Software aimed at improving our productivity is inescapable in the workplace. While our relationships to the tools intended to boost and organize our work feel strained, they are big business. The task management platform Slack was sold for US$27.7 billion in 2021, for example.
Since the tools aren’t going anywhere for the foreseeable future, learning to make the most of these task masters will pay dividends. Here are five tips on making the most of modern productivity tools from Vern Glaser, U of A business professor and productivity researcher.
1: Don’t hate it until you try it
It’s easy to default to skepticism when it comes to the value of modern productivity tools. Before you decide a given tool is a worthless hunk of junk, Glaser makes a simple suggestion: give it a try.
“My experience, to be honest, is that people who are skeptical of a tool don’t use it,” he says. “Or they attempt to use it to do things that it can’t do.”
Some informed experimentation before you write off a piece of technology might help you discover something that genuinely improves your work or even your life. At the very least, your rejection will be based on firsthand experience instead of hearsay or vibes.
2: Use the right tool for the job
Glaser often collaborates with other researchers. As a productivity evangelist, his efforts to get his peers to use project management software like Asana or Trello have met with mixed results.
“One of the things productivity tools require is that everybody has to agree to and buy into the rules — and follow them,” he says.
Before you launch collaborative tools like Asana or Trello, he says you need to get everyone together to talk about it.
“If you have a simple meeting where you talk through how it will be used, and what you want it to help with, you’re creating space for everybody to get on the same page,” he says.
You can’t expect to solve a problem that hasn’t been clearly identified and understood.
“Unfortunately, I’ve found it’s impossible to get a bunch of independent academics to agree on what the rules are.”
Glaser still uses Asana to organize his own work, but he’s given up trying to get research collaborators to join him.
3: Use the tools to help you use the tools.
Some people have found that the best, most patient tech tutor is a generative AI assistant. For example, Glaser found organizing the notes he kept using an app called Bear was a challenge.
“It was kind of a pain with a traditional file structure, but I didn’t know how to think through a tagging structure,” he says.
So he asked Claude, a generative AI model by Anthropic, for help. “Claude gave me four different ways to do this and helped me build an elegant tagging system for my notes.”
Far easier than searching through forums or FAQs for a problem similar to yours, generative AI can talk you through the best way to use a tool like Slack or Smartsheet. Try asking the robot how to use the robot.
4: Think more about the use than the tool
One of the major themes of Glaser’s research is that people often underestimate the importance of process for using productivity tools.
“Often, people think if you find the perfect software, it will solve all your problems,” he says. “But it’s less about the software you pick and more about the process you design to use it and get people on board. The use of the tool is more important than the tool itself.”
Glaser recommends “spending time ‘designing’ the use of the tool.” He says the process of thinking through how to use it can be more important than the particular tool you use.
5: No single tool works for everyone
A handy task manager tool may look great to one employee and overwhelming to another. Throw in neurodiversity and the challenges to finding a tool that works for the team increase.
Before becoming an academic, Glaser launched a consulting and software business. When the business began using Asana to coordinate work, it ran into difficulties — an employee with ADHD struggled to use the tool.
“Productivity tools can be hard for ADHD or other neurodivergent people, and it’s important to be thoughtful,” says Glaser.
In response, Glaser’s business pivoted to Azure DevOps, a coding-oriented tool that helps employees stay on task.
In other words, willingness to move away from a tool that doesn’t work for the whole team can itself be an important productivity tool.
His advice? Try to stay open to new experiences.
“It’s a mindset,” says Glaser. “How willing are you to drop the tools you’re comfortable with to try new ones that might work better?”