If you’re anything like me, your email box gets out of hand very, very quickly. Like hundreds- of- emails- a -day out of control. Cleaning out your mailbox can  become an overwhelming task. Plus, it is painfully boring and tedious.

Just the sight of a full mailbox can lead to complete overwhelm, but I recently found a really cool tool that can make cleaning out your inbox fun!  The Email Game is a brilliant solution to a mind-numbing but necessary task.

The goal of the Email Game is to go through, sort and reply to your emails as quickly as possible. You essentially have to open your emails and choose what to do with them:  delete, archive, skip or reply. The faster you go, the more points you get.

Beware, if you choose to skip an email you will lose points. You can even see where you stand each week or month vs your previous times (ex: your #1 time this week/ 10m 32s total) and even compare your time to others playing the game (#135 overall or 220% faster than average). By default you get 3 minutes when you need to reply to an email but don’t worry, if you have an email that requires a more time consuming response you can even add more time on your clock!

Even cooler is that the Email Game recognizes dates like February 29, 2012 and times like 2:00pm and will give you the option to sync the event or task in your email to your calendar and reply all from the same screen!

The Email Game works with Gmail and Google Apps and is completely free! Get it here  and start having fun with your email!

Do me a favor – Once you’ve tried it out – be sure to leave a comment below and let me know your thoughts on the Email Game and other productivity tools you use to Overcome Overwhelm!

Image credits:  http://www.geeky-gadgets.com/chrome-email-game-brings-fun-to-the-task-of-sorting-your-email-09-09-2011/

http://web.appstorm.net/tag/overload/

We’ve been discussing 5 things that you may be doing to unintentionally sabotage the success of your business, how to recognize them, how to prevent them and how to fix them. Those 5 things are:

Week 1 – Micromanaging

Week 2 – Failing to Manage Time Well

Week 3 – Failing to Set Boundaries

Week 4 – Being Disorganized

Week 5 – Having Unrealistic Expectations

Last week we talked about Failing to Manage Time Well. This week our focus is Failing to Set Boundaries.

According to Wikipedia, boundaries are defined as:

“guidelines, rules or limits that a person creates to identify for him- or herself what are reasonable, safe and permissible ways for other people to behave around him or her and how he or she will respond when someone steps outside those limits”

When it comes to small business, boundaries can make or break your success. Things like setting your work hours, being clear about the best way(s) to contact you and clearly defining the separation of your work and home life are simple steps you should take when you establish your business. When you establish these boundaries it is very important to be clear about your values as well. Values are the core beliefs on which you make your choices and actions. Your values will help to determine certain boundaries for you that will affect your business as well as your personal life. Be clear and honest about them.

Once you have established these boundaries and values, it is equally as important to maintain a team who possesses the same core set of values. Doing this will help you to grow your business in way that is ethically acceptable to you.

What are your core values? What boundaries do you need to set? Write them down. You can use this information as the foundation on which you build your business. Use it to create your mission statement or even a vision board.

Image credit: http://www.masteryourrelationships.com/

Today’s Tech Tip is for our Mac users who wish that there was an easier way to schedule clients, appointments and meetings. Well, your search is over. Introducing iCal.

Simply put, iCal is your personal calendar multi-tasker. This cool program not only lets you schedule tasks like a normal calendar, it goes much, much further by letting you compare multiple calendars and identify and avoid any conflicts of time. For example, let’s say you want to plan a conference call with Bob on Wednesday at 1pm. If you were NOT able to view multiple calendars, like work and home, you might not realize that you already scheduled a lunch with another client on that same day that is expected to go until 1:30. With iCal, you can avoid that type of incident and potential embarrassment.

Another cool feature is the ability to subscribe to other calendars. Perhaps you need to know your spouse’s schedule or your kid’s sports and activity schedule. You could even subscribe to your team members work calendars and be able to monitor to-do’s and tasks that they are responsible for.

Run into friends who invite you to dinner? No worries, check iCal on the go on your iPhone and verify your schedule.  Check out some of the other cool features iCal offers:

• Email, text or pager notifications of upcoming events
• Ability to create alarm notifications
• Day/ week/ month/ year views
• Color code events (ex: home=green, work=red, kids=blue, etc.)
• iPhone app CalPrint lets you print your iCal. Useful to share events with work team or family members.
• It’s FREE!!

No other calendar works this hard. You can download iCal here.

image credit: http://www.apple.com/support/ical/

We’ve been discussing 5 things that you may be doing to unintentionally sabotage the success of your business, how to recognize them, how to prevent them and how to fix them. Those 5 things are:

Week 1 – Micromanaging
Week 2 – Failing to Manage Time Well
Week 3 – Failing to Set Boundaries
Week 4 – Being Disorganized
Week 5 – Having Unrealistic Expectations

Last week we talked about Micromanaging. This week our focus is Failing to Manage Time Well.
When you are a business owner, managing your time is not optional.
Time management, according to Wikipedia is:

 “the act or process of planning and exercising conscious control over the amount of time spent on specific activities, especially to increase efficiency or productivity.”

Failing to manage your time will always end in failure: failure to complete tasks, failure to maintain control, failure to grow your business. Your clients will recognize that you are disorganized and unreliable and will not continue working with you if they feel you can’t get the job done.

Although it may sound daunting at first, managing your time is vital and simply requires a little foresight and organization. One of the first things you will need to do is get a day planner or calendar. Check out Mom Agenda, Renaissance Art or Franklin Covey for a start. Don’t think you need to get a fancy, expensive planner though. The best planner that you will EVER own is the one that you will actually use. So if you’re just testing the time management waters or are low on funds you can find planners for around $10 at local office supply stores, too.

The next thing you need to do is review what projects and tasks you have that are pending. When are they due? How long do they take to complete? How many hours a day/ week/ month can you devote to that project? Begin entering due dates onto your calendar. For example: Create training manual for Bob by March 1^st.  You will then want to include the “mini-tasks” that you will need to complete between now and then. For example: (and creating a checklist first might make this easier)

• Create an outline (Feb. 8^th)
• Get links from Bob (Feb 13^th)
• Create rough draft (Feb 15^th)
• Proof read and edit as needed (Feb 17^th)
• Email copy to Bob for approval (Feb 17^th)
• Complete any additional edits and email for final approval (Feb  22^nd)
• Print 30  copies of manual (Feb 24^th)
• Go to post office and overnight to Bob (Feb 24^th)

If you have multiple projects going at once, you will want to take note of how many hours you can spend, or plan to spend, on each task For example, the task “create an outline” may take 8 hours. If it does, this would leave you little to no additional time during that day to do any other work. This is where time management really matters. Without it, you may look at your project and think, “No problem. I only need 8 total days to complete this task. I’ll do it at the end of the month.” This might be true unless, in reality, you have other projects that also require your time. Without planning out your time, you will not have taken into consideration the time you have to wait for your client’s approval, shipping time, or how many hours of a single day it might take to create your outline. As a result, you may find yourself working to the bone until late at night or even into the following morning to get things done. This will have a negative impact on your business as well as your home life.

Be smart and manage your time. It’s one more thing you can do to grow a successful business.

Got a client who thinks that it’s okay for you to work into the wee hours or during dinner?  Don’t worry, next week we’ll discuss how Failing to Set Boundaries can inadvertently sabotage your business and what to do to protect yourself.

Image credit: http://mylifearchitects.com/category/time-management/

A Twitter Chat is a discussion on Twitter that is based around a topic identified by a hashtag (#). For example: #VirtualAssistant or #chocolatecake. Anyone who has a Twitter account can join in on the conversation if they know the hashtag being used for it.

Twitter chats are a great way to market businesses, announce events and increase dialogue about a chosen topic.

When launching a new product, You can actually schedule a Twitter chat in advance and announce the date, time and hashtag for your followers and customers using Twitter and Facebook. You can even include the hashtag and chat details in your emails and on your blogs.

Once you have announced your Twitter Chat, those who choose to “attend” simply follow these few steps:

1. If they don’t have a Twitter account they can create one here
2. If they do already have a Twitter account they can go to tweetchat.com
3. Log into their Twitter account using TweetChat’s secure server
4. Enter the hashtag (#) that they want to follow
5. Join the conversation.

Check out these other effective ways to use Twitter to grow your business:

http://strategicgrowthanddevelopment.com/social-media/hello-twellow/

http://strategicgrowthanddevelopment.com/social-media/tweetup/

http://strategicgrowthanddevelopment.com/social-media/visible-tweets/

As we come into February, let’s refocus on growing a successful business. Over the next few weeks we will discuss 5 things that you may be doing to unintentionally sabotage the success of your business, how to recognize them, how to prevent them and how to fix them.

These 5 things are:

1. Micromanaging
2. Failing to Manage Time Well
3. Failing to Set Boundaries
4. Being Disorganized
5. Having Unrealistic Expectations

This week our focus is Micromanaging.

Described by Merriam-Webster’s Online Dictionary as “manage[ment] especially with excessive control or attention on details“, micromanaging is generally not a positive behavior.

The reason: it is counter- productive.  Having to be involved in, or have control over, the smallest of details wastes time, energy and resources.  In addition, overseeing every tiny detail of every task shows your team a lack of trust in their abilities to complete their assignments. Is it difficult to hand over control? Absolutely. Are you sabotaging your business by failing to delegate? Absolutely.

Without a doubt, there will be times when you need to be more involved than others. It is impossible (and foolish) not to be involved at all, but you must know when to hand over the reins.

Do you find that you are overwhelmed by the amount of work you have to do, that there are no longer enough hours in a day to get everything done that you need to get done? Do you spend more time on menial tasks than on larger projects that you need or want to be working on? If this is true for you, it may be time to start assigning these tasks to someone else.

If you have done your job and hired a trustworthy, hardworking and capable team, then it’s time to use them. If you don’t have a team, well, it might be time to get one.

If you feel a little apprehensive about this process, then start small. Let someone else get the mail, drop packages off at UPS, make phone calls, etc. You can slowly assign more tasks as you become more comfortable delegating.

Remember, you are only one person. Your capabilities, no matter how great they are (or how great you think they are) will always be limited by the number of hours in a day. Don’t be too proud, or controlling, to ask for help.

Additional Resources

• Fast Track Your Business Success by Building a Virtual Support Team
  
• Grow Your Business with a Virtual Assistant

Image credit: http://www.dontforget2work.com/2010/09/the-downside-of-micromanaging-why-you-shouldn%E2%80%99t-try-to-do-everything/

As January wraps up many people are already pushing their New Year’s resolutions to the wayside. If you hold on to just ONE of your resolutions, let it be organization! A little organization can go a long way to making your entire life feel more balanced and enjoyable, especially in your workspace.

Just like the NeatDesk, these cool gadgets can help you to keep your office space neat and tidy (and functional):

• Pivot Power Flexible Power Strip – This product is one of those “why didn’t we think of this before” type of items. Not only does it flexibility allow you to wrap it around desk legs and into awkward spaces, bending it allows you to do the previously impossible: put 2 large box style plugs side by side allowing you to utilize ALL of the outlets on the strip!! Brilliant!

• Powermat 3X  -  It doesn’t get cooler than this! Forget all the chargers and cords tripping you up, all you need is the Powermat 3X. Using induction charging technology, you simply place your iPhone, Blackberry, EVO, Droid X or even Nintendo DS on the charging pad and voila! Charging! One pad, one cord. Simple.

• Ziszor (handheld paper shredder) – A handheld paper shredder, the Ziszor is the perfect combination of portability and functionality. You no longer have to take up space on your desk, floor or on the top of your trash can for your document shredder. The Ziszor fits in your hand and shreds up to 4 sheets at a time, letting you shred junk mail, paperwork, cancelled checks, receipts and any other paper clutter before it gets out of control. It even comes with little bags you attach to it to catch the paper shreds. So smart.

• USB Desktop Vacuum Henry the Hoover – Ok how many times have you been checking your email while chowing on a donut or some chips and dropped crumbs on your desk or even into your keyboard? No need to worry if you have Henry the Hoover. This pint sized mini vac runs on batteries and will cheer up your desk while keeping it clean. To empty simply unscrew the top and dump into your garbage can. Who couldn’t appreciate that smiling face every day?

• Cable Zipper – With all of the equipment used to run an office, cords for computers, printers, lamps, external hard drives, phone chargers, etc., can take over your space. These little cords can become a big nuisance. Time to regain control with some Cable Zippers. So easy to use, you simply wrap the “zip clip” around the cords (grouping them as necessary, ex: computer cables, sound system, etc.) and “zip” the flexible cord organizer up around them.  It even includes labels to add to each end of the wires for easy set up.

There are endless ways to keep your space neat, tidy and organized; and lots of cool gadgets to help you do it!

image credits: http://theawesomer.com/pivot-power-flexible-power-strip/109132/, http://www.buy.com/videoclip/powermat-3x-charging-mat-with-powercube-for-home-office/80634.html, http://www.technofile.com/articles/ziszor.asp, http://www.amazon.com/pal-Henry-The-Desktop-Hoover/dp/B001GNTLGY, http://www.amazon.com/Cable-Zipper-Control-System-Black/dp/B00061YBTO

Sometimes, no matter how well you plan and how careful you are, things go wrong. Whether you’re planning a conference and forget to confirm the caterer or schedule a tweet chat and forget to send out an email to let people know about it, sometimes things get overlooked. It happens to the best of us and should always be considered learning experience.

So what do you do when tasks are forgotten, meetings are missed, supply orders aren’t placed or your boss is sitting at an airport waiting for a limo ride that you forgot to schedule?

First – don’t panic!!! You can’t undo the already done; this is true for work and in life. All you can do is move forward (and if you forgot about your boss’ ride, you’ll want to move forward quickly).

Once you realize that a mistake was made you must quickly rectify the issue if possible. Apologize to those affected. Reschedule a missed meeting (or get notes if you were an attendee and not the host), place a rush order on supplies needed right away or have someone pick them up if possible, call your boss a taxi and make sure payment is arranged to lessen the stress he or she will already be feeling. At this point it’s all about damage control.

Of course, the very best way to deal with problems is to prevent them. Making mistakes is a part of life, but unless you learn from them and prevent them from reoccurring, they are meaningless.

You must always be prepared for the expected and the unexpected. Turn every, and I do mean EVERY, task into a checklist.

Start with a list of questions. Give it a title for future use, for example:  I need to plan a conference:

• What do I need to do?
• What do I need to know?
• What do I need to have?
• How many people?
• Where?
• Food?
• Drinks?
• Paper?
• Pens?
• Nametags?

Missing even the simplest of tasks can snowball into unpleasantness for you and others. By simply making a checklist you can make a huge difference in your efficiency and effectiveness.  Remember to be prepared, makes lists, learn from your mistakes and accept responsibility when and if things do go wrong. Just remember, organization is your friend. Seriously.

Want to check out a great program for sorting thoughts and creating lists? Check out OmniFocus, a great way to sort all of your to-do’s!

image credit: http://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/back-to-basics-your-task-list.html

 “A clearly defined mission statement gives a template of purpose that can initiate, evaluate and refine all of one’s activities”

Laurie Beth Jones, author of The Path- Creating Your Mission Statement for Work and for Life

What is a Mission Statement?

According to Wikipedia, a Mission Statement is:

a statement of the purpose of a company or organization. The mission statement should guide the actions of the organization, spell out its overall goal, provide a path, and guide decision-making.

 Importance of Values

Making a statement of your values is important for many reasons. It is important that your customers know that you run your business with honesty, integrity and that you have a vision for the future of your business.

 How to Create a Mission Statement?

One of the easiest ways to begin your Mission Statement is to first make a list of questions:

• What is the purpose of the business? (What need does it fill?)
• What are the short term and long term goals of your business?
• What values have you built your business on?
• What can your customers expect?

Once you have that information, use it to create your Mission Statement. Make sure it is well written and easy to understand. Your Mission Statement will help to define your company for your customers.

Creating a Mission Statement can also help you to create a Vision Board

A Vision Board is a great tool to use to reinforce what your Mission Statement is all about. It is a visual reminder of your goals, values and dreams. Check out this post for more information and tips on how to create a Vision Board.

image credit: http://www.unitedyouthforum.co.cc/2011/01/mission-statement-objectives.html

Smartphones are taking over the world!!

No, seriously, Smartphones are everywhere and they are capable of doing more incredible things every day.

It is no surprise then that you can now use your smart phone (BlackBerry, iPhone, Android, etc.) to process credit card transactions. With over 20 Billion credit card transactions every year, having the ability to process credit transactions on the go is more relevant than ever.

Think your business is too small to need or be able to afford such capability? Think again. Even the smallest of businesses can take advantage of this modern convenience.

Processing a credit card transaction for your customer is as simple as 1, 2, 3.

1. Download the software for processing
2. Create an account with your merchant services company
3. Attach the external card reader to your device or manually key the information into the online processor.

It’s incredibly easy to do and incredibly valuable to have. These are a few key tips you should know:

• Pricing- Each company has its own setup fees (if any), rate (% of your transactions that they receive as payment), per transaction fees and monthly fees. It sounds like a lot of fees but they are often quite small and you can choose a company/ package that will suit your business’ needs.
• Compatibility- be sure to use software and equipment that is compatible with the phone you want to use. (equipment and software is often device specific so keep that in mind if you have multiple devices)
• Security- May sound scary but processing credit card transactions via Smartphone is actually surprisingly safe. By utilizing SSL encryption and being PCI compliant, keeping customers information secure is practically fool proof. Card information is never actually stored on the phone and no hard copy of the card ever needs to be made.

Bottom line: if you accept payments from your customers for goods or services, you should be able to offer them the convenience of credit card payments on the go. Your customers will thank you (and so will your wallet).

Check out this post to see what some of the best rated companies have to offer for plans and pricing.

image credit: http://www.technews.biz/verifone-launches-payware-mobile-credit-card-processing-system-for-iphone-3g3g-s-4220/