Struggling to Stay Productive in the Heat? Try a Digital Assistant

Summer is coming and we all know what that means: lazy afternoons at the pool, evening BBQs, the scent of sunscreen, the packing of suitcases, and the ever-growing pile of work that still has to be done.

Staying productive in the summertime can be tough. After all, we want to take a break, enjoy our vacations, and spend more time with friends and family when things start to heat up. But work doesn’t stop just because the icy weather goes away.

So, if you want to stay on top of things and enjoy the warm summer months, you have to have a plan for staying productive.

If you find yourself struggling with staying productive during the summer, you’ve come to the right place. We have some surefire ways to improve your productivity and help your team become more efficient ( despite the summer fun that awaits) using digital assistants.

But did you know that digital assistants also have the power to help businesses and nonprofits behind-the-scenes?

The ability to balance heavy workloads, improve efficiency, and streamline repetitive, mundane tasks are challenges all companies or nonprofit organizations contend with at one point or another.

And while voice assistants are usually known for their ability to find a specific song in a playlist, locate a local restaurant, or help an online shopper buy the perfect gift, digital assistants can be used to increase productivity and improve overall business management.

Let’s see how.

Keeping track of your own productivity can be a pain. If you have a team of people, all responsible for different things, productivity tracking becomes even more challenging. Not to mention, it’s tedious for you to have to individually follow what each person is doing at any given time.

With Howdy, all you have to do is send out pre-set questions to your team asking them what they’re working on, what’s holding them back, if they need help, etc. All of these answers are then compiled and sent straight to you. This process saves everyone time while still giving you daily, weekly, or even monthly status updates.

One of the biggest hassles facing large corporations with huge teams is starting a video meeting on time. Many video meetings require call-ins, passwords, logging in, and more. And if you’re team is all over the place, one little slip up could delay the meeting and start the day off on the wrong foot. Worse yet, people that have problems joining the video call will miss out on the meeting and have to be updated at another time. Again, this is an inefficient use of time and hurts productivity.

With Alexa for Business, organizations and their teams can get more work done using the intelligent assistant Alexa and the words, “Alexa, join my meeting.” From there, your digital assistant will find the next meeting on the calendar, turn on the display, and connect you immediately.

This type of digital assistant solution helps by:

It’s easy to think of things throughout the day you need to do, and forget them at the end of the day if you haven’t written them down somewhere. Worse yet, it’s easy to lose those paper reminders in the chaos that can be a typical workday if you’re extra busy or have an upcoming summer vacation on your mind.

That said, if you use the popular Cortana assistant, things like booking appointments, scheduling meetings or events, and even setting reminders is a breeze.

To use the reminders feature, all you have to do is say or type “Remind Me,” and either fill out the form with the details ( such as person, place, time, or thing you want to be reminded about) or make a statement such as “Remind me about my meeting tomorrow at 3 pm.”

The neat thing about this particular digital assistant ( whether used on your desktop or Windows phone) is that it can do things like:

Voice assistants are built using a technology called natural language processing (NLP), which use artificial intelligence and machine learning to recognize speech. This way, when someone speaks into the assistant, it can understand what the person is saying and respond in an appropriate way.

For example, with a digital assistant you can:

And the best part is, leaving voice notes for your digital assistant or letting it transcribe meeting notes for you frees up your hands to do other things, thus making you more productive.

Though some of these technologies are still relatively new, just the fact that you can use them in this way now shows promise for the future of digital assistants.

There may come a time when you, a team member, or even someone you interact with will have trouble using certain technologies because of a disability or injury. So, rather than let that slow down productivity, a speech-enabled digital assistant can help with overcoming those challenges without all the frustration.

Here are just some of the things a digital assistant can do in the workplace to boost productivity when it comes to accessibility:

Though digital assistants do have a long way to go when it comes to accessibility UX, especially for those with speech impediments, the technology continues to advance and help more people, especially in the workplace.

Digital assistants are paving the way for companies and nonprofits to be more productive than ever before, despite the weather, lack of ambition, or daydreaming that comes with summertime.

And while your current technology may offer free resources to boost productivity, they may not be enough. After all, many free productivity tools have limited features, and your team might need something more powerful to stay on track.

Here’s a quick look at some of the best premium digital assistant solutions in the market to date and how they’ll best help your workplace productivity.

Running a business or a nonprofit organization can take a lot of time and effort, whether you go it alone or have a team helping. And there will always be tasks that have to be done that are better off being automated if productivity and efficiency is on your radar.

There’s no better way to automate some of the most repetitive tasks on your plate than to use a digital assistant. Especially during work-filled/fun-filled summer months where work is pulling you and your team in one direction, and summertime activities are pulling you in another.

So, take some time to evaluate your needs and find a digital assistant that can help day or night. It’s guaranteed to save you time, money, and the frustration it takes to balance it all.

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