How You Use Alfred: Maxime Prades, Zendesk Director of Platform

In this series, we are taking a look at how some users have adopted Alfred in their workplace. They'll give us a glimpse of how they use Alfred, how they stay productive and what it's like working for some of the companies we know and love.

Today, the Director of Product at Zendesk, Maxime Prades, shares with us how he automates everything with workflows.

Who are you? What keeps you busy with work and play?

My name is Maxime (@prades_maxime), I'm French, 27 years old and I'm the Director of Product at Zendesk (@zendesk). I currently live in San Francisco.

How long have you been using Alfred?

I've been using Alfred for about 5 years now I believe, I use it everyday, and have been carrying over shortcuts and workflows for years.

What aspects of Alfred make your workday easier, smoother or more productive?

Alfred has become an integrated part of my daily workflow. I do basic things with Alfred like locking my screen, emptying the trash and restarting my computer. I do those things with Alfred so much that I would have to think for a second where the option natively lives in Mac OS X today.

Since workflows were added to the Alfred 2 Powerpack features about 2 years ago, I've started using it much more for more complex use cases. For instance, I built a few workflows around my job specifically, shortcuts to go directly to our CRM by typing someone's name or workflows to create tickets easily or even get the number of tickets I would have in a view or a queue.

The best thing about a tool like Alfred is the open platform, the fact that you can build your own private workflows super easily with basic coding knowledge, simple dynamic values are accessible to anyone without a CS degree and that's a game changer.

I built so many of my workflows, I asked friends to help build workflows when they got too complex and now every time something can be done with a few keystrokes, I immediately think of putting it into Alfred.

The thing that seals the deal for me to use Alfred is how easy and integrated it is, in a press of a key combination you can immediately get access to virtually unlimited amount of commands and queries, all without having to click somewhere. That saves a lot of click, which when your job is to sit in front of a screen all day is priceless.

Are there workflows you’ve created or imported that you’d suggest/recommend?

Alfred has tons of workflows public on the internet, my personal favorites are obviously the Zendesk workflow, the Audio Device by mikegrb, the GitHub Commands by Gregor Harlan and Should I watch this movie by Andrew Pepperrell.

What’s the first feature you show off when you introduce a friend or colleague to Alfred?

Typically, the Zendesk workflow if it's a colleague from Zendesk, but when it's a friend I'd go for the Google Translate, Evernote, Skype or Twitter workflows. Things that people can immediately see themselves using.

Are there other productivity tools that you find indispensable in your daily life you’d like to share?

Yes there are 2 tools that go everywhere with me on my Mac. First of all 1Password, the infamous password keeper; I have over 407 passwords and I know none of them. And secondly, CloudApp that I use more than a dozen times a day to share anything from screenshots to files.

Thank you for sharing your favourite workflows and productivity tips, Maxime!