Running a small business means wearing many hats—strategist, marketer, HR department, and often the person fixing the printer. With so much going on, the right tools can mean the difference between spinning your wheels and actually moving forward.
Whether you’re working from a home office or a shared office space in Detroit, these nine tools can help you cut through the noise and get more done.
1. Slack – Streamline Team Communication
Email threads are productivity killers. Slack replaces the back-and-forth with organized channels, direct messages, and file sharing—all in one place. It integrates with hundreds of apps, so your team spends less time switching tabs and more time doing actual work.
2. Trello – Visualize Your Workload
Trello uses a card-and-board system to help you manage projects at a glance. Drag tasks from “In Progress” to “Done” and watch your to-do list shrink in real time. It’s especially useful for small teams juggling multiple projects simultaneously.
3. QuickBooks – Take the Pain Out of Accounting
For small business owners, accounting can feel like a full-time job. QuickBooks automates invoicing, tracks expenses, and generates financial reports without requiring a CPA on staff. Come tax season, you’ll be grateful you set it up.
4. Google Workspace – Collaborate Without the Chaos
Google Workspace bundles Docs, Sheets, Drive, and Meet into one seamless ecosystem. Multiple team members can edit the same document simultaneously, changes are saved automatically, and everything lives in the cloud. No more “final_v3_ACTUALLYFINAL” files.
5. Calendly – Eliminate Scheduling Back-and-Forth
Scheduling meetings manually wastes more time than most people realize. Calendly lets clients and colleagues book time based on your real availability. You set the rules, share a link, and the calendar fills itself.
6. Hootsuite – Manage Social Media Smarter
Maintaining a consistent social media presence is tough when you’re also running a business. Hootsuite lets you schedule posts across multiple platforms in advance, monitor engagement, and analyze performance—all from one dashboard. Your online presence stays active even when you’re slammed.
7. LastPass – Stop Wasting Time on Passwords
The average person wastes hours each year resetting forgotten passwords. LastPass stores all your login credentials securely and autofills them when needed. It also generates strong passwords, which is a bonus for anyone still using “password123.”
8. Zapier – Automate the Repetitive Stuff
Zapier connects your apps and automates workflows between them. For example, you can automatically add new form submissions to a spreadsheet, send a welcome email when someone signs up, or create tasks from incoming emails. Once set up, these “Zaps” run on their own—freeing up time you didn’t know you were losing.
9. Toggl – Know Where Your Time Actually Goes
Most small business owners underestimate how much time routine tasks consume. Toggl is a simple time-tracking tool that logs how long you spend on each project or client. The data often reveals surprising inefficiencies—and gives you the insight to fix them.
Build a Productive Foundation
Productivity tools work best when they’re chosen with intention. Start by identifying your biggest time drains ,communication delays, manual data entry, scattered files—and pick the tools that directly address them. You don’t need all nine at once.
Many businesses operating out of a shared office space in Detroit already benefit from a collaborative environment. Pair that environment with the right digital tools, and you’ve got a setup designed for focus and efficiency.
The goal isn’t to add more software to your stack. It’s to reclaim time, reduce friction, and give your business room to grow.
