I am always looking for great tools to improve my web design and development experience and workflow. I found a great one recently that I’ve toyed with on the side, and am about to fully integrate into my design + development workflow: Jumpchart.

What I like

• It spits out clean code
  I can come out of the blocks less worried about my markup.
• Super simple export
  This was my biggest concern going in. I’m glad to see it implemented so elegantly.
• Price
  Very reasonable.

My concerns

• Will my less technical clients think that this is the actual website that I’m building and not just a model?
  In all fairness, this is probably more my problem than Jumpchart’s :-); it’s up to me to make this clear.
• Does it play nicely with CMS?
  I use CMS for most of my clients (WordPress, Joomla, SilverStripe, Textpattern). That nice, clean code that Jumpchart gives me to build upon could quickly turn to rubbish if using one of these systems. I think that a nice thing to have here would be something that would take the XHTML and make it translatable into a theme for a CMS. Hopefully the Jumpchart guys can help me out with this :-).

All in all, I think that this is a really solid offering, providing a fresh way for me and my clients to think about the most important parts of a website: the content and its flow.

Earlier this year, I read The 4-Hour Work Weekby Tim Ferriss. The book was an excellent read that really challenged my notions of work and life.

Admittedly, I’ve been reluctant and a little afraid to go head-first with some of the suggestions. One however, I’ve implemented and stuck with with much success: setting email expectations.

Whenever someone emails me, this is the auto-response that they get:

Subject: Garlin will respond at 11 AM PDT

Hello, and thanks for contacting me.

I check and respond to email daily at 1100 AM Pacific. If your message is an FYI or does not ask a question, please do not expect a response. If it contains a specific question or request, I will respond at 1100 AM Pacific the next day.

If you truly have an urgent need or request that can’t wait until 11 AM the following day, call me at (555) 555-5555.

Thanks!

This was suggested in Tim’s book as a way to set people’s expectations of when/how they should email you, and it works.

• I am getting much more focused emails sent my way that are more valuable to me.
• I am getting better feedback on the emails I send people because my responses are much more targeted.
• I now check & respond to email only once per day

I’ve also been using the Five Sentences methodology when writing emails, and that’s been great for my piece of mind.

These two tools have greatly increased my productivity, communication, and effectiveness. I encourage you to give them a try for yourself.