While you are traveling, there are situations where you are not able to turn your laptop on. But what if you have to? If you really must send a message to your team or an important file to your manager but you are currently on a bus, you will have to find your luggage, take the laptop out, turn it on, and try to do what you have to – everything in a cramped space, when you are jumping up and down as the bus is bumping on the road. This can be really annoying.
Sometimes all you need is just one word or sentence to boost the engagement of your team and push the work forward. But if you are, for example, in a noisy airport, it is not comfortable to talk over the phone. Also, if you are abroad, the cost of a phone call can devastate your wallet. What should also be taken into consideration, is that if you are in a different time zone, you may not be able to reach the members of your team immediately.
Mobile devices improve you work
Although not everyone imagines that working on a cell or tablet can be comfortable, there are more and more of those, who decide to give it a go. Turns out, at times it can be even more convenient than work on a regular PC.
Here are some interesting statistics regarding the productivity of employees:
- Americans spend 78% of the time in the 8-hour work checking emails (Reuters via AirWatch Blog)
- In 2015, 68% of e-mails were opened on mobile devices (Reuters via AirWatch Blog)
- 82% of employees prefer to receive text messages as voice messages (RingCentral)
As you can see, the trend to work on mobiles is quite large. As statistics present, especially in the field of communication. Time is a resource that is an essential element of management. Thanks to mobile phones, we do not waste it on activities like turning our PC on just to respond to one message. They even give us an opportunity to stay in the office a bit shorter. Of course, there are still many supporters of the theory of personal presence in the company, but their numbers are depleting in this era.
Below, we will present some applications that allow one to manage his or her work from mobile phone.
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TimeCamp
Naturally. TimeCamp a tool for work time tracking, monitoring and analyzing the time spent on a computer. With its advanced reporting function and the possibility to create projects, we can determine exactly how much time we spend on particular tasks or other activities. The work time tracked through your mobile can also be essential, because not only you will be able to analyze the statistics to improve your working schedule but you also can add this time to the main app, and, for example, present it to your client, who pays by the hour. Recently, we have launched a brand new version of this app, with a more intuitive interface, more features, and better optimization for both Android phones and iPhones. More about it can be found in our article about the new TimeCamp app.
No matter how big your team is and how many projects you’re working on. TimeCamp provides access to all the data tracked by your device in one place. It easily records the time spent on tasks, and allows you to properly bill your customers. Download it here.
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Excel
Excel is one of many applications from the Microsoft Office bundle, but this one is probably the most well-developed, towering above the rest, and perhaps even the best in the world. Excel on its mobile version retained many of the features from the regular version, but it comes with a simplified interface that allows one to create even very advanced sheets. Users with sufficient knowledge will be able to perform miracles on it. Although Excel is easier to handle on the desktop, from your mobile, you can easily read the files and make quick decisions on the basis of the figures.
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Slack
Slack is an absolute must when it comes to communication between team members. It allows the user to create multiple channels for different purposes. We can invite our team members to particular channels, send notifications to them (or let the whole channel know if the message is important .) The interface is intuitive, users can attach files, it also offers a powerful search engine that will facilitate information gathering. Disadvantages? Well, it is harder to write on a mobile, but the app is flawless.
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Dropbox
One of the many clouds for file storage. The best way to use it is to create a virtual folder on all your devices (ie. mobile phone, tablet, laptop, desktop computer), so you will be able to quickly access your files from any place and in every situation. It is well known that it is better to take pictures with your mobile, but show them on your tablet or PC. File synchronization, therefore, allows you to quickly take advantage of the capabilities of your devices.
To synchronize files between your devices, install the Dropbox desktop application on your computer and mobile application on your smartphone or tablet. Then log in to each application using the same email address and password.
If you already have the Dropbox app installed, simply add files to the Dropbox folder, and it will automatically sync the file with your Dropbox account, which means that it can be accessed from any computer, smartphone or tablet, where a Dropbox app is installed.
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Acrobat Reader
Acrobat Reader offers a free version that allows a user to quickly open PDF documents, add comments to them, or even tag them. It is well integrated with Dropbox but has its own service in the cloud. PDF files are very common and there are many tools that can save a file in this format. While sending files of different formats between different devices can cause us problems, because we won’t be able to open them properly, PDF does not cause any trouble. Acrobat Reader is available on every device, and PDF format of a file is universal. Neat and useful.
