When your entire team feels overwhelmed by the flood of emails each day and their to-do lists that just keep growing and growing, it may not be a coincidence. Many offices leave it to each individual to decide on their own email plans, but if your team comes together and decides on a company-wide plan, then team members can be freed up to spend less time on emails and more time on their job responsibilities.  Refocusing attention and priorities in the workday as a team effort also provides a good boost to those that aren’t naturally as organized as others.  Here are 3 reasons why an email management plan could work for your team:

1. Improves Efficient Communication - If you compose each email properly with a specific subject and include your email signature, hopefully you won’t receive as many emails looking for your contact information.  Recipients will also be more inclined to call you instead of type out another email to you if your phone number is right in front of them.
2. Reduces Digital Clutter - When you create a system that works for how to handle your incoming emails, you’ll be able to eliminate the clutter in your inbox quicker.
3. Saves Time for Your Team - If you can manage email effectively, especially as a team, you can reduce the amount of time you spend in meetings. Instead of making all the decisions face-to-face, your team can make those decisions through email.

Want additional tips on how to manage your email effectively? Follow The Productivity School’s blog for daily tips on email management and other productivity topics!

When projects start piling up on you and your coworkers in the new year, you may begin to panic and wonder how you’ll ever remember all the tasks associated with each one and how you’ll get them all done on time. Instead of stressing out more than necessary by depending on yourself, consider using apps and online tools that are designed to outline and manage your projects for you. Here are the 5 apps that we, at Innovatively Organized, recommend most to our clients:

1. Liquid Planner- This online project management software allows you to easily distribute tasks among coworkers, schedule tasks based on priority and on best-case/worst-case estimates of time, and view your project analytics and reporting. Also included in this software is document sharing abilities and a timesheet so that team members can track their time.
2. Smartsheet- This is a project management tool that allows you to view your entire project all in one sheet. The sheet includes the status and budget of your project. It also allows you to compare your estimated and actual cost and time of each project. What’s great is that there are many templates to choose from that can suite different needs for each project.
3. Basecamp- This project management app’s simple interface allows you to view your to-do list, files, and discussions with team members all in one place. It also includes a shared calendar between team members and allows you to track daily progress. 
   
4. Pro Workflow- This app features a comprehensive dashboard that displays the summary data of your project and the tasks at hand. It also includes a timeline so you can visualize your tasks and provides messaging for you and your team members, clients, etc.
5. Azendoo- This project manager is partnered with Evernote, Box, Dropbox and Google Drive so your project can be handled seamlessly with all your favorite tools. It is great for handling to-do lists and allows you to share task lists and files with team members.

What’s important is finding the right project management tool for you and your team. Share and test out these apps with your coworkers and then decide which ones you’ll use as team to make your project as efficient as possible.

© 2014 Gigaom, Inc.

With our extensive use of Evernote and our support of ScanSnap, we here at Innovatively Organized were thrilled to hear the news of the new Evernote Edition ScanSnap! Two of our favorite productivity tools coming together into one amazing device was reason enough for us to get excited, but here are some more reasons why this Evernote scanner is a must-have for 2014:

• Automatically organizes everything. The ScanSnap can detect what type of document you’re scanning and automatically file it where it needs to go within your Evernote account.
• Operates under a WiFi connection. With this scanner, you won’t be cluttering up your office with more cords because it can be used with a WiFi connection.
• Simple Operations. This ScanSnap automatically detects double-sided documents, rotates them, and detects color.
• Includes a free year of Evernote Premium. This allows you to use the ScanSnap without having to buy Evernote if you didn’t have it previously.

This partnership of two of our most recommended productivity tools can help declutter your office and get you a step closer to becoming paperless.

Want more useful tips and recommendations that can help boost your productivity? Follow The Productivity School on Twitter for daily tips!

Make 2014 your most productive year by actually eliminating an item from your list. Many people pack on tasks and goals to their to-do list in January and become overwhelmed immediately. This can actually hinder someone from getting any of those goals completed. Instead of adding something else to your to-do list today, what is one thing you can take off your list and let go of? This should be something that doesn’t add value to your life or is more of a filler than a real goal. There is a productivity myth between being busy and being productive, which makes most people inclined to add more items to their new years goals than necessary. By taking something off your list, you can focus on your main goals and utilize them. We want you to create a list of resolutions and goals that are realistic and attainable instead of overloading your list with things you may want to accomplish but aren’t yet ready to commit to doing.