The Best Apps to Empower your Home Workflow

As we go deep into our second lockdown here in the UK, we are seeing a huge rise in companies allowing staff to work from home full time. It has been projected that by the end of 2020, 50% of the entire UK workforce will be working remotely in some capacity. According to Buffers 2019 state of remote report, the majority of workers (84%) still prefer to get things done working from home.

The full report breakdown: What location do you primarily work from?

84% Home

8% Co-working Space

4% Coffee Shops

3% Other

0.5% Libraries

With these stats in mind, you can see how important it is to consider the challenges of getting tasks done, especially in the comfort of your own home. One of the biggest benefits remote workers have fed back to their employers is that they have a better work-life balance. People also report that home working boosts their productivity.

While this sounds great, the reality is the jury is still out on whether people achieve these benefits automatically or if it has a negative impact on other workers. If we look at the same report, we find that working from home can cause common struggles for people.

22% of people surveyed say they struggle to unplug from work, 19% said they feel lonely, 17% said they struggle to collaborate or communicate well with other team members, 10% feel distracted, 7% have issues with staying motivated, 3% have WiFi issues.. the list goes on.

I can personally say I have felt some of these struggles myself. Issues such as WiFi can be easily fixed, but creating a barrier between work time and home time can be a struggle when tasks over-run.

So, what can we do?

During my time home working I have found a host of software on my hosted desktop that has helped me communicate with my team, helped my productivity, and even schedule my day. None of these apps are expensive, in fact most are free and run on a RentedApps desktop with no problem.

• Serene: A tool that cuts out distractions, helps you stay focused and complete tasks faster.
• Zoom: Video and voice calls for groups and one-to-one.
• Slack: Team communication, the way it should be for remote workers.
• Toggl: Keep track of how long it is taking you to complete tasks
• RentedApps: Of course, how could we not recommend it! No matter where we need to work I can log into my desktop (from any computer) and use everything, even my other apps!
• Calendar: Manage all of your calendars and events in one place, arrange meetings without dozens of emails.
• Spark: A smart email client that stops your inbox getting in the way of productivity and turns it into an asset.
• Zapier: Save time on repetitive tasks and switching between apps by automating processes.
• Daywise: Schedule notifications to stop work interrupting your free time.

Each one of these apps and tools has given me something different to improve my home working balance, it is also important to me that my RentedApps hosted desktop runs all of them with ease. I have found that my productivity is up, my working relationships are better by funnelling chat and calls through Slack, and my time is better managed through Zappier & Daywise.

Give them a try and see what you think!