Improve your communication, project management and more with these 10 tools for working online

When you’re working remotely, it requires that you collaborate, communicate, and manage projects a bit differently than you would if you were in the office. Whether working online is part of your regular routine, or you’re still getting the hang of the concept due to the recent health crisis, it’s essential that you have tools in your tool belt to help you do your job efficiently, effectively and productively.

Here’s a list of 10 apps and websites you can use to improve communication, manage projects, boost your focus, engage with your team, and more.

Communicate effectively

Communicating is one of the primary skills you must have in place if you’re going to be effective when working remotely. Whether you want to communicate verbally or in writing, there are various tools you can use to get the job done.

Here are a few top-rated options.

Slack

Slack has forged to the front of the line as one of the most popular and cult favorite communication tools. Thanks to its extensive abilities, you can

• Text: Text with members of your team through the platform
• Send Documents: Send documents, photos, and other necessary files
• Search: Use the powerful search tool to quickly find conversations
• Integrate: Integrate with many of the most popular business services you might already use like Google Docs, Trello, Dropbox, Asana, and more.

Yammer

Yammer serves as a private social network that allows for easy communication and collaboration amongst your team. You can

• Meet: Host online meetings and video calls
• Easily communicate: Chat with your team from your desktop or mobile device
• Share: Create team sites to share information, content, files, and more

Zoom

Zoom lets you easily communicate with your team no matter where you are. You can

• Meet: Host 100+ participants in video meetings and hold 1-on-1 meetings
• Message: Send and receive instant messages
• Collaborate: Set up breakout rooms for small groups to communicate
• Add on: Add on the webinar and phone features for additional communication options

Manage projects

When working online, you want to have an effective project management system in place to ensure that everyone is on the same page related to your business projects. The tool you use should allow you to assign tasks, set due dates, communicate with those involved with the project, and more. Here are a few popular project management tools.

Asana

Asana is one of the most well-known project management tools. It offers a comprehensive and easy to navigate work management platform allowing your team to stay focused on their goals, projects, and tasks. When using Asna, you can.

• Set Deadlines: Set priorities and deadlines for upcoming projects
• Assign Tasks: Assign tasks, so everyone is clear about responsibilities
• Visualize: Create visual project plans to map out the project at hand
• Automate: Set workflows so you can save time by reducing the number manual tasks you do

Trello

Trello is another popular project management tool with a simple and effective interface. With Asana you can

• Organize: Easily organize tasks in a simple visual form similar to the game solitaire
• Collaborate: Add due dates, assign tasks and communicate about projects
• Automate: Use the built in automation tool, Butler, to assign workflows when rule-based triggers are met

TeamWork

Teamwork is designed to help you collaborate on projects with both in house and remote staff members. You can make use of

• Templates: Improve your processes with high-performance templates
• Collaboration: Send messages, files and more to those on your team
• Timer: Use the built-in timer to track time spent on projects
• Milestones: Use this milestone feature to ensure you’re reaching project deadlines

Collaborate on tasks

When working remotely on tasks, you want to ensure that you’re able to collaborate with those on your team to get the job done. There are many tools available to support you with getting this. Here are two impactful options.

Google Drive

The Google suite of tools and tasks needs no introduction. Google offers a variety of tools to help you collaborate on projects with others while working remotely. With the Google suite you can

• Edit: You can edit files at the same time as your team members and automatically save changes
• Convert Files: The drive is compatible with over 100 file types so you can easily store, share and collaborate on different tasks no matter the original format
• Access Remotely: Google Drive files can be accessed from anywhere as long as you have the appropriate permissions. Access them rom your phone, tablet, or computer as needed.

Mural

Mural is designed to meet your online brainstorming and visual design needs. With Murall you can make use of

• Integration You can easily integrate Mural with your project management and communication tools
• Templates: Use ready-made templates to brainstorm ideas, plan projects and more
• Visual Design: Make use of digital sticky notes, whiteboards, flow charts, diagrams and more to virtually put your thoughts on paper

Stay focused

Finally, when working remotely, it can be more challenging to stay focused than if you were in the office. Thankfully, there are tools designed to make this easier.

Freedom

Freedom is a website blocker you can use on your computer, phone, and other digital devices. Its’ system helps you keep your distractions at bay. When using freedom you can

• Block: You can block specific distracting websites, apps or the internet as a whole
• Schedule: Automatically schedule times that need to be distraction-free so you can focus on accomplishing essential tasks
• Lock: To keep you from losing your focus, you can put your devices on lock mode, which won’t allow you to end a block session even if you want to

Brain.FM

Brain.FM provides you with music to improve your focus. It uses a scientific approach to produce music that directly impacts your mind.

• Reduce Distractions: With the music available through Brain.FM, it will fade into the background while still reducing distractions around you.

When you’re working from home, you don’t want your effectiveness or productivity to wane. Make use of the resources, tools, and apps available to you so you can continue to communicate effectively, collaborate with your team, manage projects, and maintain your focus.