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This answer may contain sensitive images. Click on an image to unblur it.Do you believe a more strenuous screening process for applicants buying a firearm would help prevent more shootings from occuring?No, most crimes are committed by career criminals and the majority of those criminals get their guns from sources that completely defeat the current screening process and any screening process we could devise. The less likely cases, those that are random in nature, usually involve an individual that at one time passed a screening, but they either fooled the system, slipped through the cracks, or changed in some way. The real question is, “Why create more strenuous screening when criminals bypass all screening in the first place and others can fool the system?”.CriminalsLets consider drug testing for a moment. One common test uses a urine sample to find remnants of illicit compounds. Another uses a hair sample. Imagine if we sent people home with a small bottle or Ziploc bag and told them to provide a sample the next day. Do you think the number of “clean” results would increase? They most certainly would because people would submit clean samples from other people. This is why we collect samples on the spot, these people have a vested interest in getting the result they want.With firearms it’s slightly different and even easier to game the system. Instead of sending the individual being tested home with a couple sample containers the individual can send someone else to take the test for them or find someone that will lie for them and skip the test altogether. Most individuals that cannot legally buy or possess a firearm get their guns through straw purchases and “bad apple” FFL dealers,In the face of these sobering numbers, it's worth asking how criminals, poorer and less educated than the average American, keep getting guns. The embarrassing answer? We don't know for sure. Until we know more about the sources of crime guns, it will be difficult to devise and build consensus for effective, targeted policies that reduce unlawful access to firearms.That's not to say we're flying blind. We know that criminals primarily get their guns from corrupt firearm dealers, gangs and social networks, and theft. What we don’t know is how important each of these sources is to the criminal gunSome researchers have suggested that gun retailers divert a relatively low volume of weapons, while others have found them to be a major source. Moreover, the volume of dealer-supplied guns may swing dramatically. One study found that over the course of six years, the share of criminals getting weapons from dealers declined from 21 percent to 14 percent.Gangs and networks of families and friends are a frequently cited source of guns, but research on the scope is unclear. Gangs in particular have actually been found to suppress the gun trade in their neighborhood to preserve their monopoly on violence and to avoid the police attention that comes from gun use. The role of friends and family is even murkier. Research has put their role as a supply source at 30 to 40 percent of crime guns, but little is known about the composition of this nebulous “friends and family” category.Anywhere from 200,000 to 500,000 guns are stolen annually. Some of these will be used in criminal acts, but others will be given to friends, sent abroad, or routed back to the legal market through sales to pawnshops and retail gun dealers. Because of the limitations of ATF tracing data, determining how many crime guns came from theft remains a challenge.How Do Criminals Get Illegal Guns?As we can see guns are stolen often in the US, but many researchers argue stolen guns are too easy to trace and are most often sold right away and not used by the original thief in the commission of other crimes, but the data is hard to come by on this topic. We do know the vast majority of crime guns are not obtained through legal means. Logically it makes sense, criminals would not risk being traced and prefer to use trusted sources over random people that might just be an ATF or FBI agent engaged in a sting or a gun shop that may deny and report them.The primary tool in obtaining illegal guns is willful fraud. Bad apple FFL dealers falsify records, so when law enforcement tries to track a gun they are sent on a wild goose chase. Straw purchasers lie in order to purchase a firearm for someone else that cannot legally buy or possesses a firearm, something that is illegal in 50 of 50 states. Fraud defeats any bureaucratic screening process we can come up with because those that employ it do not submit to the system. The system only works when people enter into it. We cannot pass a law that will make people stop willfully breaking the law.Psyche TestingOne popular argument is that we should add psychological testing as a criteria for owning a firearm to weed out people with mental illnesses, and some want this test to be applied each time a firearm is purchases as a part of the background check system.There are legal and Constitutional issues with this idea, as well as problems with positive feasible results from such a policy. The legal and Constitutional issues are for the courts to decide and are fairly clear so I won’t go into that, but the evidence is overwhelmingly clear on this topic. In short, there is no way psychological evaluations would be an effective policy to prevent violence.In 2017 there were more than 25,000,000 background checks processed, down from 27,000,000 the previous year. That means we would have to run 25,000,000 evaluations as well. If you really want to degrade the already floundering mental health system tying up clinicians with bureaucratic evaluations is one way to do it, potentially exacerbating the issues that lead to the worst crimes committed with guns. This idea is more likely to make the problem worse, not better, if reducing mass shootings is the goal.We know the evaluations would have to be fairly superficial in order to sustain the inflow of requests. The most popular method of evaluation is the informal interview. Using a superficial single method of evaluation has been shown to be ineffective,Fennig and colleagues (1994) long ago showed that diagnoses derived from clinical interviews alone agreed only about 50% of the time with diagnoses derived from multi-method assessments. In short, our reliance on using one clinician and one source of information (i.e., patient interview) to generate a diagnosis may well create an unreliable and erroneous understanding of the patient.Psychological evaluationIf you want a fairly accurate result you need to use multiple clinicians all using multiple methods. So if two clinicians each use two methods of evaluation that’s about 100,000,000 new appointments a year that serve no purpose in the overall mental health field.Even using multiple clinicians and multiple methods there are still inherent issues with evaluations in general that could lead to abuse and false positives that deny citizens their rights unduly. All ten of the fallacies outlined in this article warrant a read, but this one stands out:Confusing Retrospective & Predictive Accuracy (Switching Conditional Probabilities)Predictive accuracy begins with the individual's test results and asks: What is the likelihood, expressed as a conditional probability, that a person with these results has condition (or ability, aptitude, quality, etc.) X? Retrospective accuracy begins with the condition (or ability, aptitude, quality) X and asks: What is the likelihood, expressed as a conditional probability, that a person who has X will show these test results? Confusing the "directionality'' of the inference (e.g., the likelihood that those who score positive on a hypothetical predictor variable will fall into a specific group versus the likelihood that those in a specific group will score positive on the predictor variable) causes many errors.This mistake of confusing retrospective with predictive accuracy often resembles the affirming the consequent logical fallacy:People with condition X are overwhelmingly likely to have these specific test results.Person Y has these specific test results.Therefore: Person Y is overwhelmingly likely to have condition X.10 Fallacies in Psychological AssessmentOne huge flaw in such evaluations is how incredibly easy it is to lie. Clinicians and patients must have the same goal in mind in order for the evaluation to be effective. The data collected during the interview is completely self-reported. Anecdotally, I have an acquaintance that has a rare form of a disorder that is similar to multiple sclerosis. He has “failed” three psyche evals in order to qualify for disability benefits because he doesn’t want anyone to think he is weak, so he says he is “fine” and lies about his difficulties, something he has done his entire life. Now imagine someone wants to buy a gun. Do you really think they would self-report disqualifying information? This is only made worse with people that have certain kinds of mental illness or disorders such as multiple personality disorders and antisocial personality disorder, which some argue may be risk factors for violent behavior. From 1998 to 2012 around one million people lied intentionally or unintentionally on the background check form 4473 and were denied by the NICS system. Without an instant check of background information the form 4473 would just be a checklist with no verifiable authority. We have no such check for people undergoing a self-reported evaluation.In addition to this, even if we began to run psychiatric evaluations at the time of sale we cannot actually use the results in most states,There are an estimated 3 million living Americans who have been involuntarily committed to mental institutions. The NICS database only contains the names of about 90,000 of these individuals. There are only 17 states that provide information on involuntary commitment for inclusion in the NICS database. Many of the noncompliant states simply have not computerized their records on involuntary commitment. However, a large number of the noncompliant states are also grappling with serious health-information privacy issues and are reluctant to provide the required data to NICS before these issues are resolved.Under the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, mental health records may only be released to medical professionals, health insurance workers and quality-control personnel. Ohio’s attorney general has not yet determined how to gain access to the medical records needed to process CCW applications. Because Ohio has a relatively new CCW law, sheriffs are being asked to assist temporarily in checking courthouse records for involuntary-commitment orders. This exercise is both time-consuming and labor-intensive. It’s also unlikely to produce all of the information needed to verify the accuracy of answers provided on Ohio CCW permit applications.Although federal and state laws establish involuntary commitment as a prohibiting factor for gun purchases, mental health professionals contend that there is no scientific basis for this prohibition.According to Dr. Paul Applebaum, vice president of the American Psychiatric Association (APA), “checking for involuntary commitments…doesn’t make sense because past mental illness does not predict future violence.”Mental Illness And Gun Ownership - Guns & AmmoBecause of HIPPA the information gathered by psychiatric evaluations cannot be used in the NICS system because only medical professionals, health insurance workers, and quality-control personnel can access this information. In addition to that, as Dr. Paul Applebaum points out, these kinds of evaluations, even if they provided accurate results, would not constitute an accurate assessment of potential violent behavior in the future.As a side note, there were 19.8 times more legal transactions processed by the NICS system in 2012 alone than denials from the beginning of the NICS system to 2012. That would point to the success rate of any psychological evaluation system being incredibly low, assuming we had an effective, verifiable psychological evaluation system.For more information on evaluation effectiveness you can see: Is it possible for a psychopath to deceive psychiatrist in order to pass psychological test and consider of being normal, no mental-disorder?Psychological evaluations tied to background checks in order to purchase a firearm would only be effective in degrading the mental health system and would not present any positive benefits.ConclusionI could go on and on about other topics, like ATF budget and personnel issues, or NICS failures, but I think this is enough to explain the situation. We can’t make people submit to the system and those that operate outside the system cannot be controlled. The common claim that mental illness should be a primary factor in approving or denying a sale of a firearm is not only a costly bureaucratic mess, even if we could settle the privacy issues that make it impossible right now, but has no ability to improve the situation. Many people ask, “Why haven’t we made it harder to legally buy a firearm?”. The answer: because it wouldn’t improve anything. Making it more difficult for lawful citizens to legally own firearms doesn’t punish or restrict criminals that do not subscribe to the system. It’s only common sense that targeting people that aren’t the problem won’t fix the problem.For more information on the situation in the US you can see: Fred Lead's answer to Can pro-gunners not understand that a firearms ban is not just what we want, but what's necessary because innocent civilians are dying? They can't prevent shootings, so there's no other option.

Below is a true Story of how I ended up homeless on Thanksgiving in 1998. I ended up turning it into a paper for college years ago. Took me about 10 years to get over it.Thump, thump, thump. There is a muffled knocking coming from the kitchen door. Somebody has come to visit. My sleepy mind draws the conclusion that it is probably our neighbor, Tina Murray. Yesterday Gladys Ann, my wife, had asked Tina to stop by and assist her with two apple pies she was attempting to bake.The delicious aroma of a turkey roasting in the oven saturates the air. I remember now, it is Thanksgiving, and apparently I have overslept. Why didn’t my alarm clock wake me earlier? Where is my alarm clock? It is not on the bureau, where it has sat for the last ten months.Thump, thump, thump again. This is odd, why has no one answered the door by now? There is always someone around here, you can not beg for quiet time alone. Privacy is non-existent with four people in a one-story house fifty feet long.”Honey? Can you get the door?” I ask aloud in yawning and broken voice. Silence. Perhaps the wife and her parents went out to the store for some last minute items. I ponder this as I hurriedly pull on a pair of fading Levi blue jeans and a black tee shirt.Thump, thump, thump. The knocking is louder now, almost impatient.“I’m coming, Hold on!” I shout, hopping around on one foot fighting a rebellious sock. “Just a minute!” Cursing to myself as I finally cow the sock into obedience.As I open the bedroom door, I notice rest of the house is actually clean. It is never physically dirty, but there is always some kind of clutter about. Anything from shoes and boots to video-cassettes and magazines can normally be found littering the kitchen table or tossed haphazardly against the large freezer which occupies a space near the only kitchen door. It is a losing battle to keep the place neat. The in-laws are perhaps the most unorganized people I have ever met. It is their right, however, and the disapproving looks they give me reinforce that daily. It is their house, not mine, and I am only here because they are letting me. I only reluctantly agreed to move here at my wife’s repeated requests, knowing that I would be sacrificing a large part of my independence in doing so. I wanted to make Gladys Ann happy.“Just for a couple months.” She had said, “My dad is not feeling well and I want to be near him to make sure he is ok”.I did not bother to bring up how Jack always felt bad, especially whenever she and I were about to go somewhere together alone. On our honeymoon he “got ill”, and needed Gladys Ann there at his side to take care of him. Then Jack miraculously recovered once we cancelled the trip to Canada we had planned. We never did have that honeymoon.Moving through the kitchen, I finally notice the alarm clock. It is unplugged and laying upside down on the freezer. The clock is bound loosely with it’s own power cord, as if someone had tried to wrap the cord while walking at the same time.At that moment I notice the shape of someone at the door. I can see the outline through the thin, floral-pattern curtains covering the glass windows panes. Wait a minute, the person is wearing a duster very much like a forest ranger’s or that of a …policeman..Fear and apprehension immediately grip me as I manipulate the door handle and pull open the door. The person is indeed an officer. He is the perfect image of a cop. The dark blue of his patrolman’s uniform is decorated with the yellow arm-stripes of a corporal and the shining silver badge of the Maine State Police. The silver nameplate above his left breast-pocket states simply “Smith”. Corporal Smith`s face has the wizened features of an officer who has seen at least a few harsh Maine winters. His steely expression exudes an aura of confidence in his ability to deal with a host of unsavory situations.“What is wrong? Has something happened? Where is my wife?” I rattle off, barely feeling the sharp bite of cold, late-November air invading the house.“Justin Hodgkins?” Corporal Smith asks with authority.“Hodgdon” I correct. “What is the matter?” The worried tone of my voice appears to surprise Corporal Smith, and his expression softens slightly.The officer blinks his eyes and pauses for a moment, as if contemplating a new course of action or preparing to impart some terrible, unthinkable news. “We have a report that you have been threatening people and destroying property belonging to this family.”“Oh thank god!” A wave of relief floods over me, thankful that my notions of some kind of car accident involving my wife are untrue. Then it dawns on me that I am being accused of something. Shocked, I blurt out “What? What do you mean? I live here!”.“Can we take a look inside?” The corporal asks. I hadn’t noticed the other officer behind him. A younger man without stripes on his uniform, he immediately struck me as a quiet sort. But at the moment I was more concerned with myself, and I paid no further heed to his presence.“Oh! Oh yeah. Come on in. It’s too cold to stand out here and talk all day. Anyway, it looks like we have snow coming.” I say, in the typical, add-the-weather-to-your- conversation, fashion of many Maine residents.The officers enter the warmer kitchen. Corporal Smith, with his right hand resting on his baton, stops near the kitchen table. The other officer takes a position on the other side of the room where he can look on, and intercede if I prove to be violent or something.“Please, have a seat.” I say, pulling out a couple chairs from the kitchen table.“No thanks, we prefer to stand.” The corporal states politely, at the same time using his eyes to inspect his surroundings for signs of a struggle or other damage. Finding none, he asks: “Have you had anything to drink today? Or last night?” He seems to be following a mental checklist for domestic situations.“Drinking?” I say, perplexed. “I haven’t had anything to drink in at least six months.”“Hmm. Ok, I think I see what is happening here.” Corporal Smith scratches his chin with his right hand and then continues: “Alright. Unfortunately the owners have stated a desire to have you removed from their` home.” He pauses, processing my reaction to his words. ”You will have to come with us. Do you have any friends or relatives you can stay with until you sort this out?”I am stunned. “Whaa… How can they do this? It’s Thanksgiving! I haven’t done anything wrong!” As I speak, the other officer is shaking his head slightly, a regretful look on his face. “Where is my wife?” I ask finally.“She is with her parents.” Corporal Smith replies, sympathy showing in his voice. “I am sorry. There is nothing else we can do. In a domestic situation our job is to neutralize the situation and prevent any immediate conflict. Unfortunately, this means that we are mandated to remove you, as this is their home.”His words hit home within me. I reasoned “So basically they can just take what they want of me and then toss me out on the street.” I went on to explain my version of the situation: “I am only here because my wife wanted us to move in and help her parents for a couple of months. It hasn’t been easy on our marriage, but every time I tried to convince her we should move out it turned into an argument.” I continued, trying to justify my feelings to the officers. “I kind of felt that she was being influenced by her parents, but this?” I could feel the tears beginning to dampen the corners of my eyes.Not wanting to reveal my sadness to the officers, I went into my bedroom.“Let me get a few things then, I will only take a minute.” As I picked up my wallet I could feel the tears running down my face. A great pressure welled up inside me, tightening my throat and chest. I asked myself: Why did things have to get this bad? Were they really this bad? What should I have done to prevent this? What could I have? I reached for my jacket as I tried to gather in my emotions. Now is not the time for this, I will reason this out later.When I returned to the kitchen, I was sure they knew I had been crying. I sat down to pull a pair of sneakers and asked: “So where will I be taken now, Jail?” My voice was still restricted, as if I was being slowly strangled by some great invisible Boa.“We will bring you down to the Bangor Area Shelter, you can stay there until you get your bearings” Corporal Smith replied. “You will have to contact someone from there, I do think you should get a lawyer very soon. I have seen this before and I think you will need one before this is all said and done.”The officers escort me out the door and to the police cruiser. Approaching the car, I suddenly notice Jack and his wife Ethel, the in-laws, standing across the street. The family Chevy Blazer is parked behind them and facing away from me. There is a shadowy figure sitting in the truck. I reason that this is my wife, not wanting to witness the actions her parents have taken with or without her consent.Corporal Smith opens the car door and states.” For what it is worth, I believe you”I nod my head in acknowledgement but, inside me, emotions of fear, anger, and sorrow are struggling in an epic battle. “Thank you.” I say, distracted by my thoughts.As the police cruiser pulls onto the roadway I notice a single large snowflake fall from the gray clouds overhead, the silent journey of the flake providing little clue to the impending chaos of the coming storm.I found out later from a friend that the main contributor to this was her finding out that our unborn twins (it was a touch and go pregnancy) were given the okay by the doctor that they should be alright from then on. I guess the ex decided she didnt need me in the picture anymore, after the urging of her over controlling parents.

The list to end all lists! I have managed 4 remote teams of 10 to 50 and interviewed over 50 managers and CEOs of remote teams. Here is a list of tools that I have tried that work best for each of the most common challenges and functions. I have also updated it with tools that are not frequently mentioned but are up and coming tools that are really good.1. Internal communicationsSlackThe ultimate chat app for teams. Any list must have Slack. So here it is. Slack is known to be a hub that serves this function. Bring your company together with Slack where teams can keep colleagues from across the world. You can always find a place to communicate with private channels and direct message here, so that you could work smoothly and efficiently with the help of Slack.RemoDisclosure: I am the founder of Remo. If you are working remotely, it is inevitable for you to feel a sense of loneliness, especially when you don’t know who to catch up with your work. With Remo, you will feel everything coming into reality, that you will feel like you are working in a real office together with your colleagues. You will know who exactly are talking to each other, so that you won’t bother to disturb them. Instantly interact with a coworker just by entering the same room, then you can enjoy a face-to-face conversation beyond the limits.2. External communicationsZoomIf you are having an external meeting with your clients and you have no choice but to resort to a virtual meeting, Zoom is the best in the business. Connect to your potential customers, and suppliers with Zoom. Give them a professional image of your company even if you are conducting a meeting at home.3. Project ManagementTrelloNeed a task management app? Trello can provide you with a visual overview of what is being worked on and who is working on it, so you can better manage all your pending tasks. The shareable visual Kanban boards allow you to pack all the details, where you ideas are represented as a whiteboard filled with post-it notes. With this system, you can definitely keep your production levels high and maintain flexibility wherever you work.AsanaIf your projects are more complicated Asana is the next level up from Trello. Project management might seem to be complicated, because you need to initiate, plan ahead and execute your work of the team. If you are managing a remote team but you are still assigning tasks or projects to your team through emails, you are really lagging behind. With Asana, you no longer have to worry about this. It is very user-friendly, that you can manage multiple projects and sub-tasks.NiftyProject management has been a complex task, especially for remotely working teams which make the situation even more difficult to handle. Nifty has been trusted by thousands of forward-thinking teams, where team collaboration meets project management. Just use this tool to plan your projects ahead and collaborate with your teammates stakeholders. When you can automate your progress reporting with ease, you will realize how fast and easy it can be to jointly finish a task even you are apart.4. Design collaborationFigmaIf you find sketching too time-consuming and difficult to share, you should give Figma a try. Figma has a powerful feature set with design, prototype and collaboration all in one browser for every part of the design phase, so that you can manage and easily share a consistent visual language your remote team. Let your ideas flow beyond distance with increased efficiency and flexibility today.MarvelAnother alternative that you can try would definitely be Marvel. Using the Marvel design platform, you can find everything you need to bring ideas to life. You will be given access to all the core functionality you need to build digital products, so that you can generate your design products in one place.LingoIf you are doing sketch designs but you just have no idea how to organize them nicely, Lingo might be a good choice. Store all components here because Lingo supports symbols, artboards, layers, text styles and many more. When you can visually organise all your assets in one place with Lingo, you can create and share new designs easily with your remote team.InVisionWhat is more convenient than having a stand-alone design presentation app that allows you to create any prototype starting from scratch to finish? You can also share your ideas and designs using the Live Share function, which allows you and your co-workers to collaborate remotely in real-time using an in-browser screen share. Each person has their own mouse, so you can point and see what other collaborators are talking about. It has been very helpful for remote collaboration in the design process.5. Team BuildingRemoWe built Remo because we wanted to make the remote working experience awesome, so we created a workspace that allows people to hang out, have happy hour and play games. Working remotely can sometimes be lonely and we wanted to make the environment as engaging as possible. Feel like you are with your team inside this virtual office space.TogetherTubeMaintaining a remote team dynamic is hard but TogetherTube can fix that. You can use TogetherTube to watch videos together and have a movie night even when you're apart. Create a room for your team where you meet after work and watch the latest videos while you chat how your day went. Get rid of the stress of work and enjoy the happy hour online!DonutIf you are working remotely for some time, you will feel isolated because you don’t think you have counterparts. This explains why team building is especially important if you want to manage your remote team well. Keep your employees connected, empowered and poised for growth with the help of Donut, and let your remote workers engage more in the team with a structured feedback system!JackBox GamesIf you want to add more variety to your remote team building activities, playing online games together would be a good choice for you to think of. JackBox has been releasing collections of easy-to-play party games for you to chill and build your team culture. You might need to draw weird doodles and compete to write the best inside joke. Jackbox Party Packs can take your get-together to the next level, and pull your remote team closer together.6.White-boardingMiro (previously Real Time Board)If you are managing a remote team, you probably don’t have a chance to enjoy how fast it is for the whole team to sit together and get the project brainstormed. Miro can save you by its most intuitive visual collaboration platform for teams, with a large user base of over 2.5 million worldwide. Use this robust digital whiteboard to brainstorm your ideas and manage a project on a single board with your team. Just create a centralized hub for strategy and planning to ship faster, gather all the information and perfect your work now!Mural.coThe most struggling part for remote teams would definitely be the constraints on thinking and working collaboratively. We love that Mural provides you with the essential features which include whiteboarding, annotations, graphics, and templates, which help to ease your difficulties in remote collaboration. Taking a more structured approach using Mural during meeting sessions could foster better idea contribution, and try to experience a productivity surge with small changes in your daily practices.InVision - FreehandCollaboration can be redefined team-wide with InVision. Freehand in InVision gives you an entirely new way to creatively collaborate your work. From wireframing to planning, from designing presentations to giving feedback, do it all with Freehand. Remote collaboration can never be done so easily with Freehand.7. Time ZonesTimee.ioIf you are working in a culturally diverse team which consists of people from all over the world, it is always easy for you to mix up the time zones where your colleagues belong to. This might be a little bit chaotic, especially when you are so bad at counting back and forth the time differences. Timee knows your concerns and that’s why this platform provides you with a time scale for easy time comparisons. Create your own time event at Timee as a scheduler, make sure the times fit for everyone so that some innocent people won't have to wake up late at night or early in the morning again!Happy.toolsThis app is from Automattic the creators of Wordpress, and they are the granfather of remote teams. When you are working remotely, your office is basically “everywhere”. Happy Tools can do this by converting a time-consuming puzzle into an easy-to-access an always updated table. This calendar allows your virtual office to run smoothly, because it can keep hundreds of employees in one view. Make sure you try out this one, and stay happy as you work.8. Documents, sheets, slidesAirtableThe value of your data increases as you manage them better. Airtable gives you a hundred percent of freedom to arrange your work just the way you like. Changes can be instantly synced across everyone’s devices in real time. Feel free to add whatever contents to its fields, because Airtable can store information in a spreadsheet, so you can stay organized no matter where and when you are working.GSuite (Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Drawing etc.)I guess most of you are already familiar with this tool? Google doc is the most user-friendly tool that even students would love to use for their projects. You can easily view, share and edit all the documents jointly with your team, anytime and anywhere whenever you have internet access. The ability to download and email your documents in different formats also gives great convenience, so that work can be collaboratively done regardless of time and distance.9. Internal documentationNotionNotion is basically Evernote on Steroids. It uses a genius block and link system so you can create links between notes, complex folder structures and even a CRM system. It is the best thing I have seen. Even better it can be shared as an online wiki as well. With the Notion’s Knowledge Base, you can create a custom database supporting several types of media that makes it easier to consolidate information into one place. By turning your tribal knowledge into answers that are super easy to find,it really helps your remote team to work more efficiently.SliteAt the digital age, you really want to put everything online to save a record, especially for remote workers. If your team members miss a meeting because of timezone differences, he will definitely find Slite very useful because you can take meeting notes with this tool so that your team can still collaborate on project smoothly. However, this is still not the main course. Create your company wiki with Slite, so that everyone can obtain centralized information. Use Slite so that you can freely structure your team’s information in channels and discover information with highlights of the latest activity.NuclinoIf you are working remotely, I bet you must have experienced similar inconvenient situations when you find difficulties keeping yourself updated with what’s going on in the company. Nuclino focuses on internal documentation where teams can collaborate on a project and let everyone share valuable knowledge. Unlike traditional documentation tools that are complex and difficult to learn, Nuclino is a great knowledge base that solves this problem by making it easy and fast for everyone to contribute, so make sure you give it a try.10. Video/screen recordingLoomI use Loom to give tests to candidates, record meetings, and even send messages. This is the best free screen recorder enables you to capture your screen in high quality and resolution. Not only can you instantly share your completed video to your audience via Gmail with a simple link, you can also download it to your own computer to store your video as a record. You don’t need to bother switching apps or uploading the videos yourself. It is a must-have tool.Quicktime Player (Mac)Before Loom I was using Quicktime and it still works well. The video files can get big, but I then upload it into Google Drive and it can stream from there.11. Screenshot/GIF captureCloudAppYou always want to demonstrate what you are doing on your desktop and share it to your remote team. CloudApp can do this by bringing screen recording, screenshots, and GIF creation to the cloud. The app is super user-friendly yet at a professional enterprise level. Just capture and share with a few buttons, now you can accelerate your workflow.DroplrSometimes it is pretty hard to explain and report your work without a visual facilitation, which makes you hesitate from recruiting a remote worker. With Droplr, you don’t need to write long emails anymore. Just simply show the complicated processes using screencasts and easily transfer your captures with customized short links. Explain your thoughts visually to enrich your messages and give clearer feedback to your team and your clients.12. Process workflowProcess StreetWe know that time is money, and that’s why we have been striving hard to make sure that we are catching up with world trends. In terms of how to steal more time from recurring work, Process Street can help manage your team’s checklists and procedures. Start by creating your own process template, followed by running multiple instances of the template as checklists. This helps to track the progress of your remote team and make sure that everyone is in the right direction.13. Recruiting candidate testingHundred5We use Hundred5 to test candidates quickly Sometimes you might need the right people to start off their work right away, and don’t want to waste too much time on the selection process. You might not want to ask an international candidate to fly across continents just for an interview, especially when you are planning to recruit remote workers. Hundred5 can pre-qualify candidates by using filters in the job application process. Candidates need to take a short test to show that they have the skills to do the job, so the recruitment process can go as efficient as it can be by automating the most tedious parts. Not only can you speed up your recruitment process, candidates can also enjoy a better application experience.14. Performance managementLatticeTo better manage a team of remote workers, performance trackers are extremely important to keep everyone on the same page even though they are not working physically together. Lattice provides companies and employees with a continuous performance management system. By a mature and systematic reviewing and feedbacking system, you can celebrate wins and overcome challenges together with your team.15. Employee happiness trackingOfficevibeIf you want to keep track on your remote workers’ happiness level regularly even when they are not working around you, you need to get Officevibe. This employee engagement software is exclusively personalized for your team with great autonomy, then your workers now have the opportunity to speak their minds honestly in the way they prefer. Although you guys are working remotely, it is always possible to create a strong workplace culture to unlock all the potentials with Officevibe. Engage every employee and empower every team leader. Together Everyone Achieves More, that’s what makes a strong team.Culture AmpYou want to make sure that your remote workers are happy, so that they are more motivated to work and contribute for better results. Culture Amp helps you to build diagnostic, deep dive and pulse surveys with powerful analytics by guiding you to ask your employees the right question. Only by taking small steps with this tool, you can already create a better working experience for your remote workers by knowing how to let them better engage in the team.16. Time trackingHubstaffMany companies discover that as their business grows, keeping track of an employee's progress on a regular basis becomes a more difficult task, especially for remote teams. This can lead to a decline in performance as remote reworkers eventually lose motivation at work without companions. To avoid this from happening, use Hubstaff as a time tracking solution. No longer hindered by the inability to monitor your remote teams on the spot, you can gain a better understanding of the moving parts inside your company.TogglYou may usually need to put in extra effort in managing your workers remotely to make sure that they finish their job duties efficiently, and that’s what makes communication and performance tracking more difficult than companies working together in a real office. Toggl can help you understand more about how much your time is worth by breaking down your time by projects, and tasks. In this case, you can focus more on the planning and better utilise your time. Manage your time better with Toggl and start to turn your team on productivity today!TimedoctorIf you want to improve productivity of your remote team, you must first want to know how much time you have spent on working and how much time you have wasted. Time Doctor helps you to identify your inefficiencies. Each employee will install this application onto their computers, and the time tracked will be sent to your servers, so you will know exactly which task has occupied your team the most time. With Timedoctor, anyone can become a great doctor that cures the core of your team with its time tracking and employee monitoring functions.17. Employee MonitoringDesktimeIn case you still don’t know the difference between time tracking and employee monitoring tools, make sure you are clear about this after today so that you can get the best solutions for your team. Time tracking tools will record down the time start and stop when your employee is working, but monitoring tools will track the computer continuously once you have installed them. Use Desktime if you want to do automatic time tracking. Monitor your remote workers’ daily activity, sick leaves, vacations and overtime with ease, and get a clear overview of your team's workflow. Make sure your team is still highly driven even when you are not around.WorkpulsAn alternative to Desktime would be Workpuls. If you are managing a team of remote workers, you really want to visualize team productivity to make sure that time is well spent. Workpuls is an all-in-one application that streamlines everyday operations continuously so that you can manage your team productivity better. What’s the point of tracking every instance of your employee? Real-time employee monitoring can tell you exactly how your remote workers with powerful data for a more efficient team. You can also take these data as a reference for having coaching and feedback sessions.18. Employee expense cardNeatIt is difficult to manage your employees’ expenses, especially when they are working remotely. Neat is a Hong Kong-based company solving this problem. By providing debit Mastercards that can be used globally for both online and offline spending, your employees can send and receive money worldwide, making transfers locally or internationally. When you compare Neat to traditional banks, the former is definitely a faster, easier and cheaper solution.19. Meeting transcriptionVoiceaIf your team members are coming from around the world, you will always find coming up with a time that everyone is available for a meeting super difficult. Use Voicea as a meeting transcript solution. It is a voice collaboration platform powered by an Enterprise Voice Assistant, which is an AI that captures highlights and creates actionable recaps in meetings. With this assistant on conference lines or on calls, so that you can focus more on the conversation of the meeting.FirefliesWith Fireflies, you can record, transcribe and search for content all in one place. Even if you are not available to make it to the meeting, you can still catch up as if you have never missed anything. Read the transcript and listen to the call in the Fireflies dashboard. I know your time is precious, especially for remote teams when time and communication is key. Fireflies also knows you well too, that’s why you can jump around time stamps and use smart search to review a long call in just a few minutes.20. Remote meeting scheduler assistantX.aiThe ultimate AI-powered meeting assistant, I have team members that swear by this. The maturely developed AI Engine has the ability to do a lot of hyper-intelligent reasoning that learns exactly when, where and how long you would like to meet the team.Meetingbird (manual)I use Meetingbird religiously, it provides you with a simple interface and powerful integrations which make scheduling meetings a lot easier. Also with its robust preferences, you can customize meeting times, locations and time zones without paying a single effort. Save more time with this scheduling platform and let your team grow as you wish.21. Airpod auto-connector (requested by our resident Airpod-expert)AirbarIf you are as sophisticated as our resident Airpod-expert on my team, connecting to your Airpod with one click of a button might be something you care about. Just use Airbar! Available for Windows 10 notebooks and MacBook Air notebooks.22. Reduce background noise during callsKrispIf you are working with a remote team, video meeting is probably the thing you always need to exchange ideas. Sometimes the background noise during calls will always annoy you, how about considering Krisp as your solution? Switch on Krisp to remove all background noise from your side, so that you can speak and listen without any distractions.23. Motivation, focus and deep workForestYou probably have encountered the difficulty to stay focused when you are working remotely at home but not in an office, because the comfortable and stressless environment just makes you hard to focus. Try Forest so you can put down your phone and focus in any scenario! Whenever you want to focus, plant a tree yourself or collaboratively with your team. The tree will grow as you focus and die as you want to play with your phone.TomightyWhen you are with your phone, you just have too many temptations that can distract you from work. In this case, you need Tomighty to help you maintain the self-discipline, especially for remote workers who will really find this useful. Utilizing the Pomodoro technique, which breaks your work into 25 minute increments, provides a very simple and effective time management on a desktop that helps you stay focused on tasks that require high concentration.24. Unplugging from workFlipdIt might be a serious problem to work remotely because you are having your working station and your personal space combined. Therefore, you need someone to tell you when to disconnect from work and strike and work-life balance. Use Flipd to help you stay focused, at the same time you can also turn yourself off with this app and go do something else other than work.HeadspaceIf you are always busy, you might even forget to unplug yourself from work. Work can be exhausting, and you definitely need some meditation and rest to recover from a whole day of work. In Headspace, there are hundreds of themed sessions to deal with stress, sleep, and anxiety. Try bite-sized guided meditations that totally fit your busy schedules, and enjoy some quality time alone.