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Clearing Up the Confusion E-Zine Vol 03 Issue 13
------- Clearing Up the Confusion E-Zine -------
Vol 3, Issue 13
When I write these introductions I always seem to talk about my
daughter, Kaylie, and her exploits as she grows. This time,
though, just to be a little different, I thought I would talk
about my lovely wife, Lisa.
Lisa, among her many other amazing talents, has an ability to
organize that is just this side of unnatural. She knows whose
birthdays, weddings, graduations, anniversaries, etc, etc, are
coming up and always seems to have a card ready (many of which
she makes herself). She's ordered our household so that all of
the general upkeep gets done in a timely manner. The only way a
company for whom she works doesn't come out the better for the
bargain is if they don't listen to her and act on her advice.
Seriously.
In fact, that's one of the reasons I've asked her to help me set
up systems to help run my company, because while she is the
crowned monarch of the world of organization, I seem to rate
slightly lower on the nobility scale -- I think my title is
something like "court jester".
That being the case, I'm always on the outlook for tools which
can help me keep on top of things and this month I've started
working with a new one. Check it out in the article below.
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In This Issue...
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1. Article: Conquering the Mountains of Chaos
2. Shameless Self-Promotion
3. The Fine Print
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1. Article: Conquering the Mountains of Chaos
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I recently finished re-reading "The E-Myth" by Michael Gerber for
the third time. One of the things the author recommends for a
successful business is to develop systems for everything. He
makes a powerful argument, which is why I've started creating a
more organized approach to my business processes. In order to
jump start this a little, I thought I would check around to see
what tools were available to me. The one I've been playing with
the past few weeks is Basecamp (http://basecamphq.com/).
BaseCamp is a system to help you organize projects, especially
those with more than one person involved. To use the fully
functional version, they charge a monthly fee, from $24/month up
to $149/month. They do, however, have a free version which is
missing a couple of features, most notably file storage and time
tracking. Still, if you would like to try it out, it's a good
way to go.
I've got free accounts set up for two projects right now. One of
the big things I use it for is To-Do lists. For the one project,
I keep a separate list for each of the different modules. It's a
good place to record those bugs and missing features that I
discover as I work. Once they are in there I don't have to worry
about remembering them again.
Basecamp, though, is much more than just a fancy To-Do list
maintainer. It has features to record milestones, assign
responsibility for both To-Do items and milestones, and allows
you to maintain notes in a "Writeboard" environment (yes, I
spelled that correctly). It even has a messaging facility which
would allow you to keep all information regarding the project in
one location.
One of the really nice things about Basecamp is that there is no
dearth of information about how to work with the system. Every
section has a video displayed, showing fairly clearly the finer
points of using that particular section. All in all a very nice
system.
Now as I mentioned, the free version of the system has a few
limitations. It has no time tracking, nor does it have file
storage. With regards to the former, you could check out a
service like Toggl (http://toggl.com/). For the latter,
something like the free version of box.net should be sufficient
for most people's needs.
I'm just starting to use these tools, so I've got a ways to go
before it is truly integrated into the way I do things. Still,
I'm finding it fairly useful in the short run. I'll probably
stick around for a while to see how it goes.
So what sort of project organization products do you use? I
would love to hear about them. Drop me a line at
gpeters@cyberdatasolutionsllc.com and let me know about your
experience.
Copyright 2009, Greg Peters
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2. Shameless Self-Promotion
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The "Clearing Up the Confusion" E-Zine is a production of Greg
Peters, owner, chief cook, and bottlewasher of Cyber Data
Solutions. CDS has been helping website designers develop better
web presence for their clients for more than a decade. Visit us
on the Web at www.cyberdatasolns.com to see how we can help your
webmaster.
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3. The Fine Print
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