How I Work - Hours
In the last post I wrote, I talked about how I had difficulty organizing and staying focused as a tech. Today, I'm going to talk about an app that I found for my iPhone that helps me keep track of what I do during the day.
I discovered the Hours app for iPhone a few months ago when I wasgetting our Chromebooks ready for the new class of students coming in. I was really curious at how much time I was spending on getting these ready, so I launched the app and got to work. Basically, in Hours you can create several projects and start and stop them throughout your day.
As you can see in my screenshot above, I have several different projects, including student support, teacher support, network maintenance, and so on. As you switch or start tasks, you simply tap on the timer next to each task. There's even a widget for the notification center on the iPhone to make it even more accessible. It's fascinating to look back at the day and see what I actually spent time on during the day. Each day is different, depending on which technology decides to break or behave during the day. It's nice that it's so flexible that I can add whatever tasks I want, and I'm still refining it to match exactly how I work.
Using Hours has the added benefit of helping to answer the question I often have at the end of a ridiculously busy day: "What did I actually do today?" I highly recommend this app if you are constantly switching gears during the day, for self-evaluation and helping you figure out if you can consolidate tasks or better schedule things. It takes some time to remember to start the timer for the next task, but when you do it only takes a second or two, and the data you collect on how you spend your workday can be invaluable for self-reflection.
Next time, let's dive a bit into the nerdy networking stuff, and take a look at an app that I can't seem to get away from: FREEPing.
Hours
I discovered the Hours app for iPhone a few months ago when I wasgetting our Chromebooks ready for the new class of students coming in. I was really curious at how much time I was spending on getting these ready, so I launched the app and got to work. Basically, in Hours you can create several projects and start and stop them throughout your day.
As you can see in my screenshot above, I have several different projects, including student support, teacher support, network maintenance, and so on. As you switch or start tasks, you simply tap on the timer next to each task. There's even a widget for the notification center on the iPhone to make it even more accessible. It's fascinating to look back at the day and see what I actually spent time on during the day. Each day is different, depending on which technology decides to break or behave during the day. It's nice that it's so flexible that I can add whatever tasks I want, and I'm still refining it to match exactly how I work.
Using Hours has the added benefit of helping to answer the question I often have at the end of a ridiculously busy day: "What did I actually do today?" I highly recommend this app if you are constantly switching gears during the day, for self-evaluation and helping you figure out if you can consolidate tasks or better schedule things. It takes some time to remember to start the timer for the next task, but when you do it only takes a second or two, and the data you collect on how you spend your workday can be invaluable for self-reflection.
Next Time
Next time, let's dive a bit into the nerdy networking stuff, and take a look at an app that I can't seem to get away from: FREEPing.
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