I, like many people, rely heavily on my smart phone to manage my work when I am out and about. I personally use an iPhone and love the fact that I can see my calendar, deal with emails on the fly, and even schedule tasks into my task list seamlessly using my phone.
I have found that most types of incoming communications that need a response or an action have been fairly easy to deal with on my iPhone. When dealing with emails, I can quickly delete or file things that I don’t need to action or have already actioned. My process is that anything I leave in my Inbox still requires some action when I am back at my desk.
My Achilles heel when using the phone has always been voicemails. If I listened to a voicemail, and did not return the call immediately, there was always a risk that I would get distracted, forget to make a note to return the call, and therefore forget it. This always bothered me, and the voicemail system itself always felt outdated and cumbersome to me. Well, not anymore!
Last week my iPhone was updated to the latest iOS (14.0.1 I believe). And to my delight, the way voicemails are managed has been completely revolutionised! Now, instead of having to dial a number to listen to your voicemails, new voicemails get listed as sound files in your phone app that you can listen to anytime.
The beauty of this is that you can easily forward the voicemail as an email to yourself if you need to remember to action it at a later stage. The sound file can then be listened to again via your PC, and of course the email can be converted into a task or a calendar appointment, so you don’t forget to deal with it at the appropriate time. Simple and effective.
I feel so much more comfortable now knowing that whether you email me, text me or call me I have a way of managing the action so that I never let you down. Thank you, Apple*.
*I have never used an Android device or any other phone other than an iPhone, so do not know if these other devices already do something similar. If they do, good stuff. If they don’t, it is a real pity.