Tagged Conquer Hardskills:

Ghost it out: Powerpoint Presentations, Anatomized and Simplified

Dear floundering Powerpoint presentation-makers of the universe:

I’m about to save you a lot of time. I’m also about to improve your communications with seniors and subordinates and make your thinking more structured. And I’m going to do it all with ghosts.

I’m not referring to your traditional poltergeists, but rather to what we in the consulting world call a “ghost deck.” Essentially, a ghost deck is a Powerpoint presentation. It looks eerily similar to the way you imagine your final presentation looking, with an important caveat: it lacks any actual analysis or data. Laying out such a document upfront has several benefits.

First, a potential ideological issue some of you might take with ghost-decking: it’s a top-down approach. You data analysts of the world have a right to find top-down approaches to information analysis upsetting. It runs the risk of leaving out crucial information that you might not have known about at the outset of your investigation. But rest assured: presentation-making is a separate process from whatever investigation you’re presenting. And post-investigation, you have the expertise to dictate the structure of a final presentation quite effectively. So fear not.

The Ghost Deck

To get us kicked off: it can be helpful to think of a ghost deck as an effective communications tool as much as a planning tool. It allows you to convey the flow of the story that you wish to tell, as well as your ingoing hypothesis. It ensures alignment with all members of your team, and it works in all directions. You can share it with a manager to make sure that he or she agrees with your direction and to avoid redoing work down the line. You can also help the team that you are managing to understand the key conclusions that you are working toward or to show where their work fits within the broader picture. Amongst your cohort, it’s an effective way to collaboratewith peers to ensure that everyone is aligned on a common vision.

Secondly, writing a ghost deck up front forces you to be outcome-oriented in your thinking. By laying out the storyline and even sketching out the supporting charts, you’ll be certain to only focus on analysis and research that really matters. It is all too common to see people taking a scattered approach to their analysis, or even worse, a “boil the ocean” approach in which they try to uncover every fact and figure, even if it is only tangentially relevant to the story at hand.

So tactically, how does one create a ghost deck? I break it into three steps.

Step one: the dot-dash

I tend to be a vertical thinker, which means that my first approach is to attempt to jot down the story in a few bullet points. (The term dot-dash refers to bullet points at different levels of indentation). Try to write your bullet points as though they are the titles of each slide in your presentation. This may take a few tries, but it is worth getting right before moving on. What is your central thesis? What are the most compelling facts that would support it? At this stage, don’t be afraid to leave placeholders, like “Over the last 10 years, sales have increased by X percent in country A, but only Y percent in country B”. We haven’t done the analysis, but now I know what data I’ll need to find, and I can even imagine the bar chart comparing sales growth across different countries.

Once you are comfortable with your dot-dash story, you’re ready to make the mini-deck.

Step two: the mini-deck

Think of the mini-deck as a zoomed out version of your final presentation. Take a piece of paper, and draw a grid of eight to sixteen boxes. Figure out which bullets from your dot-dash will fit into each slide. Aspire to keep it to one message per page, and draw a miniature version of any supporting charts. You may be surprised by how much you adjust your initial dot-dash in this phase. Read through the story out loud, as though you were presenting it, and test the flow.

Step three: The ghost deck

If you have an open-minded audience, or if you really only want to test the story at a high level, you can stop with step two and simply present the mini-deck. However, translating the mini deck into a full sized presentation can be a helpful way to get more constructive feedback, and also provides a great starting point for your analysis. The key here is not to spend too much time getting everything visually perfect. Keeping charts in a hand-written format is totally fine – I rarely present any draft material that isn’t on notebook paper to start. The final document that you present eventually may not look exactly like the ghost deck that you created on day one, but your path to get there will have been significantly more structured, transparent, and efficient.

Creating a ghost deck is a small upfront investment that will pay massive dividends down the line. Give it a try – you’ll be amazed by how much constructive input you can receive, or how much direction you can administer, before you’ve ever set forth on the actual analyses.

And that’s not spooky at all.
Dec 20
Ghost it out: Powerpoint Presentations, Anatomized and Simplified Dear floundering Powerpoint presentation-makers of the universe: I’m about to save you a lot of time. I’m also about to improve your communications with seniors and subordinates and make your thinking more structured. And I’m going to do it all with ghosts. I’m not referring to your traditional poltergeists, but rather to what we in the consulting world call a “ghost deck.” Essentially, a ghost deck is a Powerpoint presentation. It looks eerily similar to the way you imagine your final presentation looking, with an important caveat: it lacks any actual analysis or data. Laying out such a document upfront has several benefits. First, a potential ideological issue some of you might take with ghost-decking: it’s a top-down approach. You data analysts of the world have a right to find top-down approaches to information analysis upsetting. It runs the risk of leaving out crucial information that you might not have known about at the outset of your investigation. But rest assured: presentation-making is a separate process from whatever investigation you’re presenting. And post-investigation, you have the expertise to dictate the structure of a final presentation quite effectively. So fear not. The Ghost Deck To get us kicked off: it can be helpful to think of a ghost deck as an effective communications tool as much as a planning tool. It allows you to convey the flow of the story that you wish to tell, as well as your ingoing hypothesis. It ensures alignment with all members of your team, and it works in all directions. You can share it with a manager to make sure that he or she agrees with your direction and to avoid redoing work down the line. You can also help the team that you are managing to understand the key conclusions that you are working toward or to show where their work fits within the broader picture. Amongst your cohort, it’s an effective way to collaboratewith peers to ensure that everyone is aligned on a common vision. Secondly, writing a ghost deck up front forces you to be outcome-oriented in your thinking. By laying out the storyline and even sketching out the supporting charts, you’ll be certain to only focus on analysis and research that really matters. It is all too common to see people taking a scattered approach to their analysis, or even worse, a “boil the ocean” approach in which they try to uncover every fact and figure, even if it is only tangentially relevant to the story at hand. So tactically, how does one create a ghost deck? I break it into three steps. Step one: the dot-dash I tend to be a vertical thinker, which means that my first approach is to attempt to jot down the story in a few bullet points. (The term dot-dash refers to bullet points at different levels of indentation). Try to write your bullet points as though they are the titles of each slide in your presentation. This may take a few tries, but it is worth getting right before moving on. What is your central thesis? What are the most compelling facts that would support it? At this stage, don’t be afraid to leave placeholders, like “Over the last 10 years, sales have increased by X percent in country A, but only Y percent in country B”. We haven’t done the analysis, but now I know what data I’ll need to find, and I can even imagine the bar chart comparing sales growth across different countries. Once you are comfortable with your dot-dash story, you’re ready to make the mini-deck. Step two: the mini-deck Think of the mini-deck as a zoomed out version of your final presentation. Take a piece of paper, and draw a grid of eight to sixteen boxes. Figure out which bullets from your dot-dash will fit into each slide. Aspire to keep it to one message per page, and draw a miniature version of any supporting charts. You may be surprised by how much you adjust your initial dot-dash in this phase. Read through the story out loud, as though you were presenting it, and test the flow. Step three: The ghost deck If you have an open-minded audience, or if you really only want to test the story at a high level, you can stop with step two and simply present the mini-deck. However, translating the mini deck into a full sized presentation can be a helpful way to get more constructive feedback, and also provides a great starting point for your analysis. The key here is not to spend too much time getting everything visually perfect. Keeping charts in a hand-written format is totally fine – I rarely present any draft material that isn’t on notebook paper to start. The final document that you present eventually may not look exactly like the ghost deck that you created on day one, but your path to get there will have been significantly more structured, transparent, and efficient. Creating a ghost deck is a small upfront investment that will pay massive dividends down the line. Give it a try – you’ll be amazed by how much constructive input you can receive, or how much direction you can administer, before you’ve ever set forth on the actual analyses. And that’s not spooky at all.

Online, Inc.: Tools to get your venture started

Ivan Drucker and Caroline Green of IvanExpert

One of the best things about starting a business in the digital era  is the volume of information for entrepreneurs available at low costs (or for free!) on the internet. In years past, you could spend months and months, not to mention thousands of dollars, just to get a business launched. Luckily for today’s savvy entrepreneurs, those days are behind us. Here are a few online tools that’ll help you start your business.

Finding the Right Business Structure and Name

Many of us are so excited by the prospect of starting a business that we want to start right away by telling everyone about it. But not so fast. Before you open your doors for business, there are still a few important steps that need to be taken:

1) Forming a business entity: It used to be that incorporating, finding employment documents, filing tax documents, and jumping through the legal hoops that come with starting a new business involved actual lawyers. Expensive ones. Thanks to the Internet, this isn’t nearly the stumbling block it used to be.

For quick and relatively painless legal tips and documents, you can check out sites like LegalZoom. If you need more background and education, Nolo Press has lots of booklets and templates available for purchase on many topics relevant to small businesses. They offer some useful all-online docs: “Legal Guide for Starting and Running a Small Business,” “Working as an Independent Contractor,” “How to Write a Business Plan,” and “Choose the Best Legal Entity for a One-Person Business,” to name a few.

2) Researching taxes:  The IRS website, for federal rules and guidelines
The IRS website has a whole section dedicated to small businesses. It can tell you how to get your EIN (Employer Identification Number), what types of federal taxes you’ll need to pay, a checklist for starting your new business, and all the forms available for download.

There may be state guidelines to follow and taxes to pay as well, so do a search for “form a company [your state]” or “corporation rules [your state]” or “Department of State [your state]” and find your state’s webpage for business regulations and forms.

3) Getting clearance on your company’s name: The last thing you want is to have a successful launch, only to find out that someone else is already using your company’s name. Investigate at  the US Patent and Trademark Office’s online site—and then use the site to file your own trademark.

Marketing

Now this is where the internet provides a wealth of free and low-cost opportunities for business owners.

4) Build a website

These days you must have a website if you have a business. One easy way to create a basic site is Wordpress (it’s not only for blogs!), which you need to install at your web host (or pay somebody to set this up for you). There are thousands of free design templates, and you can update your site content yourself. Squarespace is a modular system to create an attractive website that also allows you to make changes and updates easily; there’s a monthly fee for use. For you open source fanatics, check outDrupal.

5) Printed materials
You’ll probably need business cards, and you may also need flyers, handouts, and other printed materials. These can all be created and purchased online fairly inexpensively. A few options for where to purchase (we have used some of these companies, and heard good things about others):
Vistaprint 
Mimeo (Mimeo does professional printing, but doesn’t print business cards)
Zazzle
Modern Postcard
Moo

Business Operations

Congratulations! You’ve got your business up and running. Now is the time to avail yourselves of all the tools that make it even easier to keep the wheels turning.

6) Get documents signed online


If you need to get many clients, vendors, or contractors to sign legal documents, DocuSign and EchoSign are two online systems that allow recipients to “e-sign” online—no printing, scanning, or faxing necessary. We’ve just started using EchoSign and are impressed with how fast people sign our agreements, because the system is so easy.

7) Accept credit cards

Make it easy for your clients to pay you by accepting credit cards. Two popular and easy credit card systems to set up arePayPal, for accepting payments online, and Square, for swiping people’s cards onsite with an iPhone or iPad. Easy payments can also be made through LevelUp, which is the most user-friendly of the bunch.

8 ) Accounting


Create invoices quickly and easily using Freshbooks; you can also use it for basic accounting purposes. For a more sophisticated accounting system, Intuit now offers QuickBooks Online.

9) CRM


Manage your client lists and your prospective clients with an online customer relations management (CRM) system. Keep track of every phone call and email, set reminders to follow up with a lead, and create task lists. Two systems that are easy to learn areBatchBook and Highrise.

10) Dropbox


Have your most up-to-date documents wherever you are, whether at the office, at home, or on your iPad, by using Dropbox to sync documents among multiple devices. It also allows you to share specific documents securely with collaborators or clients.

[ed. note: Being an entrepreneur and a female can be a taxing endeavor, and you need to develop a circle of advisors, sponsors, and mentors. If you’ve got a concept and are ready to get going but feel lost and without support, start with Entrepreneuress Academy, care of Melanie Duncan.]
Dec 15
Online, Inc.: Tools to get your venture started Ivan Drucker and Caroline Green of IvanExpert One of the best things about starting a business in the digital era  is the volume of information for entrepreneurs available at low costs (or for free!) on the internet. In years past, you could spend months and months, not to mention thousands of dollars, just to get a business launched. Luckily for today’s savvy entrepreneurs, those days are behind us. Here are a few online tools that’ll help you start your business. Finding the Right Business Structure and Name Many of us are so excited by the prospect of starting a business that we want to start right away by telling everyone about it. But not so fast. Before you open your doors for business, there are still a few important steps that need to be taken: 1) Forming a business entity: It used to be that incorporating, finding employment documents, filing tax documents, and jumping through the legal hoops that come with starting a new business involved actual lawyers. Expensive ones. Thanks to the Internet, this isn’t nearly the stumbling block it used to be. For quick and relatively painless legal tips and documents, you can check out sites like LegalZoom. If you need more background and education, Nolo Press has lots of booklets and templates available for purchase on many topics relevant to small businesses. They offer some useful all-online docs: “Legal Guide for Starting and Running a Small Business,” “Working as an Independent Contractor,” “How to Write a Business Plan,” and “Choose the Best Legal Entity for a One-Person Business,” to name a few. 2) Researching taxes:  The IRS website, for federal rules and guidelinesThe IRS website has a whole section dedicated to small businesses. It can tell you how to get your EIN (Employer Identification Number), what types of federal taxes you’ll need to pay, a checklist for starting your new business, and all the forms available for download. There may be state guidelines to follow and taxes to pay as well, so do a search for “form a company [your state]” or “corporation rules [your state]” or “Department of State [your state]” and find your state’s webpage for business regulations and forms. 3) Getting clearance on your company’s name: The last thing you want is to have a successful launch, only to find out that someone else is already using your company’s name. Investigate at  the US Patent and Trademark Office’s online site—and then use the site to file your own trademark. Marketing Now this is where the internet provides a wealth of free and low-cost opportunities for business owners. 4) Build a website These days you must have a website if you have a business. One easy way to create a basic site is Wordpress (it’s not only for blogs!), which you need to install at your web host (or pay somebody to set this up for you). There are thousands of free design templates, and you can update your site content yourself. Squarespace is a modular system to create an attractive website that also allows you to make changes and updates easily; there’s a monthly fee for use. For you open source fanatics, check outDrupal. 5) Printed materialsYou’ll probably need business cards, and you may also need flyers, handouts, and other printed materials. These can all be created and purchased online fairly inexpensively. A few options for where to purchase (we have used some of these companies, and heard good things about others):Vistaprint Mimeo (Mimeo does professional printing, but doesn’t print business cards)ZazzleModern PostcardMoo Business Operations Congratulations! You’ve got your business up and running. Now is the time to avail yourselves of all the tools that make it even easier to keep the wheels turning. 6) Get documents signed online If you need to get many clients, vendors, or contractors to sign legal documents, DocuSign and EchoSign are two online systems that allow recipients to “e-sign” online—no printing, scanning, or faxing necessary. We’ve just started using EchoSign and are impressed with how fast people sign our agreements, because the system is so easy. 7) Accept credit cards Make it easy for your clients to pay you by accepting credit cards. Two popular and easy credit card systems to set up arePayPal, for accepting payments online, and Square, for swiping people’s cards onsite with an iPhone or iPad. Easy payments can also be made through LevelUp, which is the most user-friendly of the bunch. 8 ) Accounting Create invoices quickly and easily using Freshbooks; you can also use it for basic accounting purposes. For a more sophisticated accounting system, Intuit now offers QuickBooks Online. 9) CRM Manage your client lists and your prospective clients with an online customer relations management (CRM) system. Keep track of every phone call and email, set reminders to follow up with a lead, and create task lists. Two systems that are easy to learn areBatchBook and Highrise. 10) Dropbox Have your most up-to-date documents wherever you are, whether at the office, at home, or on your iPad, by using Dropbox to sync documents among multiple devices. It also allows you to share specific documents securely with collaborators or clients. [ed. note: Being an entrepreneur and a female can be a taxing endeavor, and you need to develop a circle of advisors, sponsors, and mentors. If you’ve got a concept and are ready to get going but feel lost and without support, start with Entrepreneuress Academy, care of Melanie Duncan.]

The Multitasking Epidemic: How to Fight it, How to Master it

By Kristen Walker

Is technology scattering your focus? Levo’s Kristen Walker talks about way to learn to minimize the interruptions of technology in the second in her three-part series on communication technology.

Women are often known and praised for their multitasking abilities. As Gen Y women who have gown up in the technology era, we have by necessity become adept at observing, analyzing, and reacting to several forms of incoming information at once, what with TV, ads, cell phones, email, and, you know, real life all demanding our attention all at once.

I know I’m not the only one who has simultaneously g-chatted with my best friend, text messaged my mom, browsed Facebook on my laptop, scrolled through the day’s new headlines, and updated my Twitter status – and I still managed to fast-forward through every commercial break during my latest DVR’d episode of “New Girl.” If this sounds at all familiar, then you’ve mastered the multi-focused approach required by today’s Millennials to keep up with the constant stream of communication invading our lives.

What about at work?

It’s a given that you’ve mastered the art of multitasking in your everyday life, but have you ever stopped to consider how this may be affecting your productivity at work?
In the first article in this series, you learned how to prevent work from encroaching on your personal life by limiting how often you check your work phone or email when away from the office. Following those tips will surely help clear your mind during your off hours, but unfortunately none of us can escape the rapid influx of messages while at work.

You know the story: you’re laser-focused on a project that’s due to your boss before the end of the day and just figured out how to tackle the next section when, ding, you get an incoming email. Your natural reaction is most likely to stop what you’re doing and skim the contents of the message, which means diverting attention from the task at hand.

So what’s the problem?

In the psychological study I referenced in the first article in this series, “The Impact of E-mail Communication on Organizational Life,” the author cites an experiment that showed that “switching between tasks resulted in a delay before engaging effectively in a new task, even if the worker had been previously engaged in the task. Each fragmentation to a task adds to the total time required to complete it.”

Every time you shift your attention from your current project to your inbox – which could easily happen several times an hour or more – you delay the completion of the project because it takes extra time for you to fully engage once again. And considering that the majority of the emails you receive on a daily basis don’t require an immediate response, you could be wasting a significant amount of time.

To add in another layer of chaos, we surely can all admit to occasionally using work time to discuss non-work related topics with coworkers or to communicate with our friends, family, doctors, etc., be it by phone, text, instant messaging, Facebook, Twitter, etc.With work and personal devices constantly beeping and buzzing, demanding our attention all day long, it’s a wonder we get any work done at all!

None of these interruptions would be such a hindrance to productivity if we didn’t feel so pressured to respond to every incoming message immediately. As the Erasmus study notes, most email recipients feel compelled or obligated to “answer messages the minute they arrive.” While this rapid exchange of information may be beneficial to your company as a whole, it can cause undue stress and lessened productivity in individual employees.

But what can I do about it?

Unfortunately most bosses won’t agree to let you hole up in a room alone with no means of contact with the outside world until you finish your current project. When you’re surrounded by communication technology all day, it can be nearly impossible to entirely cut out all distractions and interruptions, so here are a few new habits you can adopt to make sure technology is making your work like easier, not more chaotic:

  • Commit to reading and answering emails at set times each day, such as once an hour on the hour. In the in-between times, shut down your email so you can fully focus on your current task. The Erasmus study suggests that there are “two type of responders: those who responded as soon as they received an e-mail (constant responders) and those who delayed their responses to some later time when a number of messages had accumulated (batched responders).” Most batched responders experienced fewer workplace interruptions and reported a decreased feeling of disorganization. If you’re a constant responder, it may be more beneficial for your sanity to try out the batched approach and see if it helps you feel less stressed.
  • If you’re really focused on a project and you’re on a tight deadline, send an email to your boss and coworkers letting them know you’re going into “stealth mode” for a few hours, and ask them not to contact you unless it’s urgent. Then log out of your email, power down your phone, X out of your Internet browser, and turn off any other mode of electronic communication until you’re done with your project.
  • Allow yourself two short breaks each day – one in the morning and one in the afternoon – to communicate with colleagues and personal contacts about non-work related subjects. If your best friend text messaged about weekend plans or your mom emailed reminding you to call and wish your grandma a happy birthday, wait until your designated break to read and respond to these messages so they don’t mentally jog you out of your current mindset.
  • Keep a notepad next to your keyboard to write down “to-do list” reminders as they pop into your mind, whether it’s responding to a coworker’s email or paying your rent online. It happens to all of us – no matter how absorbed you may be in a project, you may suddenly think of some task you forgot to do and be tempted to drop everything and take care of the issue ASAP. But instead of completely disengaging from your project, jot down a brief reminder in your notepad. You can deal with this during your next email or personal break.

Forbes.com accurately describes our rapidly changing work environment: “In today’s age of technology, we’re expected to work quicker, think faster and be more productive. Between your desk computer, laptop and iPad – not to mention your smart phone that’s within sight at all times or your intra-office Instant Messenger that constantly blinks in the corner of your screen – information is currently being received and disseminated through our high-tech devices.”

It’s easy to feel mentally scattered in this type of environment, and it’s a safe bet that this technology boom won’t slow down anytime soon. So by getting in the habit of minimizing these interruptions early on in your career, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of mental stress in the long run.
Dec 12
The Multitasking Epidemic: How to Fight it, How to Master it By Kristen Walker Is technology scattering your focus? Levo’s Kristen Walker talks about way to learn to minimize the interruptions of technology in the second in her three-part series on communication technology. Women are often known and praised for their multitasking abilities. As Gen Y women who have gown up in the technology era, we have by necessity become adept at observing, analyzing, and reacting to several forms of incoming information at once, what with TV, ads, cell phones, email, and, you know, real life all demanding our attention all at once. I know I’m not the only one who has simultaneously g-chatted with my best friend, text messaged my mom, browsed Facebook on my laptop, scrolled through the day’s new headlines, and updated my Twitter status – and I still managed to fast-forward through every commercial break during my latest DVR’d episode of “New Girl.” If this sounds at all familiar, then you’ve mastered the multi-focused approach required by today’s Millennials to keep up with the constant stream of communication invading our lives. What about at work? It’s a given that you’ve mastered the art of multitasking in your everyday life, but have you ever stopped to consider how this may be affecting your productivity at work?In the first article in this series, you learned how to prevent work from encroaching on your personal life by limiting how often you check your work phone or email when away from the office. Following those tips will surely help clear your mind during your off hours, but unfortunately none of us can escape the rapid influx of messages while at work. You know the story: you’re laser-focused on a project that’s due to your boss before the end of the day and just figured out how to tackle the next section when, ding, you get an incoming email. Your natural reaction is most likely to stop what you’re doing and skim the contents of the message, which means diverting attention from the task at hand. So what’s the problem? In the psychological study I referenced in the first article in this series, “The Impact of E-mail Communication on Organizational Life,” the author cites an experiment that showed that “switching between tasks resulted in a delay before engaging effectively in a new task, even if the worker had been previously engaged in the task. Each fragmentation to a task adds to the total time required to complete it.” Every time you shift your attention from your current project to your inbox – which could easily happen several times an hour or more – you delay the completion of the project because it takes extra time for you to fully engage once again. And considering that the majority of the emails you receive on a daily basis don’t require an immediate response, you could be wasting a significant amount of time. To add in another layer of chaos, we surely can all admit to occasionally using work time to discuss non-work related topics with coworkers or to communicate with our friends, family, doctors, etc., be it by phone, text, instant messaging, Facebook, Twitter, etc.With work and personal devices constantly beeping and buzzing, demanding our attention all day long, it’s a wonder we get any work done at all! None of these interruptions would be such a hindrance to productivity if we didn’t feel so pressured to respond to every incoming message immediately. As the Erasmus study notes, most email recipients feel compelled or obligated to “answer messages the minute they arrive.” While this rapid exchange of information may be beneficial to your company as a whole, it can cause undue stress and lessened productivity in individual employees. But what can I do about it? Unfortunately most bosses won’t agree to let you hole up in a room alone with no means of contact with the outside world until you finish your current project. When you’re surrounded by communication technology all day, it can be nearly impossible to entirely cut out all distractions and interruptions, so here are a few new habits you can adopt to make sure technology is making your work like easier, not more chaotic: Commit to reading and answering emails at set times each day, such as once an hour on the hour. In the in-between times, shut down your email so you can fully focus on your current task. The Erasmus study suggests that there are “two type of responders: those who responded as soon as they received an e-mail (constant responders) and those who delayed their responses to some later time when a number of messages had accumulated (batched responders).” Most batched responders experienced fewer workplace interruptions and reported a decreased feeling of disorganization. If you’re a constant responder, it may be more beneficial for your sanity to try out the batched approach and see if it helps you feel less stressed. If you’re really focused on a project and you’re on a tight deadline, send an email to your boss and coworkers letting them know you’re going into “stealth mode” for a few hours, and ask them not to contact you unless it’s urgent. Then log out of your email, power down your phone, X out of your Internet browser, and turn off any other mode of electronic communication until you’re done with your project. Allow yourself two short breaks each day – one in the morning and one in the afternoon – to communicate with colleagues and personal contacts about non-work related subjects. If your best friend text messaged about weekend plans or your mom emailed reminding you to call and wish your grandma a happy birthday, wait until your designated break to read and respond to these messages so they don’t mentally jog you out of your current mindset. Keep a notepad next to your keyboard to write down “to-do list” reminders as they pop into your mind, whether it’s responding to a coworker’s email or paying your rent online. It happens to all of us – no matter how absorbed you may be in a project, you may suddenly think of some task you forgot to do and be tempted to drop everything and take care of the issue ASAP. But instead of completely disengaging from your project, jot down a brief reminder in your notepad. You can deal with this during your next email or personal break. Forbes.com accurately describes our rapidly changing work environment: “In today’s age of technology, we’re expected to work quicker, think faster and be more productive. Between your desk computer, laptop and iPad – not to mention your smart phone that’s within sight at all times or your intra-office Instant Messenger that constantly blinks in the corner of your screen – information is currently being received and disseminated through our high-tech devices.” It’s easy to feel mentally scattered in this type of environment, and it’s a safe bet that this technology boom won’t slow down anytime soon. So by getting in the habit of minimizing these interruptions early on in your career, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of mental stress in the long run.

Jim Hopkinson, Salary Tutor

Jim Hopkinson is the author of “Salary Tutor: Learn The Salary Negotiation Secrets No One Ever Taught You.” He is also a blogger and speaker, helping teach young professionals how to negotiate their salary in their corporate jobs, or how to develop their personal brand and leverage social media in order to build their own business.

Most recently, Jim was a marketing director at Conde Nast, managing the community manager program for brands such as Glamourand Teen Vogue, as well as overseeing online marketing and social media for Wired. An avid sports fan, Jim spent several years working for ESPN, and was also the third employee at a tech startup. He teaches a social media strategy class at NYU, and has written for the Wall Street Journal, Payscale.com, and Monster.com.

We at Levo are teaming up with Jim to bring you a series of helpful starter-tips for salary negotiations— whether you’re squeamish about bringing up the conversation for your first big job or doing a mid-stream negotiation around a performance evaluation.
Dec 12
Jim Hopkinson, Salary Tutor Jim Hopkinson is the author of “Salary Tutor: Learn The Salary Negotiation Secrets No One Ever Taught You.” He is also a blogger and speaker, helping teach young professionals how to negotiate their salary in their corporate jobs, or how to develop their personal brand and leverage social media in order to build their own business. Most recently, Jim was a marketing director at Conde Nast, managing the community manager program for brands such as Glamourand Teen Vogue, as well as overseeing online marketing and social media for Wired. An avid sports fan, Jim spent several years working for ESPN, and was also the third employee at a tech startup. He teaches a social media strategy class at NYU, and has written for the Wall Street Journal, Payscale.com, and Monster.com. We at Levo are teaming up with Jim to bring you a series of helpful starter-tips for salary negotiations— whether you’re squeamish about bringing up the conversation for your first big job or doing a mid-stream negotiation around a performance evaluation.

The Levo League

Posted on Tuesday December 20th 2011 at 05:39pm. Its tags are listed below.

Ghost it out: Powerpoint Presentations, Anatomized and Simplified Dear floundering Powerpoint presentation-makers of the universe: I’m about to save you a lot of time. I’m also about to improve your communications with seniors and subordinates and make your thinking more structured. And I’m going to do it all with ghosts. I’m not referring to your traditional poltergeists, but rather to what we in the consulting world call a “ghost deck.” Essentially, a ghost deck is a Powerpoint presentation. It looks eerily similar to the way you imagine your final presentation looking, with an important caveat: it lacks any actual analysis or data. Laying out such a document upfront has several benefits. First, a potential ideological issue some of you might take with ghost-decking: it’s a top-down approach. You data analysts of the world have a right to find top-down approaches to information analysis upsetting. It runs the risk of leaving out crucial information that you might not have known about at the outset of your investigation. But rest assured: presentation-making is a separate process from whatever investigation you’re presenting. And post-investigation, you have the expertise to dictate the structure of a final presentation quite effectively. So fear not. The Ghost Deck To get us kicked off: it can be helpful to think of a ghost deck as an effective communications tool as much as a planning tool. It allows you to convey the flow of the story that you wish to tell, as well as your ingoing hypothesis. It ensures alignment with all members of your team, and it works in all directions. You can share it with a manager to make sure that he or she agrees with your direction and to avoid redoing work down the line. You can also help the team that you are managing to understand the key conclusions that you are working toward or to show where their work fits within the broader picture. Amongst your cohort, it’s an effective way to collaboratewith peers to ensure that everyone is aligned on a common vision. Secondly, writing a ghost deck up front forces you to be outcome-oriented in your thinking. By laying out the storyline and even sketching out the supporting charts, you’ll be certain to only focus on analysis and research that really matters. It is all too common to see people taking a scattered approach to their analysis, or even worse, a “boil the ocean” approach in which they try to uncover every fact and figure, even if it is only tangentially relevant to the story at hand. So tactically, how does one create a ghost deck? I break it into three steps. Step one: the dot-dash I tend to be a vertical thinker, which means that my first approach is to attempt to jot down the story in a few bullet points. (The term dot-dash refers to bullet points at different levels of indentation). Try to write your bullet points as though they are the titles of each slide in your presentation. This may take a few tries, but it is worth getting right before moving on. What is your central thesis? What are the most compelling facts that would support it? At this stage, don’t be afraid to leave placeholders, like “Over the last 10 years, sales have increased by X percent in country A, but only Y percent in country B”. We haven’t done the analysis, but now I know what data I’ll need to find, and I can even imagine the bar chart comparing sales growth across different countries. Once you are comfortable with your dot-dash story, you’re ready to make the mini-deck. Step two: the mini-deck Think of the mini-deck as a zoomed out version of your final presentation. Take a piece of paper, and draw a grid of eight to sixteen boxes. Figure out which bullets from your dot-dash will fit into each slide. Aspire to keep it to one message per page, and draw a miniature version of any supporting charts. You may be surprised by how much you adjust your initial dot-dash in this phase. Read through the story out loud, as though you were presenting it, and test the flow. Step three: The ghost deck If you have an open-minded audience, or if you really only want to test the story at a high level, you can stop with step two and simply present the mini-deck. However, translating the mini deck into a full sized presentation can be a helpful way to get more constructive feedback, and also provides a great starting point for your analysis. The key here is not to spend too much time getting everything visually perfect. Keeping charts in a hand-written format is totally fine – I rarely present any draft material that isn’t on notebook paper to start. The final document that you present eventually may not look exactly like the ghost deck that you created on day one, but your path to get there will have been significantly more structured, transparent, and efficient. Creating a ghost deck is a small upfront investment that will pay massive dividends down the line. Give it a try – you’ll be amazed by how much constructive input you can receive, or how much direction you can administer, before you’ve ever set forth on the actual analyses. And that’s not spooky at all.
Ghost it out: Powerpoint Presentations, Anatomized and Simplified Dear floundering Powerpoint presentation-makers of the universe: I’m about to save you a lot of time. I’m also about to improve your communications with seniors and subordinates and make your thinking more structured. And I’m going to do it all with ghosts. I’m not referring to your traditional poltergeists, but rather to what we in the consulting world call a “ghost deck.” Essentially, a ghost deck is a Powerpoint presentation. It looks eerily similar to the way you imagine your final presentation looking, with an important caveat: it lacks any actual analysis or data. Laying out such a document upfront has several benefits. First, a potential ideological issue some of you might take with ghost-decking: it’s a top-down approach. You data analysts of the world have a right to find top-down approaches to information analysis upsetting. It runs the risk of leaving out crucial information that you might not have known about at the outset of your investigation. But rest assured: presentation-making is a separate process from whatever investigation you’re presenting. And post-investigation, you have the expertise to dictate the structure of a final presentation quite effectively. So fear not. The Ghost Deck To get us kicked off: it can be helpful to think of a ghost deck as an effective communications tool as much as a planning tool. It allows you to convey the flow of the story that you wish to tell, as well as your ingoing hypothesis. It ensures alignment with all members of your team, and it works in all directions. You can share it with a manager to make sure that he or she agrees with your direction and to avoid redoing work down the line. You can also help the team that you are managing to understand the key conclusions that you are working toward or to show where their work fits within the broader picture. Amongst your cohort, it’s an effective way to collaboratewith peers to ensure that everyone is aligned on a common vision. Secondly, writing a ghost deck up front forces you to be outcome-oriented in your thinking. By laying out the storyline and even sketching out the supporting charts, you’ll be certain to only focus on analysis and research that really matters. It is all too common to see people taking a scattered approach to their analysis, or even worse, a “boil the ocean” approach in which they try to uncover every fact and figure, even if it is only tangentially relevant to the story at hand. So tactically, how does one create a ghost deck? I break it into three steps. Step one: the dot-dash I tend to be a vertical thinker, which means that my first approach is to attempt to jot down the story in a few bullet points. (The term dot-dash refers to bullet points at different levels of indentation). Try to write your bullet points as though they are the titles of each slide in your presentation. This may take a few tries, but it is worth getting right before moving on. What is your central thesis? What are the most compelling facts that would support it? At this stage, don’t be afraid to leave placeholders, like “Over the last 10 years, sales have increased by X percent in country A, but only Y percent in country B”. We haven’t done the analysis, but now I know what data I’ll need to find, and I can even imagine the bar chart comparing sales growth across different countries. Once you are comfortable with your dot-dash story, you’re ready to make the mini-deck. Step two: the mini-deck Think of the mini-deck as a zoomed out version of your final presentation. Take a piece of paper, and draw a grid of eight to sixteen boxes. Figure out which bullets from your dot-dash will fit into each slide. Aspire to keep it to one message per page, and draw a miniature version of any supporting charts. You may be surprised by how much you adjust your initial dot-dash in this phase. Read through the story out loud, as though you were presenting it, and test the flow. Step three: The ghost deck If you have an open-minded audience, or if you really only want to test the story at a high level, you can stop with step two and simply present the mini-deck. However, translating the mini deck into a full sized presentation can be a helpful way to get more constructive feedback, and also provides a great starting point for your analysis. The key here is not to spend too much time getting everything visually perfect. Keeping charts in a hand-written format is totally fine – I rarely present any draft material that isn’t on notebook paper to start. The final document that you present eventually may not look exactly like the ghost deck that you created on day one, but your path to get there will have been significantly more structured, transparent, and efficient. Creating a ghost deck is a small upfront investment that will pay massive dividends down the line. Give it a try – you’ll be amazed by how much constructive input you can receive, or how much direction you can administer, before you’ve ever set forth on the actual analyses. And that’s not spooky at all.

Ghost it out: Powerpoint Presentations, Anatomized and Simplified

Dear floundering Powerpoint presentation-makers of the universe:

I’m about to save you a lot of time. I’m also about to improve your communications with seniors and subordinates and make your thinking more structured. And I’m going to do it all with ghosts.

I’m not referring to your traditional poltergeists, but rather to what we in the consulting world call a “ghost deck.” Essentially, a ghost deck is a Powerpoint presentation. It looks eerily similar to the way you imagine your final presentation looking, with an important caveat: it lacks any actual analysis or data. Laying out such a document upfront has several benefits.

First, a potential ideological issue some of you might take with ghost-decking: it’s a top-down approach. You data analysts of the world have a right to find top-down approaches to information analysis upsetting. It runs the risk of leaving out crucial information that you might not have known about at the outset of your investigation. But rest assured: presentation-making is a separate process from whatever investigation you’re presenting. And post-investigation, you have the expertise to dictate the structure of a final presentation quite effectively. So fear not.

The Ghost Deck

To get us kicked off: it can be helpful to think of a ghost deck as an effective communications tool as much as a planning tool. It allows you to convey the flow of the story that you wish to tell, as well as your ingoing hypothesis. It ensures alignment with all members of your team, and it works in all directions. You can share it with a manager to make sure that he or she agrees with your direction and to avoid redoing work down the line. You can also help the team that you are managing to understand the key conclusions that you are working toward or to show where their work fits within the broader picture. Amongst your cohort, it’s an effective way to collaboratewith peers to ensure that everyone is aligned on a common vision.

Secondly, writing a ghost deck up front forces you to be outcome-oriented in your thinking. By laying out the storyline and even sketching out the supporting charts, you’ll be certain to only focus on analysis and research that really matters. It is all too common to see people taking a scattered approach to their analysis, or even worse, a “boil the ocean” approach in which they try to uncover every fact and figure, even if it is only tangentially relevant to the story at hand.

So tactically, how does one create a ghost deck? I break it into three steps.

Step one: the dot-dash

I tend to be a vertical thinker, which means that my first approach is to attempt to jot down the story in a few bullet points. (The term dot-dash refers to bullet points at different levels of indentation). Try to write your bullet points as though they are the titles of each slide in your presentation. This may take a few tries, but it is worth getting right before moving on. What is your central thesis? What are the most compelling facts that would support it? At this stage, don’t be afraid to leave placeholders, like “Over the last 10 years, sales have increased by X percent in country A, but only Y percent in country B”. We haven’t done the analysis, but now I know what data I’ll need to find, and I can even imagine the bar chart comparing sales growth across different countries.

Once you are comfortable with your dot-dash story, you’re ready to make the mini-deck.

Step two: the mini-deck

Think of the mini-deck as a zoomed out version of your final presentation. Take a piece of paper, and draw a grid of eight to sixteen boxes. Figure out which bullets from your dot-dash will fit into each slide. Aspire to keep it to one message per page, and draw a miniature version of any supporting charts. You may be surprised by how much you adjust your initial dot-dash in this phase. Read through the story out loud, as though you were presenting it, and test the flow.

Step three: The ghost deck

If you have an open-minded audience, or if you really only want to test the story at a high level, you can stop with step two and simply present the mini-deck. However, translating the mini deck into a full sized presentation can be a helpful way to get more constructive feedback, and also provides a great starting point for your analysis. The key here is not to spend too much time getting everything visually perfect. Keeping charts in a hand-written format is totally fine – I rarely present any draft material that isn’t on notebook paper to start. The final document that you present eventually may not look exactly like the ghost deck that you created on day one, but your path to get there will have been significantly more structured, transparent, and efficient.

Creating a ghost deck is a small upfront investment that will pay massive dividends down the line. Give it a try – you’ll be amazed by how much constructive input you can receive, or how much direction you can administer, before you’ve ever set forth on the actual analyses.

And that’s not spooky at all.

The Levo League

Posted on Thursday December 15th 2011 at 12:00am. Its tags are listed below.

Online, Inc.: Tools to get your venture started Ivan Drucker and Caroline Green of IvanExpert One of the best things about starting a business in the digital era  is the volume of information for entrepreneurs available at low costs (or for free!) on the internet. In years past, you could spend months and months, not to mention thousands of dollars, just to get a business launched. Luckily for today’s savvy entrepreneurs, those days are behind us. Here are a few online tools that’ll help you start your business. Finding the Right Business Structure and Name Many of us are so excited by the prospect of starting a business that we want to start right away by telling everyone about it. But not so fast. Before you open your doors for business, there are still a few important steps that need to be taken: 1) Forming a business entity: It used to be that incorporating, finding employment documents, filing tax documents, and jumping through the legal hoops that come with starting a new business involved actual lawyers. Expensive ones. Thanks to the Internet, this isn’t nearly the stumbling block it used to be. For quick and relatively painless legal tips and documents, you can check out sites like LegalZoom. If you need more background and education, Nolo Press has lots of booklets and templates available for purchase on many topics relevant to small businesses. They offer some useful all-online docs: “Legal Guide for Starting and Running a Small Business,” “Working as an Independent Contractor,” “How to Write a Business Plan,” and “Choose the Best Legal Entity for a One-Person Business,” to name a few. 2) Researching taxes:  The IRS website, for federal rules and guidelinesThe IRS website has a whole section dedicated to small businesses. It can tell you how to get your EIN (Employer Identification Number), what types of federal taxes you’ll need to pay, a checklist for starting your new business, and all the forms available for download. There may be state guidelines to follow and taxes to pay as well, so do a search for “form a company [your state]” or “corporation rules [your state]” or “Department of State [your state]” and find your state’s webpage for business regulations and forms. 3) Getting clearance on your company’s name: The last thing you want is to have a successful launch, only to find out that someone else is already using your company’s name. Investigate at  the US Patent and Trademark Office’s online site—and then use the site to file your own trademark. Marketing Now this is where the internet provides a wealth of free and low-cost opportunities for business owners. 4) Build a website These days you must have a website if you have a business. One easy way to create a basic site is Wordpress (it’s not only for blogs!), which you need to install at your web host (or pay somebody to set this up for you). There are thousands of free design templates, and you can update your site content yourself. Squarespace is a modular system to create an attractive website that also allows you to make changes and updates easily; there’s a monthly fee for use. For you open source fanatics, check outDrupal. 5) Printed materialsYou’ll probably need business cards, and you may also need flyers, handouts, and other printed materials. These can all be created and purchased online fairly inexpensively. A few options for where to purchase (we have used some of these companies, and heard good things about others):Vistaprint Mimeo (Mimeo does professional printing, but doesn’t print business cards)ZazzleModern PostcardMoo Business Operations Congratulations! You’ve got your business up and running. Now is the time to avail yourselves of all the tools that make it even easier to keep the wheels turning. 6) Get documents signed online If you need to get many clients, vendors, or contractors to sign legal documents, DocuSign and EchoSign are two online systems that allow recipients to “e-sign” online—no printing, scanning, or faxing necessary. We’ve just started using EchoSign and are impressed with how fast people sign our agreements, because the system is so easy. 7) Accept credit cards Make it easy for your clients to pay you by accepting credit cards. Two popular and easy credit card systems to set up arePayPal, for accepting payments online, and Square, for swiping people’s cards onsite with an iPhone or iPad. Easy payments can also be made through LevelUp, which is the most user-friendly of the bunch. 8 ) Accounting Create invoices quickly and easily using Freshbooks; you can also use it for basic accounting purposes. For a more sophisticated accounting system, Intuit now offers QuickBooks Online. 9) CRM Manage your client lists and your prospective clients with an online customer relations management (CRM) system. Keep track of every phone call and email, set reminders to follow up with a lead, and create task lists. Two systems that are easy to learn areBatchBook and Highrise. 10) Dropbox Have your most up-to-date documents wherever you are, whether at the office, at home, or on your iPad, by using Dropbox to sync documents among multiple devices. It also allows you to share specific documents securely with collaborators or clients. [ed. note: Being an entrepreneur and a female can be a taxing endeavor, and you need to develop a circle of advisors, sponsors, and mentors. If you’ve got a concept and are ready to get going but feel lost and without support, start with Entrepreneuress Academy, care of Melanie Duncan.]

Online, Inc.: Tools to get your venture started

Ivan Drucker and Caroline Green of IvanExpert

One of the best things about starting a business in the digital era  is the volume of information for entrepreneurs available at low costs (or for free!) on the internet. In years past, you could spend months and months, not to mention thousands of dollars, just to get a business launched. Luckily for today’s savvy entrepreneurs, those days are behind us. Here are a few online tools that’ll help you start your business.

Finding the Right Business Structure and Name

Many of us are so excited by the prospect of starting a business that we want to start right away by telling everyone about it. But not so fast. Before you open your doors for business, there are still a few important steps that need to be taken:

1) Forming a business entity: It used to be that incorporating, finding employment documents, filing tax documents, and jumping through the legal hoops that come with starting a new business involved actual lawyers. Expensive ones. Thanks to the Internet, this isn’t nearly the stumbling block it used to be.

For quick and relatively painless legal tips and documents, you can check out sites like LegalZoom. If you need more background and education, Nolo Press has lots of booklets and templates available for purchase on many topics relevant to small businesses. They offer some useful all-online docs: “Legal Guide for Starting and Running a Small Business,” “Working as an Independent Contractor,” “How to Write a Business Plan,” and “Choose the Best Legal Entity for a One-Person Business,” to name a few.

2) Researching taxes:  The IRS website, for federal rules and guidelines
The IRS website has a whole section dedicated to small businesses. It can tell you how to get your EIN (Employer Identification Number), what types of federal taxes you’ll need to pay, a checklist for starting your new business, and all the forms available for download.

There may be state guidelines to follow and taxes to pay as well, so do a search for “form a company [your state]” or “corporation rules [your state]” or “Department of State [your state]” and find your state’s webpage for business regulations and forms.

3) Getting clearance on your company’s name: The last thing you want is to have a successful launch, only to find out that someone else is already using your company’s name. Investigate at  the US Patent and Trademark Office’s online site—and then use the site to file your own trademark.

Marketing

Now this is where the internet provides a wealth of free and low-cost opportunities for business owners.

4) Build a website

These days you must have a website if you have a business. One easy way to create a basic site is Wordpress (it’s not only for blogs!), which you need to install at your web host (or pay somebody to set this up for you). There are thousands of free design templates, and you can update your site content yourself. Squarespace is a modular system to create an attractive website that also allows you to make changes and updates easily; there’s a monthly fee for use. For you open source fanatics, check outDrupal.

5) Printed materials
You’ll probably need business cards, and you may also need flyers, handouts, and other printed materials. These can all be created and purchased online fairly inexpensively. A few options for where to purchase (we have used some of these companies, and heard good things about others):
Vistaprint 
Mimeo (Mimeo does professional printing, but doesn’t print business cards)
Zazzle
Modern Postcard
Moo

Business Operations

Congratulations! You’ve got your business up and running. Now is the time to avail yourselves of all the tools that make it even easier to keep the wheels turning.

6) Get documents signed online


If you need to get many clients, vendors, or contractors to sign legal documents, DocuSign and EchoSign are two online systems that allow recipients to “e-sign” online—no printing, scanning, or faxing necessary. We’ve just started using EchoSign and are impressed with how fast people sign our agreements, because the system is so easy.

7) Accept credit cards

Make it easy for your clients to pay you by accepting credit cards. Two popular and easy credit card systems to set up arePayPal, for accepting payments online, and Square, for swiping people’s cards onsite with an iPhone or iPad. Easy payments can also be made through LevelUp, which is the most user-friendly of the bunch.

8 ) Accounting


Create invoices quickly and easily using Freshbooks; you can also use it for basic accounting purposes. For a more sophisticated accounting system, Intuit now offers QuickBooks Online.

9) CRM


Manage your client lists and your prospective clients with an online customer relations management (CRM) system. Keep track of every phone call and email, set reminders to follow up with a lead, and create task lists. Two systems that are easy to learn areBatchBook and Highrise.

10) Dropbox


Have your most up-to-date documents wherever you are, whether at the office, at home, or on your iPad, by using Dropbox to sync documents among multiple devices. It also allows you to share specific documents securely with collaborators or clients.

[ed. note: Being an entrepreneur and a female can be a taxing endeavor, and you need to develop a circle of advisors, sponsors, and mentors. If you’ve got a concept and are ready to get going but feel lost and without support, start with Entrepreneuress Academy, care of Melanie Duncan.]

The Levo League

Posted on Monday December 12th 2011 at 05:48pm. Its tags are listed below.

The Multitasking Epidemic: How to Fight it, How to Master it By Kristen Walker Is technology scattering your focus? Levo’s Kristen Walker talks about way to learn to minimize the interruptions of technology in the second in her three-part series on communication technology. Women are often known and praised for their multitasking abilities. As Gen Y women who have gown up in the technology era, we have by necessity become adept at observing, analyzing, and reacting to several forms of incoming information at once, what with TV, ads, cell phones, email, and, you know, real life all demanding our attention all at once. I know I’m not the only one who has simultaneously g-chatted with my best friend, text messaged my mom, browsed Facebook on my laptop, scrolled through the day’s new headlines, and updated my Twitter status – and I still managed to fast-forward through every commercial break during my latest DVR’d episode of “New Girl.” If this sounds at all familiar, then you’ve mastered the multi-focused approach required by today’s Millennials to keep up with the constant stream of communication invading our lives. What about at work? It’s a given that you’ve mastered the art of multitasking in your everyday life, but have you ever stopped to consider how this may be affecting your productivity at work?In the first article in this series, you learned how to prevent work from encroaching on your personal life by limiting how often you check your work phone or email when away from the office. Following those tips will surely help clear your mind during your off hours, but unfortunately none of us can escape the rapid influx of messages while at work. You know the story: you’re laser-focused on a project that’s due to your boss before the end of the day and just figured out how to tackle the next section when, ding, you get an incoming email. Your natural reaction is most likely to stop what you’re doing and skim the contents of the message, which means diverting attention from the task at hand. So what’s the problem? In the psychological study I referenced in the first article in this series, “The Impact of E-mail Communication on Organizational Life,” the author cites an experiment that showed that “switching between tasks resulted in a delay before engaging effectively in a new task, even if the worker had been previously engaged in the task. Each fragmentation to a task adds to the total time required to complete it.” Every time you shift your attention from your current project to your inbox – which could easily happen several times an hour or more – you delay the completion of the project because it takes extra time for you to fully engage once again. And considering that the majority of the emails you receive on a daily basis don’t require an immediate response, you could be wasting a significant amount of time. To add in another layer of chaos, we surely can all admit to occasionally using work time to discuss non-work related topics with coworkers or to communicate with our friends, family, doctors, etc., be it by phone, text, instant messaging, Facebook, Twitter, etc.With work and personal devices constantly beeping and buzzing, demanding our attention all day long, it’s a wonder we get any work done at all! None of these interruptions would be such a hindrance to productivity if we didn’t feel so pressured to respond to every incoming message immediately. As the Erasmus study notes, most email recipients feel compelled or obligated to “answer messages the minute they arrive.” While this rapid exchange of information may be beneficial to your company as a whole, it can cause undue stress and lessened productivity in individual employees. But what can I do about it? Unfortunately most bosses won’t agree to let you hole up in a room alone with no means of contact with the outside world until you finish your current project. When you’re surrounded by communication technology all day, it can be nearly impossible to entirely cut out all distractions and interruptions, so here are a few new habits you can adopt to make sure technology is making your work like easier, not more chaotic: Commit to reading and answering emails at set times each day, such as once an hour on the hour. In the in-between times, shut down your email so you can fully focus on your current task. The Erasmus study suggests that there are “two type of responders: those who responded as soon as they received an e-mail (constant responders) and those who delayed their responses to some later time when a number of messages had accumulated (batched responders).” Most batched responders experienced fewer workplace interruptions and reported a decreased feeling of disorganization. If you’re a constant responder, it may be more beneficial for your sanity to try out the batched approach and see if it helps you feel less stressed. If you’re really focused on a project and you’re on a tight deadline, send an email to your boss and coworkers letting them know you’re going into “stealth mode” for a few hours, and ask them not to contact you unless it’s urgent. Then log out of your email, power down your phone, X out of your Internet browser, and turn off any other mode of electronic communication until you’re done with your project. Allow yourself two short breaks each day – one in the morning and one in the afternoon – to communicate with colleagues and personal contacts about non-work related subjects. If your best friend text messaged about weekend plans or your mom emailed reminding you to call and wish your grandma a happy birthday, wait until your designated break to read and respond to these messages so they don’t mentally jog you out of your current mindset. Keep a notepad next to your keyboard to write down “to-do list” reminders as they pop into your mind, whether it’s responding to a coworker’s email or paying your rent online. It happens to all of us – no matter how absorbed you may be in a project, you may suddenly think of some task you forgot to do and be tempted to drop everything and take care of the issue ASAP. But instead of completely disengaging from your project, jot down a brief reminder in your notepad. You can deal with this during your next email or personal break. Forbes.com accurately describes our rapidly changing work environment: “In today’s age of technology, we’re expected to work quicker, think faster and be more productive. Between your desk computer, laptop and iPad – not to mention your smart phone that’s within sight at all times or your intra-office Instant Messenger that constantly blinks in the corner of your screen – information is currently being received and disseminated through our high-tech devices.” It’s easy to feel mentally scattered in this type of environment, and it’s a safe bet that this technology boom won’t slow down anytime soon. So by getting in the habit of minimizing these interruptions early on in your career, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of mental stress in the long run.

The Multitasking Epidemic: How to Fight it, How to Master it

By Kristen Walker

Is technology scattering your focus? Levo’s Kristen Walker talks about way to learn to minimize the interruptions of technology in the second in her three-part series on communication technology.

Women are often known and praised for their multitasking abilities. As Gen Y women who have gown up in the technology era, we have by necessity become adept at observing, analyzing, and reacting to several forms of incoming information at once, what with TV, ads, cell phones, email, and, you know, real life all demanding our attention all at once.

I know I’m not the only one who has simultaneously g-chatted with my best friend, text messaged my mom, browsed Facebook on my laptop, scrolled through the day’s new headlines, and updated my Twitter status – and I still managed to fast-forward through every commercial break during my latest DVR’d episode of “New Girl.” If this sounds at all familiar, then you’ve mastered the multi-focused approach required by today’s Millennials to keep up with the constant stream of communication invading our lives.

What about at work?

It’s a given that you’ve mastered the art of multitasking in your everyday life, but have you ever stopped to consider how this may be affecting your productivity at work?
In the first article in this series, you learned how to prevent work from encroaching on your personal life by limiting how often you check your work phone or email when away from the office. Following those tips will surely help clear your mind during your off hours, but unfortunately none of us can escape the rapid influx of messages while at work.

You know the story: you’re laser-focused on a project that’s due to your boss before the end of the day and just figured out how to tackle the next section when, ding, you get an incoming email. Your natural reaction is most likely to stop what you’re doing and skim the contents of the message, which means diverting attention from the task at hand.

So what’s the problem?

In the psychological study I referenced in the first article in this series, “The Impact of E-mail Communication on Organizational Life,” the author cites an experiment that showed that “switching between tasks resulted in a delay before engaging effectively in a new task, even if the worker had been previously engaged in the task. Each fragmentation to a task adds to the total time required to complete it.”

Every time you shift your attention from your current project to your inbox – which could easily happen several times an hour or more – you delay the completion of the project because it takes extra time for you to fully engage once again. And considering that the majority of the emails you receive on a daily basis don’t require an immediate response, you could be wasting a significant amount of time.

To add in another layer of chaos, we surely can all admit to occasionally using work time to discuss non-work related topics with coworkers or to communicate with our friends, family, doctors, etc., be it by phone, text, instant messaging, Facebook, Twitter, etc.With work and personal devices constantly beeping and buzzing, demanding our attention all day long, it’s a wonder we get any work done at all!

None of these interruptions would be such a hindrance to productivity if we didn’t feel so pressured to respond to every incoming message immediately. As the Erasmus study notes, most email recipients feel compelled or obligated to “answer messages the minute they arrive.” While this rapid exchange of information may be beneficial to your company as a whole, it can cause undue stress and lessened productivity in individual employees.

But what can I do about it?

Unfortunately most bosses won’t agree to let you hole up in a room alone with no means of contact with the outside world until you finish your current project. When you’re surrounded by communication technology all day, it can be nearly impossible to entirely cut out all distractions and interruptions, so here are a few new habits you can adopt to make sure technology is making your work like easier, not more chaotic:

  • Commit to reading and answering emails at set times each day, such as once an hour on the hour. In the in-between times, shut down your email so you can fully focus on your current task. The Erasmus study suggests that there are “two type of responders: those who responded as soon as they received an e-mail (constant responders) and those who delayed their responses to some later time when a number of messages had accumulated (batched responders).” Most batched responders experienced fewer workplace interruptions and reported a decreased feeling of disorganization. If you’re a constant responder, it may be more beneficial for your sanity to try out the batched approach and see if it helps you feel less stressed.
  • If you’re really focused on a project and you’re on a tight deadline, send an email to your boss and coworkers letting them know you’re going into “stealth mode” for a few hours, and ask them not to contact you unless it’s urgent. Then log out of your email, power down your phone, X out of your Internet browser, and turn off any other mode of electronic communication until you’re done with your project.
  • Allow yourself two short breaks each day – one in the morning and one in the afternoon – to communicate with colleagues and personal contacts about non-work related subjects. If your best friend text messaged about weekend plans or your mom emailed reminding you to call and wish your grandma a happy birthday, wait until your designated break to read and respond to these messages so they don’t mentally jog you out of your current mindset.
  • Keep a notepad next to your keyboard to write down “to-do list” reminders as they pop into your mind, whether it’s responding to a coworker’s email or paying your rent online. It happens to all of us – no matter how absorbed you may be in a project, you may suddenly think of some task you forgot to do and be tempted to drop everything and take care of the issue ASAP. But instead of completely disengaging from your project, jot down a brief reminder in your notepad. You can deal with this during your next email or personal break.

Forbes.com accurately describes our rapidly changing work environment: “In today’s age of technology, we’re expected to work quicker, think faster and be more productive. Between your desk computer, laptop and iPad – not to mention your smart phone that’s within sight at all times or your intra-office Instant Messenger that constantly blinks in the corner of your screen – information is currently being received and disseminated through our high-tech devices.”

It’s easy to feel mentally scattered in this type of environment, and it’s a safe bet that this technology boom won’t slow down anytime soon. So by getting in the habit of minimizing these interruptions early on in your career, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of mental stress in the long run.

The Levo League

Posted on Monday December 12th 2011 at 12:00am. Its tags are listed below.

Jim Hopkinson, Salary Tutor Jim Hopkinson is the author of “Salary Tutor: Learn The Salary Negotiation Secrets No One Ever Taught You.” He is also a blogger and speaker, helping teach young professionals how to negotiate their salary in their corporate jobs, or how to develop their personal brand and leverage social media in order to build their own business. Most recently, Jim was a marketing director at Conde Nast, managing the community manager program for brands such as Glamourand Teen Vogue, as well as overseeing online marketing and social media for Wired. An avid sports fan, Jim spent several years working for ESPN, and was also the third employee at a tech startup. He teaches a social media strategy class at NYU, and has written for the Wall Street Journal, Payscale.com, and Monster.com. We at Levo are teaming up with Jim to bring you a series of helpful starter-tips for salary negotiations— whether you’re squeamish about bringing up the conversation for your first big job or doing a mid-stream negotiation around a performance evaluation.
Jim Hopkinson, Salary Tutor Jim Hopkinson is the author of “Salary Tutor: Learn The Salary Negotiation Secrets No One Ever Taught You.” He is also a blogger and speaker, helping teach young professionals how to negotiate their salary in their corporate jobs, or how to develop their personal brand and leverage social media in order to build their own business. Most recently, Jim was a marketing director at Conde Nast, managing the community manager program for brands such as Glamourand Teen Vogue, as well as overseeing online marketing and social media for Wired. An avid sports fan, Jim spent several years working for ESPN, and was also the third employee at a tech startup. He teaches a social media strategy class at NYU, and has written for the Wall Street Journal, Payscale.com, and Monster.com. We at Levo are teaming up with Jim to bring you a series of helpful starter-tips for salary negotiations— whether you’re squeamish about bringing up the conversation for your first big job or doing a mid-stream negotiation around a performance evaluation.

Jim Hopkinson, Salary Tutor

Jim Hopkinson is the author of “Salary Tutor: Learn The Salary Negotiation Secrets No One Ever Taught You.” He is also a blogger and speaker, helping teach young professionals how to negotiate their salary in their corporate jobs, or how to develop their personal brand and leverage social media in order to build their own business.

Most recently, Jim was a marketing director at Conde Nast, managing the community manager program for brands such as Glamourand Teen Vogue, as well as overseeing online marketing and social media for Wired. An avid sports fan, Jim spent several years working for ESPN, and was also the third employee at a tech startup. He teaches a social media strategy class at NYU, and has written for the Wall Street Journal, Payscale.com, and Monster.com.

We at Levo are teaming up with Jim to bring you a series of helpful starter-tips for salary negotiations— whether you’re squeamish about bringing up the conversation for your first big job or doing a mid-stream negotiation around a performance evaluation.

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