Tools of the trade are not the same anymore. Instead of hammers, screwdrivers and pliers, we have laptops, phones, and iPads. And that is just the hardware. The software is what really makes these new tools come to life.
But have you ever taken a moment to consider just how many tools, software applications, websites, and services that you need/use to run a small business? It is literally astounding just how many we use at ScheduleWise! To create, deploy, and support our Scheduling/Workflow Management Software, we have had to become competent and sometimes expert users in so much other software!
In a recent fit of wild transparency, I’ve highlighted below the most prominent applications/services that we use to run ScheduleWise. Not all of them do we use every single day, but for the most part, we touch each of these applications at least once per month.
When they say that software is eating the world, you can see why!
Here is a listing…
For administering the business:
Highrise
Google Apps
— email
— calendar
YouCanBookMe
MS Office – Excel Rocks!
Website – Content Management System – WordPress / Elementor
TeamWork for Proj Mgt and Dashboards.
Zoom
Mmhmm
Freshbooks
Quickbooks
MindMeister
Dropbox
Notepad++
Evernote
Mailchimp
Zapier
Wufoo
Twitter
Grasshopper
iPhone and apps galore!
iMessage
TeamWork Desk for Support
Adobe Acrobat / PDFsam
FreeCommander – File Manager
ScheduleWise – That’s right, we use our own app to do work for our clients.
Wistia
Fiverr
99Designs
For development of ScheduleWise:
JIRA
Slack
Atom
GIT
BitBucket
Sourcetree
SQL Server Management Studio
Azure
Sophos VPN
RDP
Viviotech Hosting
Chrome/IE/Edge/Firefox/Brave
Chrome Dev Tools / Firebug
ColdFusion Dev Server
ColdFusion Security Analyzer
IIS
Screenpresso
Camtasia
Adobe XD
Gimp
NPM – Node
live-server
Software no longer in use… either replaced or no longer needed:
For administering the business:
Google Apps
— Analytics
— Adwords
Website – Content Management System – MURA
Trello
Join.Me
Prezi
SFax
For development of ScheduleWise:
Lighthouse Issue Management
Cisco VPN Clients
FireFTP
Eclipse
Tortoise SVN
Hosting.com/Edge Hosting
Oh! And I would certainly be remiss if I didn’t mention good old paper and pencil! I have my handy, dandy notebooks which I have been journaling, ideating, and diagramming for the past 12 years.
So that about covers all of the applications, tools, and services that we use to run our little company. When we started ScheduleWise back in 2008, we didn’t know all the things that we didn’t know. We knew how to optimize patient schedules and workflow and created an application that did just that. For all the other stuff it takes to run a business, we learned over time. As needs arose, we found tools and services to help us along the way. It’s no wonder that most small business do not survive the first five years. There is just so much to learn and do!
Truth be told, it’s probably easier today than anytime in human history to find just the right application or specialist for a job. Not only are the tools themselves most likely out there (ScheduleWise is one of those such tools!), but also insanely important is the ability to find them with the help of your favorite search engine.
But the next time you have a big, glorious idea, and you’re thinking about starting a company of your own, take heed! You’ll be learning a LOT more than you bargained for. But isn’t that half the fun?!
