Yes I succumbed early on and purchased an iPad. I’d been attempting to go completely paperless in my business life for around five years now, trying different iterations of smart phones, netbooks and laptops to achieve the aim. I achieved different levels of success along the way, but couldn’t seem to completely ditch the handwritten PM’s Notebook. As we know, the PM’s Notebook, or Daily Log is an integral part of delivering a successful project. I’ve lost count how many times taking notes in my notebook has saved my bacon, and the bacon of those in my teams.
At last though, I’ve been able to achieve my aim for an extended period through the daily, or should I say constant, use of an iPad. I attend meetings constantly, that’s how my work is done, and I have a standard meeting kit that I take with me to each meeting. Now it consists solely of the iPad inside a Newertech’s iFolio case (less the shoulder strap) and a Boxwave Stylus. The iFolio case is about half the size of my previous A4 sized folio case I used to carry around.
So to make this all work I use the following applications on the iPad, over and above the standard applications which come on the device, such as Mail, Calendar and the like:
I use this 
application constantly and it is the replacement for the notebook. Handwritten notes that can be uploaded to Google Docs, emailed as PDF, stored, edited and printed. It allows just about anything you need to keep a record of conversations and daily project management decisions. I used to use Penultimate, but found without a zoom feature that I was going through way too many pages with even the smallest amount of text. Notes Plus has a zoom feature which allows you to write much more text on a page. You can also type notes if you like. The developer is very responsive as well, which is always a good sign.
I stumbl
ed across this application when I was searching for a method of displaying mind maps on to a screen. I wanted a way that would remove the whiteboard diagramming, then the printout, then the Visio diagramming later on. This application pushes out a workable diagram through the iPad’s VGA connection and allows for emailing of the file in various formats later on. Very handy to visually determine the scope of a new project or stage from the client’s brain.
I’ve just started using Nozbe and it is tremendous. It’s a task list application, it has a very handy browser based application as well which you can sync with your iPad. In fact, you could run most of your project’s tasks by using both the iPad version and the web based version. I’m not fully convinced right now, but it has been handy to quickly type in action items during a meeting and to allocate them to staff afterwards. The issue I have with any of the getting things done type applications is that I’ve found myself forever adding tasks but rarely being able to cross any off. It’s got a handy iPhone application as well and integrates perfectly with Evernote. More on that in my next post.
My next post will be a broad overview of the applications I use on my laptop to make the job of project management just that little bit easier.
What iPad applications do you use, feel free to let me know in the comments?
