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Outlook Calendar Tip: Go Straight to a Future Date rather then Browsing to it

Posted by: standss | Comments (0)

Tuesday, April 24th, 2012

Do you need to make an appointment entry for a future date e.g. 20 January 2013, how can you get there?

Most of us would say:

Go to the Calendar
Change to Week View or Month View and BROWSE to the future date

You are right, this is one way of doing this BUT there is a much easier and faster way to JUMP to the future date.

Here is how you can jump straight to a future date:

Open Outlook
Go to the Calendar
Press CTRL+G on your keyword. This brings up a screen as show below:

In the Date: field, enter the future date e.g. 20-1-12
From the Show in: drop-down list select the view you would prefer
Click OK

You will now jump straight to the date entered, all you have to do is enter your appointment in the required time slot, Faster right?

Hope you find this tip useful.

If you know of other ways to make the use of Calendar easier and faster, let us know by leaving a comment below.

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip

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Outlook Appointments in a Different Time Zone

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Friday, January 27th, 2012

Do you have meetings with people in other time zones. We’ve talked about displaying multiple time zones in Outlook previously.

Here’s another time zone tip (for users of Outlook 2010 only). This lets you enter appointments based on the time in another time zone without having to convert it to local time.

* Open your appointment

* Click Time Zones on the ribbon. Outlook will add a time zone drop-down next to the appointment time.

Now you can enter the time of the appointment if the appointment time is given to you based on the time in the other time zone… and Outlook will automatically add it in your calendar at the correct time in your Time Zone.

(Thank you to Ben M. Schorr who writes at OfficeForLawyers for this tip).

Note: If you’re trying to find a suitable time for a meeting based on both your time zones then the tip in displaying multiple time zones in Outlook is better as it lets you see the times in the two zone side-by-side.

Categories : General, Outlook Calendar Tip

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Start your day with Outlook the way YOU want

Posted by: standss | Comments (0)

Thursday, September 22nd, 2011

Everytime you open Outlook in the morning, the first thing you see is a inbox full of emails that you will be working on. This is how the day starts for alot of us, but this can be changed.

We are all different and we always like things which can be personalized and configured to our likings.

Do you wish to view your Calender, Contacts, Task or anything other then your Inbox (emails) in the morning?

I personally have Outlook setup to open my Calendar so I know what I had actually planned for my day. (I don’t like starting with the Inbox because it is too easy to jump into emails and start working on things that are not real priorities)

You can follow the simple steps below to change to the folder of your choice:

In Outlook 2010:

Click the File menu > Options > click Advanced on the left column
Under Outlook Start and Exit, click Browse and then choose what folder you want Outlook to show you first: Calendar, Contacts, Tasks or any of your other folders

In Outlook 2007 & 2003:

Click the Tools menu > Options
Click the Other tab, and then click Advanced Options.
Under General Settings, next to the Startup in this folder box, click Browse and then choose what folder you want Outlook to show you first: Calendar, Contacts, Tasks or any of your other folders.

Now when you start Outlook, it will display the folder that you have selected above.

Categories : Outlook Installation/Setup, Outlook as a Business Tool

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Reminders Showing Twice in Outlook + Solutions

Posted by: standss | Comments (3)

Tuesday, September 6th, 2011

Yesterday a friend of mine called for assistance regarding an unusual problem he had with Outlook Reminders. For some reason Outlook (he was using Outlook 2010) showed each of outlook calendar reminders twice. He had put up with this for sometime until it got really frustrating. Here’s how I fixed the issue.

Research on the web showed two solutions. I tried both and the second one worked.

Option 1: Use the cleanreminders switch when starting Outlook

This one did not work for him but it may be the solution that works for you.

Quit Outlook
Click Start > Run
Type Outlook.exe /cleanreminders (don’t forget the space after the exe) and press Enter

Option 2: Check your Outlook data files to see if any file is listed twice

Here’s what did work for him (I recommend you do the cleanreminders first anyway)

I checked his Outlook data files and found that his main Outlook PST was listed twice. I removed one and everything was back to the way it should be.

To check your Outlook data files:

Quit Outlook
Go to your Control Panel and double click Mail.
Select the Data File tab
IF AND ONLY IF you see the same data file listed twice, select the second one and click Remove.
Restart Outlook.

Did any of these two methods work for you. Do you have a different solution.
Please leave a comment on the blog.

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip, Outlook Performance

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Download the Rugby World Cup 2011 Game Timetable into Outlook

Posted by: standss | Comments (13)

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

The Rugby World Cup 2011 is going to start in less than two weeks (9th September). Here’s what you need to do in Outlook to ensure that you don’t miss a single game of your favourite team.

Follow these steps to download the times for all the games into your Outlook Calendar.

1. Make sure that your computer is setup to the correct time zone. This step is important to ensure that the game time gets shown at the correct time depending on where in the world you are. Go to the Windows Control Panel and open Date and Time.

(Your screen may be slightly different depending on the version of Windows… it may have a separate tab for Time Zone).

Make sure that the correct Time Zone is displayed i.e. the time zone of where YOU are. (I am in Fiji so the screen shot above says Fiji). Click on Change time zone if you need to.

2. Click on the link below and save the .ics file to your desktop
Download Rugby World Cup 2011 Schedule
(Fixtures are from the Rugby World Cup 2011 Official website)

3. Import the downloaded file into your Outlook by using the following steps. If you are using Microsoft Outlook 2010, click File – Open – Import. For all other versions of Outlook, click File – Import & Export.

4. Select Import an iCalendar (ics) or vCalendar file (vcs) from the list and click Next.

5. Use the screen that comes up to select the ics file that was downloaded in Step 2.

(You may get the following extra steps depending on the version of Outlook you are using)

6. Click either Open as New or Import. (I simply imported it to my main Outlook Calendar as it then synched with my Iphone too)

The times for all the games will now be in your Outlook.

Enjoy the games and may the best team win.

Personally I am predicting an All Blacks win… it’s about time that the trophy went back to New Zealand… I was a student there in 1987 and still remember them winning the very first world cup final. It has been a long wait for the kiwis… but this is their year.

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip

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How to organize Appointments and Tasks in Outlook by Project

Posted by: standss | Comments (2)

Tuesday, July 26th, 2011

Many of us use Outlook’s appointments and tasks to manage our daily lives and projects… and yet Outlook does not give us an easy way to manage projects inside Outlook. Outlook users frequently ask us how they can see all appointments and tasks that make up a project in one place.

Why is this important? As we finish a step, it is important to know what the next steps are to get the project completed. Things also don’t always go according to plan… and we need to see what else gets affected when things change.

Our research showed that there is no simple way to organize and view tasks and appointments under projects… so we added this functionality to our Outlook Project Management addin Smart Schedules for Outlook.

With Smart Schedules for Outlook you can:

Assign existing (or new) tasks and appointments to projects
Quickly see all tasks and appointments for a project at the click of a button.

Here are step by step instructions showing you just how easy this can be:

Assign existing (or new) tasks and appointments to projects

Open Outlook and go to the Calendar/Task folder that the existing appointment/task is located in
Select the appointment/task
Click on Assign Project button on the Smart Schedules toolbar/ribbon. This will display the following screen:

Select an existing project from the Project list.
Note: You can also type in a new project name if you would like to create a new project and add this selected appointment/task to that project.
Click OK.

Quickly see all tasks and appointments for a project at the click of a button.

Smart Schedules Project Centre makes it easy to see all appointments and tasks that you have associated with a project.

On the Smart Schedules toolbar, click Project Centre
From the Project drop-down, select the Project to which you assigned the appointment or task
You will now be able to view the appointment or task assigned to the project and all other related appointments and tasks for the project as shown below:

Next Steps…

Smart Schedules for Outlook was designed with the help of almost 20,000 Outlook users. Try it for yourself today and tell us what you think.

Download a fully functional version of Smart Schedules for Outlook.

Watch a short video of our Outlook based Project Manager (Smart Schedules)

Categories : Smart Schedules for Outlook

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[Video] Outlook Appointments & Tasks… the Fast, Easy ERROR-FREE way

Posted by: standss | Comments (0)

Thursday, June 2nd, 2011

Since our last report, we’ve been getting a lot of emails from readers… is the video ready… I want to see if this solution will work for MY BUSINESS. So…

The video is ready… take a look right now at:

The Fast, Easy, Error Free way to Schedule, Manage and Reschedule Appointments and Tasks for all your projects… inside Outlook.

My personal favourite part of the Smart Schedules for Outlook… how I can see ALL appointments and tasks for a project in one place… it makes it so much easier to see the impact of changes.

Beta Testers have been telling us that their favourites include how quick and easy it is to create ALL appointments and tasks for a process from a template…. and how easy it is to ACCURATELY reschedule multiple appointments when there is a change in a deadline.

We’d love to hear what you like so please let us know after you see the video.

Regards,
Sanjay Singh

PS: We are giving away a limited quantity of other software as part of the launch. Take a look at the video now to find out if this solution works for you.

PSS: Then, if you have the time, I would appreciate any feedback you can send me on the video… send us a email at news@standss.com. And…don’t forget to send us any questions you have on our new software.

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip, Outlook as a Business Tool, Smart Schedules for Outlook

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Why Outlook’s Appointments and Tasks are NOT Good Enough for YOUR Business… and How to Fix It in 5 Minutes

Posted by: standss | Comments (0)

Friday, May 27th, 2011

A quick post to let you know that the special report is ready for you to read now.

3 Reasons why Outlook’s Appointments and Tasks are
too Simplistic, Error-Prone, Time Consuming & Risky for Your Business
… and How to Fix It in 5 Minutes

Download and read the report now:

Click here to read the report online. You will need the latest version of the free Adobe Acrobat Reader – if you need it, get it here.

To save the report to your hard-disk and read the PDF file offline, right click this link and then click “save target as”

A special Thank You to the many readers who came back with such fantastic ideas and comments… your information was so valuable that we HAD to go back and rework major parts of both the report and the solution.

Once you have read the report, please send me your comments at news@standss.com

I look forward to helping you to add more time to your day.

Regards,
Sanjay

PS: You need to read the information TODAY as it links to a video showing you a 5 minute solution to making Outlook’s Appointments and Tasks work the FAST, EASY, ERROR-FREE way your business needs.

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip, Outlook as a Business Tool

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Are Outlook Appointments and Tasks too DUMB for use in real business?

Posted by: standss | Comments (1)

Wednesday, May 18th, 2011

You may have noticed that I dedicate a lot of time to getting the most out of Outlook for my (and hopefully your) business – just look at the emails and blog articles I send you.

So I was abit surprised (confused?) during lunch when two of my friends (a lawyer and a real estate agent) commented that they do NOT think that Outlook’s Tasks and Appointments were SMART enough tools for their businesses.

They were both using Outlook but were frequently finding that when they relied on their Outlook calendar, they were RUSHING about in the last minute trying to meet DEADLINES due to INCORRECT entries…

These guys are both extremely competent highly professional people… if they were having problems then I was sure that many other people would be having similar problems.

So I decided to do some research… to try and understand what they actually meant… and hopefully find a solution.

Their problem was that they needed to enter a SERIES of related appointments and tasks into Outlook (sort of like a process)… based on the start date for the real estate agent and the end date (generally a court date) for the lawyer.

It was TIME-CONSUMING and ERROR-PRONE to do this by hand each time…
sometimes some steps were missed or entered on the wrong date.

The problem was made worse because invariably there was a change in a critical date which required RESCHDEULING of multiple items and… it wasn’t easy to find and change them all in Outlook.

It wasn’t uncommon to miss updating one or more appointments.. and unfortunately THE SIMPLEST STEP BECOMES THE MOST CRITICAL AS SOON
AS IT IS MISSED!

The good news is that we have been working on something that I hope to release in the next month or so.

But before we do that… we thought we better make sure that we were understanding the problem properly.

Could you give us a couple of minutes of your time to answer two simple questions:

1. Why does your industry need to enter a series of appointments (and
tasks) into Outlook?

2. What are some of the problems of doing this in Outlook at the
moment?

Please type in a quick response and send it to news@standss.com

With so many readers, I can’t guarantee a personal response… but
I can guarantee that I will personally read your email.

That’s all for now… Wishing you a better Outlook.

Regards,
Sanjay Singh

P.S. I really DO value your input in getting things right. Why
does your industry need to enter a series of appointments (and
tasks) into Outlook? and… What are some of the problems of doing
this in Outlook at the moment?

Please send your response Now to news@standss.com

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip, Outlook as a Business Tool

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Coming Up… Smarter ways of Scheduling Outlook Appointments (and Tasks)

Posted by: standss | Comments (0)

Sunday, May 15th, 2011

We’ve had a lot of requests from readers in the past for something to make appointments and tasks more effective… we realise that most of our past reports and addins have focussed on email productivity.

But… recent conversations with other Outlook users and reader emails are telling us that simple scheduling errors have been causing a lot of stress for many people.

So… we have been working on a system that helps you create not only individual appointments and tasks but ENTIRE SCHEDULES of them.

And then lets you monitor them… and RESCHEDULE them in case dates change (as they always do)… all INSIDE Outlook.

We’re aiming to ELIMINATE almost all HUMAN-ERROR from the process.

I’m not quite ready to show you the result yet… but keep your eyes on your Inbox.

More about the project later in the week…

Regards,
Sanjay Singh

Categories : Outlook Calendar Tip, Outlook as a Business Tool

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