Meggin McIntosh PhD - PETE Speaker
March 28, 2008
Dr. Meggin McIntosh presented on Friday, March 28th on digital organization and getting things done for faculty and staff. It’s not a comprehensive list but here are a few highlights from her session.
Inbox Tips
- Delete it
- Do it (2 minutes or less)
- Delegate it
- Defer it
- for later action
- for later reference
Recommended Books
- Bit Literacy - There’s finally a solution for information overload. Bit Literacy, the new book by Mark Hurst, describes how to manage e-mail, todos, photos, a media diet, and other sources of stress for people today.
- Crazy Busy - Overstretched, Overbooked, and About to Snap! Strategies for Coping in a World Gone ADD
- Lifehacker - 88 Tricks to Turbocharge Your Day - the website is here as well
Interesting Quotes and Points
- 80-90% of documents in file cabinets will never be used again
- Set expectations on email- make the rules
- Use and encourage descriptive subject lines
- Use EOM (end of message) to send emails entirely in subject line
- Close the loop - respond with DONE at end of subject line but you need to set that expectation
- Change the subject line to something more descriptive or to an action to take
- if it is a process that requires brainpower you can’t do two things at once- it’s serial switching
- No ‘wall of words’ - paragraph after paragraph will result in people not reading - use bullet points. If it’s more than a screenful people won’t read it.
- BLUF - bottom line up front in emails - get your point across immediately and it’s more likely to be read
- ACE - structure your emails so that Action is first, then Context and then End and close.
- Marinade Folder - for email replies that need to hang out and cool down
- Batch your email tasks - open it only at certain times and then move through it. You do two things here. You streamline your work and get things moving
- NRN or NTN - no response necessary and no thanks necessary put in body of email
- It takes longer to reply when your inbox is full - old emails catch your eyes and it just leads to feeling overwhelmed.
Wordpress and RSS - Thursday, March 20
March 20, 2008
The goal of this workshop is to give participants an overview of UR’s new academic blogging platform, WordPress. Participants will learn the basic concepts and requisite skills needed to create, operate, and review blogs. Additionally they will be introduced to RSS technology that can make blogging more efficient, social and organized.
2:30pm - 3:30pm [Thu, Mar 20th 2008] in the TLC Training Room 320, 3rd Floor Boatwright Library
Find more Wordpress information, video tutorials and more at http://blog.richmond.edu/wordpress
Intro to ArcGIS
March 5, 2008
If you haven’t already, it’s not too late to sign up for Introduction to ArcGIS. You’ll learn about the basics of GIS as well as the capabilities of the powerful software ArcGIS.
Date: Friday, March 7, 2008 from 2:30pm - 3:30pm
Location: TLC Training Room 320, Boatwright Library 3rd Floor
