How to Use RescueTime to Be More Productive

These days everyone is seeking new ways to claim back some of their lost time. The way of the world has become hustle-and-bustle. There are so many things on our to-do lists and, it seems, less and less time to get it all done. With so many new advents in technology to do things faster and more conveniently, one would think that we would have more time. Instead, much time is wasted fooling around with these new technological enhancements. How many hours dwindle away checking emails, tapping into social networking sites and instant messaging long lost friends? If you are really adamant about managing your time more effectively, why not use technology to gain an advantage? RescueTime is a brand new web tool that allows you to monitor your time on the computer. This could be valuable information for web junkies like me who may need some form of accountability for their time. Now here is what you need to do to take advantage of RescueTime today.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

Things You’ll Need:

• Computer
• Internet Access
• RescueTime Data Collector
• Desire to be more productive

1. RescueTime Home Page Visit http://www.rescuetime.com. Click "checkout the tour" beneath the big red "Sign Up" button to learn more about the features of RescueTime or go ahead sign up free. You will receive a confirmation email. Click the link to confirm your email address and then sign into your account. You will be taken to RescueTime's introduction page to assist you in getting started with the application.
2. System Tray Icon Example Download and install the RescueTime Data Collector and then open its icon in your system tray as indicated in the picture to the left. Test the features according to the instructions located on the introduction page.
3. Start using RescueTime right away. RescueTime works in two parts. The downloadable application keeps track of every application you use and each website that you visit. You can then view the reports in easy-to-read graphical form on the website and create tags to help you categorize the different sites you visit. For instance, you can have a category called "social networking sites" of which both Facebook and MySpace belong; but you can tag Facebook as "personal" and MySpace as "business" to determine how much personal networking you do with friends and family versus networking with business colleagues and coworkers. It may take a few hours before RescueTime has collected enough data to categorize and allow you to make tags but start doing so as soon as possible.
4. Monitor your progress. Check your productivity often. At least weekly is a good starting point. Check for wasteful activities and start pairing back. Set limits on known time and energy drainers and then stick to them.
5. For even more accountability, you can also create groups. If you have a standard free membership, RescueTime allows you to add up to 5 members to your group. The application then monitors each member's productivity and creates a weekly aggregate summary. You can then use this summary to compare your own productivity to that of the average productivity of the group. No individual group member's information can be shared so each individual member's productivity remains confidential. This can be a great way to motivate a project team into productivity. If you want a larger group, more than one group or for RescueTime to track your progress for more than three months, then you will need to pay a monthly fee of $7.95 which is charged per group member.
6. You can also take RescueTime with you anywhere. Add it to your blogs or any of your social networking sites that will accept a Java coded widget. Add it to your iGoogle home page or even sign up for text alerts to your mobile phone. RescueTime makes it easy for you to track your productivity wherever you go.

Tips & Warnings

• Create quality tags as these will help you get the most out of this awesome productivity tool.
• Create alerts, join a group and add the RescueTime widgets to your blogs and social networking sites to take full advantage of all that this great accountability tool has to offer.
• Use in conjunction with GoalMaker software (check the resource box below) for even more added value and productivity.
• Unfortunately, RescueTime does not yet allow you to add in activities that occur outside the realm of computing. You will need to keep an activity journal to monitor those until the wiseguys at RescueTime realize they should add a manual input feature.