We thought it would be helpful to gather a list of the top 5 apps we use on a regular basis for both our business and for supporting us as part of delivering / managing projects.
So here it is in order of use:
In at number 1 is:
OneNote by Microsoft. This is a great tool for capturing all of your project notes in a secure area which is easily searchable and accessible across devices. We previously used Evernote, however, although this application is very good, it does not allow the embedding of excel, word or powerpoint files which is a very powerful attribute of OneNote. OneNote also comes bundled as part of Microsoft Office suite, which most organisations have deployed.
Number 2:
Reminders by Apple. This is great especially if you have bought in to the Apple ecosystem as we have, as the reminders sync across your devices – MacBook, iPad and iPhone. You can categorise in to work or personal. It’s also really easy to ask Siri to add a reminder to the specific to do list, specifying either a time or when you arrive at a specific location. You can share categories and their associated reminders / to do lists, with other members of your team or household. It’s also free, provided you have an Apple device which makes it even better.
Number 3:
Bria iPhone edition by Counterpath. This is great for connecting your iPhone to your Voip telephone system, so that you never miss a call from a prospective customer or indeed from any other stakeholders. The app in our opinion is the best / most stable solution for enabling you to turn your phone in to a Voip / softphone and connects to the most popular Voip / softphone service providers. This app is not free, however, it’s worth it!
Number 4:
Zoho Invoice by Zoho. This app allows for multiple projects to be captured, ensuring accurate time management records, through it’s timesheet capturing facility. Making it super easy for you and your team to capture the amount of time spent working on a specific project, this can be done via the stopwatch type facility, start and end times or the specific hours. This app is also free.
Number 5:
Expensify by Expensify. We use this app for capturing all expenses incurred, related to either the specific project or indeed from our business perspective. It’s possible to add specific categories for the expenses and also to flag whether they are billable to the client or re-imbursible. The app allows for quick entering of expenses using its smartscan facility (limited to around 10 scans per month for non paid app subscription) or alternatively you can simply add a photo of your expense to the details which you add in manually. If you add in manually you can add some rules based on the Merchant information added, for example if you added Starbucks it would automatically add the expense to a refreshments category. This is all configurable through the website, which then replicates / syncs, with the phone or tablet app.
You will have noticed that we have not specifically highlighted any project management software, this is simply because we always utilise the available software provided by the clients / customers with whom we work and any supporting governance tools for tracking and capturing of Risks, Issues, Assumptions, Decisions and CR’s (CRAID items)