Do you ever wonder what tools are actually behind a productivity coach’s own systems? Last week Lisa walked through the seven techniques she uses daily to keep her life and business running. This week, she’s going deeper into the tech stack—the actual tools—behind those techniques. But this isn’t a “best tools” list. It’s Lisa’s preferred tools list: the ones she’s chosen, stuck with, adapted, or swapped out over time.

In this episode, Lisa shares her personal tech stack, from the analog-meets-digital RocketBook for note-taking, to Todoist for fast, low-friction task capture, to the Google Suite that touches nearly every other tool on her list. She covers how Calendly eliminates scheduling back-and-forth, why Trello still fits her brain for visual project tracking (podcast guest pipelines and even recipe organization), and how ClickUp supports her podcast production workflow with her team. She also talks through Kit (formerly ConvertKit) for email automation and e-commerce, Canva for design and training recordings, and Riverside for high-quality remote podcast recording. Lisa closes with a few honorable mentions—WordPress/Divi, Voxer and WhatsApp for async coaching, and built-in social media schedulers—and reinforces the guiding principle behind every choice: process over platform. She figured out what she needed each tool to do for her before she ever committed to it, and that’s the mindset she wants listeners to carry into their own tool decisions.

Tech Stack Tips for Work-Life Balance

Have you ever wondered what’s actually running behind the scenes of someone who talks about productivity for a living?

The apps.
The systems.
The little pieces of technology that quietly keep everything moving.

Last week, Lisa shared the seven techniques she uses daily to keep her life and business on track. This week, she’s pulling back the curtain even further to share the actual tools—the tech stack—behind those techniques.

But here’s the important part: this isn’t a “best tools” list.

It’s Lisa’s list. The tools she’s chosen and stuck with. The ones she’s changed or adapted over time. It’s what works for her—not a universal prescription for what should work for you.

And running through every single choice is the same principle Lisa keeps coming back to:

Process over platform.

She figured out what she needed a tool to do for her before she ever committed to using it. That’s the mindset worth borrowing, even if you never touch a single app on this list.

Start With Pen and Paper (Sort Of)

Lisa’s first tool isn’t technically a piece of technology at all—it’s a notebook. But it’s a notebook that bridges the analog and digital in a way that fits how she actually thinks.

The RocketBook looks and acts like a regular notebook. You write in it with a pen, just like always. But the pages are erasable and scannable, meaning the app captures everything you’ve written before you wipe the page clean.

For someone who processes best with a pen in hand but doesn’t want to drown in paper, this is the sweet spot.

Lisa uses it for mind sweeping, sketching out tasks before they enter her task management system, podcast episode development, client notes, and training notes. Once she’s done, the scan lives in Google Drive for reference, and the page gets erased.

No waste. No clutter. No pile of notebooks she’ll never open again.

(She admits she has a collection of those, too. Lesson learned.)

Keep Task Management Simple

Next up is Todoist, Lisa’s task management app of choice—and the reason she chose it is the same reason she’s stayed with it: simplicity.

There are plenty of robust task management platforms out there. But what Lisa needs is the ability to capture something quickly from anywhere—phone, computer, iPad—and access it just as fast. Todoist does that simply and cheaply. She currently uses the free version.

She relies on it heavily for recurring tasks: daily, weekly, monthly, even yearly. You simply type the task and how often it repeats, and it handles the rest.

This gets at something important in productivity: friction. Too many steps slows you down and increases the odds you won’t actually do the thing. A system this fast and easy removes that friction and helps build the habit.

She gives an honorable mention to Google Tasks as well, which works similarly and is great for specialty, date-specific personal tasks—but keeping task management in a separate system from her heavily color-coded calendars keeps things from feeling cluttered.

Let One Suite Touch Everything

If there’s one tool that touches everything else on this list, it’s the Google Suite—specifically Google Calendar, Drive, and Docs.

Google Calendar is central to how Lisa schedules her life. She runs multiple calendars simultaneously—business, personal, family, even separate calendars for her family’s band and her son’s band—all overlapped so nothing conflicts. Each family member and event type gets its own color, and all-day events let her block off time even before she knows the exact details.

Google Drive is where the main documents live: templates, resources, episode planning, client materials, graphics, and video. If it needs to be accessible and shareable, it lives in the Drive—making it simple to send clients a single link to grab exactly what they need.

Google Docs is where Lisa does all her writing: episode scripts, show notes, templates, guest notes, and idea dumps.

She’s also added Google Meet, paired with Fathom Notetaker, after simplifying away from Zoom to trim her budget—and her clients have loved the automatic follow-up reporting and action items that come with it.

What makes the Google Suite worth featuring isn’t just what it does on its own—it’s how seamlessly it connects to nearly everything else on this list.

Remove the Scheduling Back-and-Forth

Calendly handles all of Lisa’s business scheduling: clarity calls, coaching sessions, podcast guest recordings, and collaboration calls.

Because it works directly with Google Calendar, when someone books time, it populates automatically on both ends. When something is marked busy on her calendar, that time disappears from Calendly’s availability.

No back and forth. No missed conflicts. No time zone confusion. No manual entry.

The paid version adds an automation layer for confirmations and reminders—customized based on who’s booking. A coaching client gets prep instructions. A podcast guest gets recording details and a reconfirmation nudge closer to the date. The tool handles the follow-through so Lisa doesn’t have to.

Find the Project Tool That Fits Your Brain

Lisa calls Trello her OG project management tool—one of the longest-running apps in her stack.

She once considered switching to something newer and shinier, but realized Trello simply fits how her brain works. Its Kanban-style board—cards dragged through columns—feels like digital sticky notes on a wall, which is exactly how she likes to track progress.

Her favorite use case is tracking podcast guest spots: a card moves from “applied” to “recording” to “promotion,” with labels showing status at a glance. No hunting through email to remember where things stand.

She also uses Trello for something entirely different: recipes. Columns represent food categories—entrees, appetizers, desserts—each card holding a photo, links, notes, and ratings.

It’s the same tool used in two completely different ways, because it fits the way she thinks.

Work Within the System That’s Already Working

ClickUp is the platform Lisa’s podcast production team uses, and rather than build a parallel system, she stepped into what was already running smoothly.

This gets at an important principle: sometimes the best tool isn’t the one you’d pick from scratch—it’s the one your collaborators are already using.

She uses it to track guest applications (with built-in forms that automatically generate cards), move guests through topic ideas, recording, and post-production, and tag team members for communication along the way.

Consolidate Where You Can

Kit (formerly ConvertKit) has evolved the most out of any tool on this list. It now handles email automation and e-commerce in one place—functions that used to live across multiple platforms.

Newsletters, welcome sequences, and tagging all run automatically. When someone requests a free resource, they’re tagged, receive what they asked for, and move into a follow-up sequence without Lisa touching a thing. Purchases trigger a similar pattern: confirmation, deliverable, then support sequence.

Kit replaced Member Vault for Lisa’s product sales, streamlining things into something cleaner and more professional.

Make Design Accessible

Canva is a tool Lisa wouldn’t want to be without as a team of one. It’s made design genuinely accessible without requiring significant skill or budget.

She uses it for podcast graphics, social media images, promotional materials, and even personal projects like band promotion. One bonus feature: she can build a training presentation in Canva and record herself presenting it, with her video inset alongside the slides.

Prioritize Recording Quality

Riverside is what Lisa uses to record podcast episodes—chosen because audio and video quality matter, especially after 300+ episodes.

The standout feature: it records each participant locally, so recording quality doesn’t depend on anyone’s internet connection. For remote interviews, that’s a significant advantage.

A Few Honorable Mentions

A handful of other tools round out Lisa’s stack:

WordPress with the Divi builder — the backbone of her website
Voxer and WhatsApp — for async coaching and voice messaging between sessions
Built-in social schedulers on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn — instead of adding another platform

That last one is worth sitting with: look for functionality that already exists before adding something new.

The Real Pattern Behind the Stack

Looking at this list as a whole, a few things stand out.

Most of these tools have stuck around because they work, they integrate, and they’ve grown alongside Lisa’s needs. Switching costs money and time, and adding something new isn’t automatically worth it just because it’s newer.

The other pattern: so much of this stack is about automation and communication—making sure things happen without requiring constant attention, and making sure the right information reaches the right people at the right time.

Final Thoughts

The goal was never to use what Lisa uses, or what anyone else tells you to use.

It’s process over platform—every time.

Figure out what you actually need a tool to do for you. Then, and only then, go looking for the tool that does it.

Because the best tech stack isn’t the newest or shiniest one. It’s the one that quietly does its job so you can focus on everything else.

If you want to explore any of these tools further, Lisa’s current favorites—along with affiliate links and free resources—are all at positivelyproductive.com/resources. And if you want to go deeper on project management tools specifically, check out the tech tools playlist at positivelyproductive.com/podcast.

Thank you for listening! If you enjoyed this episode, take a screenshot of the episode to post in your stories and tag me! And don’t forget to follow, rate, and review the podcast and tell me your key takeaways!

Learn more about Positively Living^Ⓡ and Lisa at https://positivelyproductive.com/podcast/

Stop trying to fit into someone else’s productivity rules! Grab my free Productivity Toolkit, a collection of workbooks designed to help you explore how you work, uncover what truly matters to you, and create your very own energy-friendly systems. Get it here: www.positivelyproductive.com/plpkit

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LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

Episode 178 7 Techniques and Tools Used by a Productivity Expert

Tech Tools Playlist

Positively Productive Resources Library

Book a Clarity Call

Async Coaching

Productivity Toolkit