Let's talk business

Self-help from an ex-Dragon

Let me stress that this is a personal view (so I don't know if Simon and Stuart at Softalk will agree with me) but my least favourite Dragon's Den star was always Rachel Elnaugh, the founder and former chief executive of Red Letter Days.

It's not that Red Letter Days went bust. That's not actually a bad thing and in the UK there is far too much stigma attached to it compared to the US where it is almost a badge of honour to have failed and picked yourself up to try again.

My problem with Rachel was always that her questions to the entrepreneurs were all a bit - well daft. She appeared to operate on how she felt rather than the facts. My favourite was Doug Richards who gives an impression of someone who knows what they are doing. I used to like Simon Woodroffe as well as he appeared to combine fact and feeling.

That's a long way of explaining why I found this story of Rachel Elnaugh's latest venture to be amusing. I can't imagine anyone less likely to motivate or inspire me.

Quality, quality, quality

The Sunday Times in the UK has been running 'How to win at business', a series of articles by serial entrepreneur Duncan Bannatyne, one of the star's of BBC Dragon's Den. This week Duncan is talking about successful marketing. His best piece of advice comes right at the very end when he says "the best form of marketing... is the product itself... It's not about 'cheaper, cheaper, cheaper' but 'quality, quality, quality'."

tags: business, marketing, bbc, dragons+den

18 ways to say focused at work

Lifehacker points to an interesting post with 18 ways to stay focused at work. OfficeTalk makes it really easy to use some of these tips:

1. Write out a daily task list and plan your day. You can schedule any OfficeTalk task simply by dragging it onto your diary. The Activities view is also really useful as it will just show the tasks that are due on the day, week or month that you are viewing.

2. Allocate time slots colleagues can interrupt you. This is where OfficeTalk knocks the socks off the competition. Not only can you easily view colleagues' diaries (if you've been granted permission) but you can also create groups and view diaries alongside each other. Meetings mode will search for free time slots. Makes it really easy to let people know when you and can't be interrupted.

3. Apply time boxing. This is something I've always done, but I've never called it time boxing. Working on something and then switching to something else does keep you fresh and for me certainly helps me to think better. Using OfficeTalk you can mark a task as being partially finished so that colleagues can see where you are on it. We also use the notes field and time stamp to keep a note of what's happening, making it easier for colleagues to update clients if you're not available.

4. Setup filters in your email. Not only does OfficeTalk let you create all of the rules you would expect to filter your email you can also set flags for follow-up or assign a task to yourself or a colleague.

 There are 14 other tips to check out - not all of which I would agree with. For example the 'Do not check personal email in the morning' wouldn't work for me as all of my email accounts go into into OfficeTalk so that I can keep track of all of my conversations and tasks. The history and pending views on contacts are ideal for refreshing your memory before you speak to friends or business contacts.

tags: productivity, collaboration, email, scheduling, calendars