Your Business Quick Tip Newsletter
Vol 18 No #164 – 18th of June 2019
Contents
- Your Smartphone Photo Gallery
- Excel Tip – Fix Lists with Trim
- The Pain and High Cost of Repetitive Actions
You know you’ll always find great productivity tips in this newsletter. This issue is no different of course. However, I’d included a wee story of interest. as well.
1. Your Smartphone Photo Gallery
You might not know that you can view your photos or albums in two or three sizes depending on the make of your phone. Simply use your two fingers to expand or contract your photos to preview them in the gallery as large or small.
2. Excel Tip – Fix Lists with Trim
If you have a list of names that have been entered by different people over time; or imported from different places – there’s a great chance that you’re going to have extra spaces here or there. A real pain if you need to split them apart into first or last names or use them for mail merging.
A quick way to fix an entire column of data at once is to use the function Trim. This will get rid of all the extra spaces (while always leaving the required one between a name/words).
Watch the How-To Video Here (44 seconds) https://youtu.be/Vja0W9B_puI
(If you like this video, why not invest in the Excel (or Outlook) Quick Tip Boot Camps?
https://bc.debbiespeaks.com/
3. The Pain and High Cost of Repetitive Actions
One suggestion saved 15.5 hours. Another fixed poor wedding photos. The third, two hours. We’re talking time only – not adding in the concurrent reduction of stress or gains from increased productivity.
May 2019
Let me go back to the beginning. I’ve just returned from a month-long stint lecturing on a cruise ship. When I first boarded and introduced myself to Peter the cruise director, I said “By the way, I normally present on getting more done in less time. If you have any problems, I’d be delighted to help anytime with some tips and tricks”. Peter’s eyes lit up and he said “I’ll take you up on that”!
Two days later
Peter asked me for help with the daily trivia quiz that he gives to his entertainment staff. I was able to introduce a new way of preparing it that would save him five minutes for each quiz.
No big deal?
You’re probably thinking “five minutes, that’s nothing.” However, multiply this by 31 days a month, for a six month on-board contract. 5 x 31 x 6 / 60 (minutes) = 15.5 Hours.
The next week, the suggestion of the amazing app touchREtouch solved his wedding photo problem.
The stress of repetitive actions
Two days before my departure, Peter called for me again, practically tearing his hair out. Stressed! His objective was to set up his next 10 upcoming cruise itineraries. Each cruise averaged 12 days and has multiple activities from 7am to midnight. Hundreds and hundreds of lines of tedious, painstaking, time consuming formatting work.
Again, I was able to show a few tricks (using clever thinking and a hidden feature or two) that saved him at least two hours (that he didn’t have) on that task. He was utterly delighted.
The point of this story?
That everyone, from the most senior of executives to managers to administrative staff. From salaried employees to those that are sales oriented – waste too much time. Build up too much stress. Loose opportunities. From not knowing their software, and using it poorly.
Quantifiable cost to business
I always guarantee that my training can help each person free up at least 20 minutes a day. That is 75 hours for a 45-week working year.
Multiply 75 by a billable rate per hour or the time needed to make a new sale, or even getting more work done daily. You can see how knowledge of software can pay off big time. Staff feel empowered. Stress is reduced. More gets done. More income generated,
Of course you know I’m going to hold up my hand and say “bring me in to run personalised small group in-house training for you”. In fact, email here for a quote – debbie@debbiespeaks.com
Alternatively, why not diary five minutes every few days to research software tips? Buy a book – or get one from the library about the software you’re using. Institute share a tip at your office meetings.