At the dawn of the technology boom, pundits predicted that machines would decrease the workweek to four days. In fact, just the opposite has happened - the typical American worker puts in an average 46 hours per week, and takes just 10 vacation days per year.

I guess it's just human nature to take advantage of our increasingly sophisticated tools to get more done in less time. But technology can be our greatest ally or cruelest taskmaster. It's up to us to decide. Meantime, here are some of the best technologies to help you save time.

1. Calling on the Magic of the Telephone

It's been around for more than 130 years, but the telephone continues to astound with advancements and ever-more sophisticated features. In just a couple of decades, the "busy signal" is virtually extinct, voice mail messages services are ubiquitous, and "call waiting" and "caller ID" Functions give users more options than ever for taking - or not taking - a call.

With the widespread use of mobile technology, we are rarely out of touch. We can effectively reach anyone in the world at any time with a few punches of the buttons. The reverse is also true; we can be interrupted more easily. The time-saving possibilities are endless; some highlights are:

• Text messaging: You can send a quick and immediate alert, which comes in handy if you want a quick, focused communication or need to send a message when he recipient is not able to talk. Conference calling. Set up a virtual meeting involving a dozen or more participants, all in remote locations. What a time and money saver! It can be used to conduct educational tele-seminars, sales presentations, meetings, strategy sessions, and more.
• Office-in-a-pocket. The newest model cell phones work like miniature telecommunications centers, offering multimedia features: Check email, browse the Web, take pictures and send them, check your messages visually without calling in to a message center - and they work internationally.
• It turns off. That's the best feature of all! You can turn off your cell phone and focus on the activity at hand, whether time with the family, an important meeting, or a good night's sleep.

2. Look, Ma, No Hands!

You've seen those folks... in the grocery store, walking along the sidewalk, sitting by themselves in a restaurant. In fact, you may be one of those people others take a second look at as you appear to be having a conversation with yourself. Until an observant soul notices the small, boxy-looking device attached to one ear.

The wireless headset liberates the multi-tasking individual from wires that limit mobility and handsets that require a hand. This phenomenal advancement in technology can save you hours a day. Walk around your office to clear your thinking and increase your focus. Go down the hall to get a drink of water, all the while negotiating a big deal. Cook dinner, do the laundry, or sweep the floor - all the while catching up with an old friend.

Quality matters. A high quality model may run $300 but it's worth it. The freedom you will fee and the increase in your productivity are well worth it.

3. Recording Your Brilliant Ideas

From the time you leave the mall until you reach your car in the parking lot, you come up with at least a dozen things you want to remember: a bill that must be paid today, to pick up cat food, a favor you want to ask your spouse, something you want to look up online, or a brilliant idea for a screenplay that could make you stinking rich.

Problem is, by the time you reach the car, you forget them all. Except for the cat food.

Don't look at your memory challenges as a sign that your brain isn't as sharp as it once was; consider, instead, that you prolific capacity to generate brilliant ideas puts too much demand on even the keenest mind. And resolve the situation by carrying a digital voice recorder with you.

These tiny devices can record two hours or more of notes from you, and save them in various folders. Once you capture your message, the options for use are endless; you can upload the folder, post it, edit it, and email it.

Some come with additional accessories such as a docking station and a lapel microphone, which can improve the sound quality and cut out unwanted background noise. These units cost less than $100 for a good model with a number of features.

4. Instant Messaging for Instant Response

I know that most people use the instant-messaging function on their computers to flag friends they suspect are online. I tap into it solely for business purposes - it not only saves time, but it allows me to get a "to-do" item off my desk as soon as I think of it.

I find instant messaging a great way to communicate with my administrative staff; instead of getting up and walking over to my assistant a dozen times a day - and interrupting her a dozen times a day in the process - I can shoot off short questions; "Had today's mail come yet?" "Did Mr. Brown send the contract back in?" "Could you send me the letter you're working on as soon as you finish it?"

Instant messaging works best when the requests are straightforward and don't require much explanation or detail from either the sender or the recipient. (Notice that all the questions I pose here require only a yes or no response.)

For these types of issues, instant messaging is certainly more time efficient than either a live conversation or a phone call.

Be sure to turn off your instant message when you really need to focus. That "You've got an instant message" signal can drive you to distraction - which, of course, means you're not as productive as you need to be.

5. Video-Conferencing to Reduce Travel

Companies that have locations and do business with others in far-flung corners can spend a lot of money on business travel. Meetings with colleagues, partners, clients, and vendors are often a critical component of business success. Despite immediate access through the Internet and the telephone, there are still times when only a face-to-face meeting can accomplish what you need to in an efficient manner.

Many corporations are now able to slash their travel budgets dramatically by investing in a video-conferencing system that's as simple as turning on a T.V. Okay, I confess that the video monitors are not the most flattering (don't judge anyone's appearance by the way they look onscreen). But being able to meet without going anywhere means less loss of productivity because of travel time.

The systems continue to get more sophisticated, with bells and whistles to enhance remote presentations, facilitate more interactivity, break off into chat rooms, and even take polling questions. The downside? If you're meeting from home, you can no longer get away with attending in your bathrobe.

6. Presenting...Presentation Software

Remember the days of slide projectors and those acetate sheets on overhead projectors? How many presentations have you sat through where the slides got stuck or the projector jammed or the presenter kept putting the acetate sheet upside-down?

Well, now that I think of it, the new computer-monitor-based presentations - PowerPoint being on the most popular programs - can suffer "technical difficulties, too. But, when they work, those sophisticated presentations are absolutely light years ahead of the old-style dog-and-pony shows.

Not only do the presentation software packages offer much more creativity and unlimited design possibilities, they're much faster to put together - and updating is a quick fix.

7. Using CRM to Manage Your Business

In most businesses, having access to clean, current customer and prospect database is essential to the continued success of the company. And the best way to ensure this is to use a Customer Relation Management (CRM) program. This system allows you to stay on top of all the information you need to serve your customers and maximize your business opportunity.

You can track transaction history - why, when, and what you've sold and for how much. Your CRM database lets you update as often as necessary, and allows you to do much more effective target marketing. Let's say you run a charter travel company that's offering a great ski package in Montana for families. Your database can identify families who have ten ski trips in the past - the most likely market for your package promotion.

CRM products come with lots of bells and whistles. You can establish multiple users and have everyone in the office working in concert. Most have scheduling features so you could plug in your time-block schedule. And many are compatible with PDAs, so you can have your CRM data and schedule wherever you go.

8. Letting Your Fingers Do the Finances

Bill paying used to be a paper intensive process: first wading through a pile of envelopes, each with three or four pages of detail; then writing a check for each invoice; and, finally, sticking them in a envelope, licking a stamp, and dropping them in the mail.

With Internet banking and electronic money transactions, handling your bill paying and other finances can be quick, paperless, and - almost - pain free. If you rack up the change you save on checks and envelopes and postage, it's a home-run.

Converting as many of your revolving credit, utility bills, and monthly expenses to electronic transactions make a lot of sense. You get notice that the bill is due via email, and you typically link to your account on a secured Website. You can review the details of the bill and pay immediately via electronic checking or credit card. You can often choose to schedule the payment for a later date, and put it out of your mind.

It's likely most of your banking can be done electronically, as well from automatic deposit of your paycheck to transferring money from checking to savings to money-market or other bank vehicles.

9. TV on Your Terms with Video Recorders

Kids aren't the only ones who can get hooked on TV. The merits and demerits of this most universal technology are hotly debated. But most people are plugged into at least a couple of shows that keep them velcro'd to their couch during prime time, possibly neglecting other tasks or activities and staying up way too late.

If this sounds like you, then a digital video recorder (DVR) may just be your next super-hero. You can record the shows you love and watch them at your convenience.

I enjoy the late night shows with the likes of Jay Leno and David Letterman. But an early bird like me can't stay up that late every night without sacrificing some daytime productivity. So the only time I catch them live is when I'm on the East Coast. The DVR allows me to tune in on my time, wind down, have a few laughs, and learn some great platform delivery techniques form the pros.

And best of all, DVR allows you to skip through the commercials. This reduces an hour-long show to less than 40 minutes. That's a 33-percent time savings!

10. Carrying a Library in Your Briefcase

For a voracious reader who travels a lot, it's hard to imagine a more welcome technology than an e-book reading device. It can hold a vast library of books and print material. With my Sony Reader, I can carry 160 books within something that, itself, is the size of one book. It saves me time deciding which book to take on the road; I can take them all!

Although the e-book reader has been around for a decade, the new generation of reading devices is riding a new wave of popularity, as using them gets closer to simulating the way we actually read books. And in additional to the most popular Sony Portable Reader and Amazon Kindle models, more devices are coming out on the market all the time.