May 13, 2008 · 8 Comments
While visiting relatives last week I saw some television. Since we don’t have a TV hooked up to get anything from over the air or cable broadcasts, it was interesting to see some of the things that are on television. One one show (I think it was the O’rielly Factor) the host was interviewing someone who had written a book about oil, oil prices or something like that. The host kept asking the guy “so who sets the price of oil.” The author tried to explain that it was a market, but they host didn’t... [Read the full story]
May 7, 2008 · 2 Comments
As more and more content becomes available on the internet it is easy to shift our reading online. There are some benefits to this. It is easy to get timely information on breaking events quickly. The downside is that you can spend a good deal of time reading things with little value or worse. Your educational reading can degrade into a few hours of mindless surfing the web. Sites like Digg, Stumbleupon, and Reddit supply a constant stream of interesting content that often is little more than a waste of time. I’m... [Read the full story]
April 25, 2008 · Leave a Comment
How should I organize my desk at work Get a file cabinet. Most of the junk on a work desks is paper that should be filed. Take the time to setup a reasonable filing system and then commit to keeping your papers stored in the file cabinet. Limit your personal clutter. A family picture or two is fine, but 20 framed photos, three baseballs, 2 snowglobes, and 4 unidentified objects is a bit excessive. Keep your extra stuff at home. Don’t use your desktop for storage. If you need additional storage space, get some boxes... [Read the full story]
May 2, 2008 · 1 Comment
How do you use hanging folders? I use hanging folders to hold regular manilla folders. So I may have a hanging folder for “Personal Taxes” and another for “Business Taxes”. Then within each of those folders, I’ll have one for each year “2004 Personal Taxes”, “2005 Personal Taxes”, etc. (I talked about this in a previous Tuesday’s Tip.) Many people organize their files alphabetically. This isn’t a bad idea, but if you have a few files, it may be slower than... [Read the full story]
May 13, 2008 · 8 Comments
While visiting relatives last week I saw some television. Since we don’t have a TV hooked up to get anything from over the air or cable broadcasts, it was interesting to see some of the things that are on television. One one show (I think it was the O’rielly Factor) the host was interviewing someone who had written a book about oil, oil prices or something like that. The host kept asking the guy “so who sets the price of oil.” The author tried to explain that it was a market, but they host didn’t... [Read the full story]
April 1, 2008 · 8 Comments
I write a lot about how to be more productive, but what if that really isn’t your thing? What if you don’t like productivity? What if your goal in life is to ruin productivity for other people. In an effort to expand our readership to people striving for unproductivity, here are six things you can do to guarantee that your co-workers get as little done as possible. Productivity501 takes no responsibility for the results of actually implementing any of these ideas. Randomly put entries on their calendar like:... [Read the full story]
May 9, 2008 · 4 Comments
How to write emails to your boss Don’t try to impress your boss with the length of your email. Most of the time they will appreciate a short and to the point message. If you need to explain something in more detail, consider listing the main points as bullets at the top and add the rest of your explanation at the bottom or as an attachment. This allows them to quickly grasp the issue without reading through several hundred words. Another advantage of a short message is that it is more likely to get read. If your boss... [Read the full story]
While visiting relatives last week I saw some television. Since we don’t have a TV hooked up to get anything from over the air or cable broadcasts, it was interesting to... [Read more]
How to write emails to your boss Don’t try to impress your boss with the length of your email. Most of the time they will appreciate a short and to the point message. If... [Read more]