12.06.2020

The COVID apocalypse has transformed the world in unimaginable ways. Individuals and businesses are finding new ways to navigate through this crisis. Work from home has been a significant adjustment along the same lines. 

Speaking of statistics: 

  • Coronavirus has forced 88% of businesses to encourage their employees to work from home.
  • 91% of the teams have already implemented WFH arrangements.
  • 74% of organizations are planning to adopt more remote work in a post-COVID world. 

That being said, we are not used to working in our living rooms and may find it counter-productive. To keep business operations flowing, it is mandatory to look out for ways that enhance productivity in WFH situations. Smartphone applications are a great tool in that direction. 

Here are, therefore, 7 smartphone applications that will help you work from home: 

Nozbe

The biggest challenge of working from home is that you need to bring your geographically scattered team on the same page. Once that is done, exercising productivity and achieving goals becomes easy. Nozbe helps you with exactly that. It organizes your team through a to-do list by leveraging communication tools. 

The app helps you collaborate with your team so that you reach the project completion with added efficiency. It allows your team members to access all the projects, tasks, and comments, to ensure that no one misses out on anything. 

All you need to do is: Finalise what needs to be done. Create projects and set teams for the same. Dedicate tasks to each project and assign individuals to complete them. You can also add comments/attachments to further clarify the tasks. 

Snagit

This app aims to transform the way you communicate in the workspace. Not only that but it also eases the process. So, the standard way to communicate, train, or teach is through lengthy emails, training manuals, exhaustive documents, and help desk articles. Snagit replaces them with visual instructions that are easy to deliver and understand. 

It offers a screen capture and recording facility for you to capture the entire process in video and add your own instructions/answers in audio. These audio-visual instructions help you create how-to guides, tutorials, and quick videos and are a great way to ensure that your message is clearly conveyed. 

Loom

We all know how challenging it is to manage time when working from home. Add typing lengthy emails, frequent phone calls, and zoom meetings to it, and you’re in for some serious failure. That’s where Loom steps in to save you. It infuses loads of productivity in your workday by cutting down the need for unnecessary emails and meetings. 

With Loom, you can capture quick videos and share them as and when the need arises. The fact that we can talk 6 times faster than we type establishes why you must prefer the app. 

Turn it the other way round, you don’t have to spend time reading long mails with undivided focus. You can easily go through Loom videos from your team members in between your work and instantly respond with a short video. 

Pinngle Safe Messenger

The need for a dedicated communication app in a work from home setting is undebatable. Pinngle is that app for you – to connect team members no matter where they are through instant messages and voice/video calls. 

The factor that outshines all average applications is that Pinngle is highly focussed on the quality and privacy of their service. The app also works to overcome the barrier of poor internet connection which is quite a common problem in homes.

Lastly, you have complete control of the information you share. Pinngle doesn’t sell/store your information and provides uncompromised security – something you cannot miss when dealing with confidential data. 

15 Five

Lack of a dedicated working environment may cause your employees’ morale to suffer. 15 Five works right in these cases. It is a performance management tool that helps managers collect regular employee feedback that in turn builds honest work relationships and successful businesses. 

The app works by sending a 15-minute insightful survey to all the employees. After they answer all the questions, the managers get a chance to read and respond to this invaluable feedback. Employers can then create a framework to improve and evolve as needed. 

15 Five extends a platform where employers get familiar with the achievements and challenges of each employee. They can leverage this information and align employee’s strengths with the organization’s goals. Ultimately, this is a sure-shot way to boost employee engagement and achieve the said goals. 

Pragli

Remote working thrives when there’s rich connection and minimum friction. Pragli does that by creating a virtual office where you’re constantly connected with what your team members are doing and where they are. The app serves you with avatars for you to know when someone is in a meeting, engaged in a project, on a break, or unavailable for the day. It saves you from the unnecessary hassle of trying to connect when the other person isn’t on board. 

Pragli brings you incredibly close to the real-world presence in the remote workspace. For explaining it better, Pragli co-founder Doug Safreno said, Pragli is for video conferencing what Slack is for email.

Forest

Our smartphones enable us in so many ways, but they are also our biggest source of distraction. If you cannot help checking social media for no reason – repeatedly, during work hours – Forest is for you. 

The app holds you accountable and pushes you to complete the planned tasks. All you need to do is plant a seed on the app when you want to focus on a particular task. The seed will keep on growing into a tree if you do not give up (use your phone). If you remain consistent at your job, you’ll eventually grow a whole forest in the app. 

The best part is that you get to plant real trees through the app. Whenever you spend virtual coins earned through Forest, the team donates to Trees for the Future, and a real tree is planted. 

Your smartphone can be an incredible productivity tool if you let it. The aforementioned apps will equip you with all you need to make your work from home journey a fruitful one.

You must try them right now to experience what great lengths apps go to ease our lives. 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *