project.
If there is a task that I can’t finish in a week, this is the best course. I want to keep the Weekly Todo project for tasks each week.
It has worked out well.
DoneDone can actually be used with your clients, if you want to do that. It has a good infrastructure in place for tracking bugs. You can take advantage of the email integration as well.
The price for DoneDone is very simple and very reasonable.
I am not telling you to run out and get DoneDone. The best tool is the one you use. However, if you are looking for something different and something to help you wade through all the tasks of your projects, have a small team or fly solo, DoneDone might be a great solution for you.
Finally, every time I have contacted them about something, I receive quick responses and several times from Michael Sanders, the Co-Founder.
Give it a look.
Charlie the news bot
Charlie is an interesting concept I found on Product Hunt. The premise is that we entrepreneurs are too busy to read news or watch news, so it shows us the summaries without advertisers.
The idea of the tool is to get summarizations of the news without the advertising, but the summaries come from sources that use advertisers. Therefore, it isn’t a perfect solution. I know the idea is to avoid bias from advertisers, but I don’t think it can completely be done.
Frankly, I don’t trust summaries of news from someone else.
Charlie is a product of OneSub.
“OneSub exists to fix the way we read the news. We will stop the rise in click-bait and fake news with your help. Join OneSub for free today. Subscribe when you’re ready.” OneSub
This might work really well for you, but I’m not convinced yet, but I’ll keep using it and see.
I would love to see news come from a wide variety of sources, including sources in other countries. OneSub uses several sources which you can see here.
Some of the news stories they were showing me I saw the day before.
Now, as with most automated systems, they get better as they engage with us, so I would assume things would be better in a month or so.
Charlie has options for iOS, Android, and browser, so it should be available for most people.
When it comes to news, I think it is best to engage various sources and do my own evaluation.
Charlie and Onesub help you curate news in your own personal dashboard. Time will tell, but there may be some potential here.
E-Sign for free?
Signing documents can be troublesome for many of us. For most of us, we use some kind of software to do our proposals. That works well for a large project, but maybe smaller projects. Perhaps we need a different option.
You can use it for free because, as SignFree says,
“We believe that everyone should have access to free electronic signatures for a paperless world where we get things done and we focus on what really matters.”
I could not agree more.
I am looking at this for a possible solution for another project of mine.
The cool thing is you can try it out instantly for free! On the homepage, in the hero area, there is a place to upload your document to be signed.
The tool is free to use, but it has a Premium plan that is more for businesses, which will be available in April 2022 (that’s now!)
SignFree also has a corporate plan.
Frankly, many of us use other means for drawing up agreements and contracts than proposal software, so SignFree might be the missing link to your workflow.
Build culture with Brightful games
Brightful Games
Call this one very interesting. These days, in the digital marketing world, we are remote. Very remote.
So how does one help build culture and team unity?
How about with games?
“Brightful is a suite of online games for team building. We are perfect for ice breaking, striking up interesting conversations, and having a fun time together.” Brightful Games
According to the website, there are three use cases for their suite of games: Culture, Education, and Online Events.
I think there are lots of possibilities for remote companies. If you are serious about building a culture and a team in your remote company, then using something like Brightful may prove very beneficial.
Planning that next virtual event? Maybe some games can help. Brightful has my interest for sure.
Wrapping it up
What kinds of tools do you use task management, news reading, e-signing, and cultivating a culture with your remote team?
Let us know at the MainWP Users Facebook group or in the new Meta MainWP.
This content was originally published here.