Should You Let Your Employees Work from Home?

Humorous but profound schematic to determine if you should let employees work from home.

Mindflash infographic

Your Computer Lady is a big proponent of working from home. I've done it (most days successfully) for 15+ years. Many of our clients work from their home. With today's technology and a little bit of training, many employees can work from home and be more productive. It does take some adjustment on the part of the employer and the employee.

The employer has to be flexible and cooperative with the employee. There's no need to get upset when the phone isn't answered at 2:30 pm if you know the employee has car pool duty at 2:30 each afternoon. Plan around that.

The employee has to be self-disciplined to stay on target and focused on the details to maintain quality and the appropriate quantity of work.

One key for success is computer skills training. When you are on your own, you need to know how to do your tasks efficiently and effectively. You don't have a co-worker to call over to your desk for tech support. There isn't an IT person to call. So the work-from-home employee has to take charge of their own training and be sure they stay up to date.

There are plenty of tools:

• Online classes like our Wednesday Call Solutions.
• Reference books like the Dummies series.
• Library or community college classes.
• In house training. It's an opportunity to gather everyone in one spot for some office bonding as well as updating skills.

But overall, it's a great way to work where the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

Microsoft Word 2007 - Inserting a Screenshot in Your Document

In Microsoft you have the ability to capture screenshots. That means you can capture images from you screen and insert them directly into your Word document. This is particularly useful if you're creating technical documentation.

To capture and insert a screenshot in your document, follow these easy steps:

1. Click Shift+Print Screen.
2. Position your cursor where you would like to insert the screenshot
3. Click Control+V to paste the image

Microsoft Office- Pin Recent Presentations, Spreadsheets and Word Documents

Have you noticed that the most recent files are always listed in the Microsoft Office button?  However, they get over written every time you open another one. So if you want to make a file show up permanently in the recent menu, click on the pin button next to file name when you click the Microsoft Office Button.

I use this and it really saves me a lot of time.  Try it!

File Organization Tips: 9 Ideas for Managing Files and Folders

The tips in this article can help you master file management by supplying some tips to help you better manage and organize computer files. After you’ve decided on a strategy for organizing and managing files and folders, we bet you’ll see improved time management skills and increased productivity.

Click here to go to Microsoft at Work to continue reading this article.  

Word 2010 Keyboard Shortcuts

No matter how often you use Office applications, no one knows ALL of the keyboard shortcuts  Click here to look at these keyboard shortcuts for Word 2010.

Keyboard Shortcuts For Excel 2010

This article describes what Key Tips are and how you can use them to access the ribbon. It also lists CTRL combination shortcut keys, function keys, and some other common shortcut keys for Microsoft Excel 2010.

To read the full article, click here.  

New Sections for Your LinkedIn Profile

Thanks, Peter Newton with Romanoski Co Inc, for the heads up on some new profile sections LinkedIn has made available. You can now add Honors and Awards, Projects, Publications, Languages and 5-6 other new sections to your profile. This is a great way to build your expertise.

In LinkedIn, go to Edit Profile. You see a link to the new sections just above the Summary section. Click the link then select the section you want to add. The individual sections have fields to help you as well as a description field to expand on the entry. Be sure to use your keywords!