Fred's Blog

A few months ago I ditched my paper meeting notebook, in favour of a techie (and nerdy) solution on the iPad.

Some people type their notes directly into the iPad with the onscreen keyboard, but I type too slow, so I needed a different solution.

That is when I found the brilliant Note Taker app. It lets you easily write handwritten notes on the iPad screen. It has a clever way to let you write your notes quite large, and it automatically makes your handwriting smaller.

You can write the notes directly on the screen with a finger, but I use a small pen, the PogoSketch. It makes the writing quicker and easier.

After the meeting I email the note to Evernote. That way the note is automatically backed up, if the iPad is lost.

Also, Evernote is pretty good at understanding handwriting and makes the notes searchable. This is handy when I am looking for an old note a few months later. Just type a word into Evernote and it shows all my handwritten notes that contain that word. Easy-peasy.

When teams are looking for improvements they normally look for ways to do more with the same resources (time, money, people, tools, etc).

However, most of the time what the team should actually focus on is to do better, not to do more.

It is much more difficult to do better than do more. To do better you need to raise your own standards, to challenge yourself, to change how you do things.

But then again, if it was easy everyone would do it. So doing better gives you a great advantage over others who just do more.

Have you heard of mind-mapping?

It is a great tool for focusing your mind, especially if your mind is as muddled and unfocused as mine.

It helps you explore problems and ideas, and add some structure to your thinking.

Personally I use Mindmeister. It is really handy as the mind-maps are stored online, and they have a nice app for the iPad. But there are other great tools out there, such as Freemind, which is free.

When you work on a project it is always handy to have a tool to track the work. These days you often have people from different of companies working on the same project at the same time.

Here are some ideas that may help you manage your projects better.

Microsoft Project

One of the most common tools for project management is Microsoft Project. It has all the functionality you could ever want, and much more.

However, in reality MS Project is often only used by the project manager. The other team members don’t have MS Project installed, or they don’t know how to find the project file on the network.

So in practice the team members only see the project plan at meetings, and they quickly forget about priorities, tasks, and time lines.

Basecamp

Enter Basecamp

Basecamp is a tool at the other end of the spectrum. It lacks a lot of functionality, but it is really easy to use for everyone on the team. It is an online tool, which means everyone can see the current plan at any stage, and you don’t have to install anything.

The most important feature of Basecamp is the ease-of-use. You just sign up your team members online, and your new project can be set up in a few minutes. Here are the main pluses:

• Really easy to use
• Cheap
• All online, nothing to install
• Easy to collaborate with people outside your company, e.g. affiliates, vendors, suppliers, customers, etc

One big problem with Basecamp is that it cannot handle task dependencies. However, for a small project these can often be handled by just telling people on the team about the dependencies by email.

If you want to try Basecamp in your own company, here are some great ideas to help you get started.

If you find a better project management tool, please let me know.