Our clients are all over Chicago, and so we go all over Chicago. I’d say that our days are evenly split between a) a client’s office, working face-to-face on a project or problem of the day b) at the Nest, working screen-to-screen with our clients via PC/phone/email, c) bouncing from at least two to three locations, working catch as catch can from laptops, cell phones, on trains, buses, Divvys, foot or Uber. More and more, our clients have the same work-style challenges. Real estate agents are bouncing from office to showing to coffee shop to closing. Lawyers are at the airport, office, or at trial. Some work during their commute into the city via Metra (The Way to Really Fly!). And any of us on “vacation.”
For most of us, working means being connected. Whether on our phones or laptops, we need a signal. Phones are always on, but have a small screen and no keyboard. If you’re on it all day because you’re in transit somewhere, the battery will run down. Laptops these days have great battery life, but you’re mostly hopping from Starbucks to airport/train station looking for that sweet, sweet Wi-Fi (which is sometimes dodgy & unsecured).
Setting your cell phone up for as a Personal Hotspot (iOS, Samsung, or Pixel) can be a great way to get online for as much time as your personal or business data plan allows. Essentially, what the phone does is take its 4G data signal and shares it with its Wi-Fi antenna, using a network name and password that you set. If you find that you’re blowing through your data, try not watching so much Netflix on the go, or ask your carrier about getting a dedicated hotspot device with its own data bucket, separate from the one you use or share with your friends or family.
If your company expects you to be working on the move and decides to make that as secure as possible, they may have (or we may have!) set up your laptop to either use a VPN to access company networks or a full Citrix environment by which you can log into a preconfigured desktop environment remotely with the utmost security.
For smaller firms or individuals who would be regularly connecting to the internet from networks that they don’t control, I recommend investigating signing up for a commercial VPN. Many amazing folks in the know seem to like Private Internet Access VPN. I picked Nord VPN a few years ago, and Macworld likes them a lot, primarily because of how easy they have been to implement on laptops and phones. CNET gives both 5 out of 5.
As for staying charged while you’re on the go, I love these tiny, 2-port USB wall chargers, and this skinny battery for your phone (or go for one with the cable built in.) As for cables, like my battery and charger links – and pretty much everything else, I love Anker. For your laptop, I recommend going with another charger from the manufacturer of the laptop I’m using. It’s long been my experience that one can usually sweet talk some clueless IT professional into loaning a 2nd charger to use on your travels or at your home office. And recent experience has taught me that that IT professional’s manager has fully approved that because your business wants you able to contribute to the bottom line anytime you’re interested and capable of doing so! And if you start off an evening work session with a few cat videos, well, we’re watching them, too.
All of that is to say, work needs to get done wherever we are. I hope that some of these tips and tricks might help reduce the stress of getting powered up and logged on.