Productivity 101

May 11th, 2010

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You might not recognize me because I’m the new guy here at Border Stylo. This is my first official blog post – cue the celebratory noises. I have been sweating this for a while, mainly because I have never written a blog post before. But as the saying goes, there’s a first time for everything. Since joining the team I’ve had a lot of firsts, including joining Twitter, which led to spending more time online in the last month than the rest of my Internet-deprived life. I’d like to thank our Community Manager for that, and especially for pushing my blog deadline ahead by a month – I think it’s her way of welcoming me with opening arms to the marketing department.

Now, onto the serious stuff, and I do mean serious. After juggling a few ideas around in my mind, a light bulb went off. Why don’t I take advantage of my fresh eyes and tell you a bit about what it’s like working for a technology start-up.

::Cue the light elevator music:: I enjoy being a part of the team at Border Stylo. We are a small but growing bunch, which means each person’s contribution is seen and felt. It is, as most would expect of a start-up, a little crazy, but it’s a blast and I’m enjoying the ride, figuratively and literally – we have a slide!

I work in a nontraditional office environment, and by nontraditional, I mean your boss isn’t standing over your shoulders or micromanaging. There aren’t any TPS reports here guys! This can make for an ideal workplace, but without constant supervision, it’s easy for distractions and laziness to creep in.

I’ve only been here for a month, but I’ve already discovered a few helpful tips for remaining productive in such a laid-back environment:

Google Calendar
This is always open on one of my screens. It’s a great tool for both personal and office life and is sometimes overlooked, but when used to its potential, it can be very efficient. The Calendar can be shared, so keeping up with the office work schedule and setting up meetings is a breeze. Also, since it’s linked to your Gmail account, the little reminders of when things are due can keep you from running late or forgetting deadlines. There’s also an option to sync up to your phone, so even on the go you’re never out of the loop.

Redmine
Redmine is a great internal productivity tool. On Monday mornings we create an iteration plan with weekly goals and post it on a wiki page. This makes it possible for other departments to know what we’re up to and hold us accountable.

Rememberthemilk.com
I discovered rememberthemilk by accident and it’s one of the few accidents I liked. It is a very simple application that allows you to get rid of all the notepads and sticky tags and get your life organized. It allows you to set reminders, share calendars, map out events and all this can be done on a computer or through a smart phone for busy people. The basic service is free, but to get the pro account there is a small charge. They can even plug it into the social networking sites like Twitter. This is a great all-in-one tool to get organized.

These are only a handful of the tools available, but they’re the ones I’ve found myself using in the last month. If you have any other suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments. Also, why not check out one of our Designer’s thoughts on productivity.

Tagged with: productivity, start-ups

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