Some conference calls can seem like they drag on endlessly. To silence the chatterboxes and get things moving, avoid scheduling calls during slow, wide open time periods in the day.

Love them or hate them, setting up conference calls can be just as bad as sitting on one. A new feature from AnyMeeting, one of our favourite web video chat services, at least makes the setup part easy -- just CC the service on an email or calendar invite, and it replies with call info and a link to join, right from your smartphone.