Productivity

There’s a myth that time is money. In fact, time is more precious than money. It’s a nonrenewable resource. Once you’ve spent it, and if you’ve spent it badly, it’s gone forever  -Neil A. Fiore

Below is a list of extensions and shortcuts I used to stay productive. Open offices are productivity killers but working remotely has its own challenges for getting distracted.

Chrome Extensions

• News Feed Eradicator for Facebook
  • Removes your news feed and live ticker, and replaces it instead with an inspirational quote.
• Strict Workflow
  • A Pomodoro extension (25 minutes of work / 5 minutes break), that blocks social media/distractions.
• Time Tracker
  
  • Was able to see my time on Facebook drop after installing the News Feed eradicator and conscious of my Reddit time.
• Momentum
  • Replaces new tab page with a  to-do list, weather, and links
• Grammarly
  • Spellcheck on steroids

Music

• Brain.fm
  • Focus Music has results that boost attention and reduce mind-wandering

Mac Apps

• Alfred:
  • More powerful app launcher than spotlight learns which app you frequently search for over time
• Bettersnaptools
  • Maximize, resize, and move windows around, didn’t realize how much I missed this tool til I used someone elses’s computer.
• F.lux
  • Dims the screen around sundown
• Cloudapp
  • easy to use screenshots and gif maker

Physical

• Whiteboard
  • Not everything digital is better, I feel more satisfied when crossing off a to-do list that’s physical
• Clean desk
  • There is a negative relationship between a Messy Desk and Productivity
• Second Monitor
  • When I need to look up documentation or spot changes having monitors saves on switching costs.

Shortcuts

I don’t understand how some people don’t seek out shortcuts for their most used applications. We spend 20.5 hours each week on email, wouldn’t it make sense to spend 20.5 seconds on how to improve how we use this necessary evil?

Gmail:

First turn on your keyboard shortcuts in settings

1. “j” and “k” – to move up and down around inbox (Just like Vim)
2.  g + i – for go to inbox
3. Shift + u – mark as unread

For more Keyboard shortcuts for Gmail

Slack:

Slack was launched as an email killer, so now I find myself replacing email time with slack, so it was worth looking into how to optimize slack usage as well.

1.  ⌘ + k –  Quick Switcher
2. Alt + Shift +↓  -Next unread channel or DM

For more Slack keyboard shortcuts 

Chrome:

1. ⌘ + Option + Arrow –  Navigate Tabs
2. ⌘ + w  – closes the current window
3. ⌘ + l –  Jump to the address bar

For more chrome shortcuts

Productivity Conclusion

If you grasped many, you did not grasp anything; if you grasped few, you grasped something – Talmud, Rosh Hashana, 4b

Don’t attempt to learn every single shortcut for every app. Perform an 80/20 analysis of what functions you see yourself repeating and focus on those. As well as which shortcut encompasses others. You can’t create more time so use what you more productively.