Understanding life

     Time management is essential in our high-speed, always-on culture, yet most advice you'll find on this topic is pretty vague. "Setting goals" and "making time work for you" are, um, great, but so are practical efficiencies. Because oDesk is home to thousands of self-starting contract workers, we've seen many efficiency tricks。

　
　　The headline promises five steps for time management, but they all come from a single principle: You can only do one thing at a time, so do it right。

　　
　　Finish what you've started. This is the core idea: Where possible, working a single task to completion is more efficient. When you sit down to work, you spend a few minutes just getting "settled in" before you're productive. If you jump from task to half-finished task all the time, that's a lot of minutes lost to "rolling up your sleeves."

　　
    Think small. You can't always spend several hours working straight through on a single big job. Don't think in those terms. Use a simple to-do list, and take each item to completion without interruption, unless something's literally on fire. An example for the job-seeker: It's not "I'll look for jobs this afternoon," it's checking email for replies to previous applications, scanning preferred job sites, writing cover letters, and tweaking your resume for each solid lead, etc。

    Quit stalling. Once you're organizing by simple components, it's easier to dive right into the small tasks. It takes a lot of warm up and deep breaths before you jump off a high-dive and we're less hesitant about walking down a flight of steps。

　　
　　Play well with others. When you're working as part of a team, make sure you're prioritizing what you do to get the most important parts into the production line. Nothing's worse than having people stand around waiting for you to produce. In a job search, prioritize anyone who's waiting to hear from you; hiring managers looking for self-starters (and who isn't?) will appreciate and remember your promptness。


      Analyze your output. How could you have been more efficient? How much of your time goes to trivial, mundane work rather than the challenging stuff you enjoy and that your boss values? Job-seekers, log the time you spend at various job sites, and count how many real leads that effort yields. This way you can reprioritize your efforts for high value results. Why are you still lurking on that job board that dried up two years ago?

　　It's a multitasking world, and there's no changing it. But when a dozen things are clamoring for your attention, you can still organize them on your terms。

     Thank you for your attention!

This just in! Now we have proof that men are “liars, liars, pants on fire!” Researchers in the U.K. have found that men lie twice as often as women. On an average day, men tell about six lies while ladyfolk tell about three. While I’m sure there are many Honest Abes out there, sorry guys, it looks like you’ve totally slaughtered us in the fibbing department. After the jump, check out the lies each gender tells most frequently, according to this study of 2,000 Brits. It looks like men and women do have something in common in our lying habits—the most frequent lie in both lists is exactly the same.

The 10 lies men tell most often:

Nothing’s wrong, I’m fine

This will be my last pint

No, your bum doesn’t look big in that

I had no signal

My battery died

Sorry, I missed your call

I didn’t have that much to drink

I’m on my way

It wasn’t that expensive

I’m stuck in traffic

The 10 lies women tell most often:

Nothing’s wrong, I’m fine

Oh, this isn’t new, I’ve had it ages

It wasn’t that expensive

It was in the sale

I’m on my way

I don’t know where it is, I haven’t touched it

I didn’t have that much to drink

I’ve got a headache

No, I didn’t throw it away

Sorry, I missed your call [Daily Mail]

Interesting that “I missed your call,” “I’m on the way,” and “I didn’t have that much to drink” made both lists, just in different positions. Which of these fibs have you told?

Thank you for your attention!

You’ve survived the first three days of Bullet Point Boot Camp (day one, day two, day three), and now we turn our attention to a popular and controversial topic — the appropriate usage and text density of bullet points.

FACT: Presenters like bullet points more than audiences do. Bullet points can be relatively easy to pull together. You can do a brain dump into your slides, and then the bullet points serve as a helpful guide/outline for your key points as you present them.

On the receiving end, the experience isn’t quite as pleasant – very similar to real bullets. After about the fifth or sixth straight slide of pure text, you’ve lost your audience - or reduced them to a mindless lump of sub-organic material.

Like real bullets, it's frequently not as fun to be on the receiving end of bullet points.

More than just “title and text”

The “title and text” format — a slide with just a title and bullet points (see layout #1 below) — should not be the standard for your presentations. Audiences have been abused over the years by slides with too much text. In spite of good content or a talented presenter, an audience is more likely to “check out” if they see too many “title and text” slides in a row.

The “title and text” format might be appropriate for an agenda or summary slide, but most of the time you’ll want to complement or replace your bullet points with an image, diagram, or chart. I’m not talking about random “decorations” but purposefully chosen graphics that support and strengthen your key messages. If you take the time to do this, the extra effort can really pay off.

Use layout #1 sparingly. Most audiences will prefer the other more visual layouts.

In a recent article, I provide a useful technique for reducing and simplifying your bullet points. It shows you how to transform “title and text” slides (#1) into “text and image” (#2) or “no text” (#4) slides.

Strategic or tactical?

In another recent two-part article, I discussed the differences between strategic and tactical presentations. The main point of my article is that most presentation experts’ recommendations are tailored to keynote/strategic presentations and not the everyday tactical variety that most people work on. Prescribing guidelines or rules that work well for keynote presentations but not necessarily for tactical presentations can lead people astray.

It’s important to recognize what type of presentation (or slide) you’re building because it can change your approach. Text density is an important consideration for both presentation types. Generally, for both strategic and tactical slides, the less text the better. However, strategic presentations need to be far more visual than tactical presentations, and as a result will rely on bullet points much less than tactical presentations (e.g., more “no text” slides rather than “text and image” slides).

Text density factors

There are a number of key factors that shape the “text density” of a slide:
Font size
Number of bullet points
Number of words per bullet point
Number of lines per bullet point
Text box width

Many presentation experts subscribe to a minimum font size (e.g., 40 pt. font). I am not as rigid in this area because I have different thresholds depending on the presentation type — I generally don’t go below 32 pt. for strategic slides and 20 pt. for tactical slides.

Some people may ask why not use a large font size for all presentations. In the case of tactical presentations, using a large 40 pt. font would mean leaving out a lot of details that your audience may need and expect. Having the missing details in a notes section or in a handout may be inadequate and untimely — ultimately undermining the success of your presentation.

For example, consultants need to provide detailed analysis findings and recommendations in their presentations — not high-level summary statements accompanied with eye-catching but uninformative stock images. In my own experience, I discovered that each type of presentation required a slightly different approach. Presentations may also be a mixture of both types, requiring the presenter to switch gears from time-to-time as they build their slides.

For strategic presentations such as keynotes, you want to use bullet points sparingly (5-7 bullets) and keep them to no more than one line per bullet point.

Use an appropriate font size for your presentation type.

As an alternative approach, David Paradi advocates a rough 6-by-6 guideline (he notes that it is not a rule but a guideline) with no more than six bullets on a slide and no more than six words per bullet. I prefer to count lines rather than words, but we share the same objective of reducing text density. I agree with Paradi that bullet points should not be full sentences and should only represent your key ideas.

Slideuments

Although tactical presentations should be visual too, they typically require more detail/text and need to stand on their own as references for guiding future action. Sometimes PowerPoint is used to create slideuments, which Garr Reynolds refers to as slides that are used like documents. I don’t have a problem with slideuments as long as they are never presented but just used as “quick summary” reference documents (i.e., more visual Word-lite documents).

Garr Reynolds wants documents to be documents, and presentations to be presentations. I mainly agree, but don't necessarily feel as though all documents need to originate in MS Word.

Tactical presentations can lean towards becoming slideuments if presenters are not careful. In general, you shouldn’t go beyond two lines per bullet point (three lines for a half-length text box) for tactical presentations; otherwise, you’re really just having complete sentences masquerading as bullet points.

To avoid the tendency of reading longer bullet points in tactical presentations, it can be helpful to bold one key word or phrase within each bullet point. If you ever come across a bullet point where you struggle to highlight something, then that bullet point should probably be removed (i.e., trim the fat).

You should rarely have to go beyond two levels.

PowerPoint gives you the option of using multiple levels of bullet points. Your bullet points shouldn’t go beyond two levels; otherwise, your multi-layered bullet points can become overly complicated for audiences to follow (i.e., multiple indents). In addition, the more levels of bullet points you have, the smaller your font sizes get.

You should rarely have to go beyond two levels.

We’re going to wrap up the Bullet Point Boot Camp and cover both content and delivery on the final day.

Thank you for your attention! 

I am very happy to have made it to PPT Live this year with the crazy project schedule and it being on the other side of the country I feared I would miss out on this great event. But I am in Atlanta and looking forward to the next few days!

Just for fun I quickly created this slide using the great, but often overlooked, feature of picture fills for text.

The visuals are great, easy to do, and fast. The word "Atlanta" is made of a skyline shot of downtown Atlanta (at night). Even better is this is just one text box with different style treatments applied to text selectively!

To fill text with an image, SELECT text >> FORMAT >> open FORMAT TEXT EFFECTS dialog >> TEXT FILL tab >> select PICTURE OR TEXTURE FILL >> FILE and select image.

Thank you for your attention! 

Working hard and being smart with your money aren't things you just should do because they seem virtuous; these behaviors ultimately allow you to get more enjoyment out of life. You'll have no regrets when you're able to accomplish what's important to you because of your savvy ways. These are 11 golden rules that I try to live by:

1.Live within your means - In order to be truly independent, it's imperative to live within your means. Your freedom is limited by owing money to anyone, whether it's a credit card company or a family member, so set yourself up for an unrestricted life by saving for the things you want and spending with a plan.

2.Work hard - Your job and the salary you command are your biggest assets in building wealth. Do your best at work and take the steps to make yourself indispensable to set yourself up for the highest level of success.

3.Research before you act - Whether you're comparing travel package and a la carte prices for a vacation or looking up a company to see if it's legitimate, research is almost always worth your time.

4.Avoid buyer's remorse - Feeling guilty just doesn't sit well. Avoid buyer's remorse by asking yourself these questions before making a purchase: Do I love it? How often would I wear or use it? Can I afford it? Could I find it cheaper somewhere else?

5.Avoid saver's remorse - There is such a thing as being too thrifty for your own good. What's the point of squirreling away so much cash if you can't splurge occasionally on yourself and others? Include an amount of discretionary money into your budget to spend on things that you might not desperately need, but would make you smile.

6.Strive for happiness - Finding a job that makes you happy most of the time is possible, and it's worth taking risks to discover what fulfills you. If for one reason or another you're stuck in a position that isn't ideal, at least strive to end your day with something that does make you happy.

7.Go for quality, not quantity - Stuffing your closet with items that will fall apart in three months is a silly way to spend your hard earned cash. Buy a smaller quantity of things that are made to last, and you'll be the owner of higher quality items that look and feel like they're worth your money.

8.Face your weaknesses head-on - We're not perfect, but admitting that you have weaknesses and doing your best to improve will allow you to continue growing. Invest time in yourself to be the most well-rounded person you can be.

9.Save for the predictable and the unexpected - We're all going to face retirement someday, and the best time to save for it is now. The golden years are inevitable. On the other hand, we also need to be prepared for the unexpected, like job loss or a medical emergency, so that we can remain in control of our finances even when other things aren't going our way.

10.Negotiate - Doors aren't closed until you hear the word no. Negotiating things like salary and benefits can get you ahead of the game, and all you need is the confidence to ask.

11.Set goals on top of goals - Cap the feeling that you're going through the motions by revising your goals when you've accomplished your old ones. Whether it's saving for a vacation to a place you've always wanted to visit or considering the next step in your career, there's always something to keep you moving and motivated.

Thank you for your attention!