It’s astounding to me how many opportunities we miss to make communication easier. And by communication, in this case, I’m talkin g about applications ranging from simple hi-how-do-you-do interactions to business deals getting done, or NOT getting done as it relates to communication. I’ve found that lots of times, it’s a problem of omissions and…

Here are some things I’ve learned while traveling. They’re just little tidbits that might make your days go smoother: On your cell phone, rename your significant other’s contact listing to read – Firstname, Lastname-CallForEmergency (so that they know who to call if someone finds you injured). Take 10 or so feet of…

Starbucks doesn’t sell coffee. They create an experience with an environment, complete with accessories, lifestyle choices, and culture. Home Depot isn’t a hardware store. It’s a solution to your improvement projects, a trusted resource for your redecorating needs, and a supplier for your new home. There are dozens more cases that come right to mind. If…

So I’m traveling a lot, and I realize that I’m carrying with me a million cords and cables. I have power cords for my cell phone, my video camera, my digital camera, my laptop. I have data cables for my microphone, my camera, my camcorder, my iPod, and I’m sure I’m missing something. Oh… two…

I’ve been mental busy lately (sorry for not writing so often on Lifehack. I’m working on that). My inbox has shot from around 50 new mails a day to 250. Of these, about 200 require that I read fully, and/or take action. The others might be groups I’m not fully giving my attention, alerts and…

I’ve been traveling a bunch more with the new job, and I’ve realized that a plane ride is quite a chunk of time where you can’t conduct NEW business. Instead, you get an opportunity to catch up on things that need doing. Here are a few things I did and felt could get done on…

Gretchen Rubin brings us a necessary list of tips to help us deal with those moments in life when our children decide they’ve had all they can stand, and they can’t stand any more. The secret is to acknowledge the reality of children’s wishes. This sounds obvious, but think about how easy it is to…

In my new role, I’ll be attending and hosting lots of conferences and meetups. This means traveling probably as much as twice a month to other places, and that means lugging all the stuff a technological nomad needs to take along to stay viable. Here’s a list that I’m compiling that contains some obvious…

I never realized this little trick about Google’s Gmail, so I thought I’d pass it on to you, just in case. If you want to keep something in Gmail, but don’t need it right away, use the ARCHIVE button. This pulls it out of the inbox view, and keeps your inbox cleaner. I have lots…

Gretchen Rubin is back with her Wednesday helpful idea. This time, it’s a quiz to see if your workspace is driving you nuts. Based on her readings from within the book, A PATTERN LANGUAGE, Gretchen identifies a bunch of things that will ensure you have a workspace that you consider peaceful. Here are a few…

Over the past several days, I’ve had the opportunity to meet several people, from presidents of corporations, to really important people like teachers of children with learning disabilities. I’ve had the opportunity to hear about a lot of businesses, and have received a lot of interesting offers in the mix. But what was really fun…

I’ve been away from Lifehack for a while, first running an unconference, then attending a conference, and I’ll be away a few days more to attend a funeral. Over these past several days, I’ve needed a way to stay organized, a simple, flexible way to get everything that needed doing handled without much effort, and…

I left my house for work this morning, knowing that I’m going to go from the office into a whole other world: PodCamp. So, I had to have everything read, because I wasn’t coming home. I said to myself, fleetingly, I should write a checklist. I didn’t. So far, here’s what I forgot: Videocamera…

I don’t know. I’m staring at Gretchen Rubin’s picture, and I swear, she doesn’t look to be much over 26 years old. So how, then, do you explain this? Gretchen has tips on how to be happy that were written — wait for it — in 1625. So either: a.) Gretchen uses some VERY…

I’m writing this using Performancing for Firefox. When I remember to use it, I like the app a great deal. It sits down at the bottom of my browser (I use it fairly crunched up), and I can write posts to various blogs with it. But here’s something I use it for that you…