Miss Jones

Holiday cottage

rjosen — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 11:34:24 +0100

Just put together the details for holiday cottage booked for client in Suffolk. Schools out and they are getting ready to go on Friday!

Transcripts

rjosen — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 11:35:43 +0100

Looking for transcription service for client and found one!

http://www.liber8ing.co.uk

Why now is the best time to oursource

rjosen — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:35:44 +0100

Cost Saving

Outsourcing is cheaper than having employees; full time, part time or temporary and that’s not just counting the cost of advertising and recruiting. It costs to take the time out to devise effective training and deliver it successfully too. Not to mention time consuming appraisals and progress meetings and the more obvious costs of NI, holiday pay, holiday cover, bonus, sickness pay and benefits.

High Quality

Outsourced specialists know they are only as good as their last piece of work so they will produce top quality work every time to keep you as their long-term client.

Better Business

Now is the time when you should be marketing, strategising and ‘doing’.

Outsourcing means someone else does the jobs you don’t have the expertise for or the time for. It can also mean ticking off the jobs that you just don’t want to do from your to-do list!

Why should you be doing data entry when your best skill is to be out networking to meet new contacts?
Why are you chasing money when you should be maintaining an excellent working relationship with that client? Let someone else be Mr Nasty!
Why spend time doing administration when that time can be spent talking to new or existing clients and building the business?
How long does it take you to find newsletters and blogs that you need to read or to do online business networking? Will that time be better spent just reading what’s perfect for you and just responding to great on-line contacts?
Why organise the database when your priority is to write the new marketing plan?

Bad Hair Days

Outsourcing means there will always be someone available to support you. No sickness. No holidays. No paternity leave (but outsourcing will cover for yours). No hangovers and no bad hair days!

Access to a larger talent pool and a varied knowledge base

Outsourcing means an entire new department in your company; a team full of additional skills. If they don’t have all the answers, they are very likely to have the resources to find the answer for you so you will also have improved knowledge.

In addition, they are likely to know of other contacts and services that can also help you.

Operational Expertise

Outsourcing means you will gain access to their know-how which will save you time in the long run. For example, you can use their best practice or HR policies rather than developing your own or they can come in to teach your staff time saving tips or sales skills.

Catalyst for Change

Outsourcing can often mean a catalyst for major change that otherwise

may be very time consuming or not happen at all.

Of course, outsourcing means you can carry on working from home with no expensive office to run!

Wimbledon tickets

rjosen — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 12:34:17 +0100

Happy Miss Jones client member is very happy we bought the Wimbledon men's semi final tickets in advance. I hear they are going for £26,000 today!

Tip of the Week April 24th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 10:45:47 +0100

Managing Your Space

Manage your space as a whole - especially at the proposed or actual introduction of new systems, tools, technology, people or processes, which might threaten to generate new demands on your time. Ask yourself - is this going to save my time or add to my burden?

Managing your space - which includes managing, redefining or reconditioning the expectations of others - is a critical aspect of effective time management.

Tip of the Week March 27th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Review your activities in terms of your own personal short-term and long-term life and career goals, and prioritise your activities accordingly.

Plan preparation and creative thinking time in your diary for the long-term jobs, because they need it. The short-term urgent tasks will always use up all your time unless you plan to spend it otherwise.

Tip of the Week March 20th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Manage phone calls

Manage your emails and phone calls - don't let them manage you. Ideally check at planned times, and avoid continuous notification of incoming emails.

The more senior you are the more selective you need to be about when to be available to receive phone calls.

Try to minimise the time that you are available to take unplanned phone calls, unless you are in a customer-facing, reactive role (customers can be internal too).

Even if you are customer-facing, plan some time-slots when you are not available, or you'll never get anything important and pro-active done.

Tip of the Week March 13th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Take short energy breaks
In order to get the most out of your day, it's important to feel energetic.

If you're hungry or you are feeling light-headed, take a short break and have a snack - something nutritious.

Feeling a little bit stressed? Take a 10 minute nap or an 10-minute walk.

Tip of the Week March 6th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Define your Hours

If you need to work on something important every day, define the hours you plan to work on that project and block those hours of time out on your calendar.

For instance, Marketing, Errands, Finance and, Sales and Administration Hours.

Tip of the Week February 27th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Eliminate interruptions

It's difficult to get things done when you are being interrupted.

The only way to focus is to eliminate interruptions.

Close your office door. Give your kids a project to work on while you write your letter.

Divert your calls to someone else.

(Try www.kbluton.co.uk)

Tip of the Week February 20th 2009

rjosen — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 17:30:23 +0000

The To Do list

Write a NOT To Do List

Write a list of what you're doing each week that you want to stop doing.

Are you involved in activities that you don't enjoy?

Are you always helping someone out, and never getting any time-saving favours in return?

Are you tired of dinner being interrupted by the telephone? Remember, you have the power to say 'No'.

The choice is yours.

Tip of the Week February 13th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Be sure you have a mix of A (High), B (Medium) and C (Low) Priority items on your list.

Try to have your list reflect 60% 'A' Priority items, 30% 'B' Priority items and 10% 'C' Priority items.

Tip of the Week February 6th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Write a To Do list

Create a To-Do list every day

Include 4-6 tasks on your list ane work on those items.

Don't allow yourself to put anything else on your list, until those are completed.

Tip of the Week January 30th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Emails and Phone Calls

Manage your emails and phone calls - don't let them manage you. Ideally check at planned times, and avoid continuous notification of incoming emails.

Tip of the Week January 23rd 2009

rjosen — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 03:00:00 +0000

PC Shortcuts (Part 2)

Ctrl + EndGoes to end of document

Shift + HomeHighlights from current position to beginning of line

Shift + End

Highlights from current position to end of line

Ctrl + Left arrow

Moves one word to the left at a time

Ctrl + Right arrow

Moves one word to the right at a time

Tip of the Week January 16th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 03:00:00 +0000

PC Shortcuts (Part 1)

Alt + F File menu option in current program

F1 Universal Help in almost every Windows program

Home Goes to beginning of current line

Ctrl + Home Goes to beginning of document

End Goes to end of current line

Ctrol + End Goes to end of document

Tip of the Week January 9th 2009

rjosen — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 03:00:00 +0000

Happy New Year!

Organise your emails

Emails are playing a bigger part in our daily lives and can become a time guzzling hindrance if you let them!

To request our complimentary email organising tips, please email us on help@missjones.info

Wishing you the very best for a happy & organised 2009!

Tip of the Week December 19th 2008

rjosen — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 03:00:00 +0000

Take some time off!

This is our last tip of the year as Miss Jones has an annual shut down from 24th December to 1st January.

To be refreshed and ready to start the new year afresh, we suggest you do the same!

Take time out for yourself

Take time out with your family and friends

Revaluate and reflect on how 2009 is going to be even better!

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a happy & organised 2009!

Don't Let Others Rent Space in Your Head

rjosen — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:00:00 +0000
I just liked this sentence! A different way of saying 'carry no baggage!'

Tip of the Week December 12th 2008

rjosen — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 03:00:00 +0000

Bring in the Experts

Outsourcing allows firms to buy in expertise without having to take on a full-time member of staff.

Tip of the Week December 5th 2008

rjosen — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 03:00:00 +0000

This week we have a

Website Of The Week

courtesy of www.enterprisenation.com

Please have a look at

www.hitmelater.com

Simply reply to emails with any number of time options

i.e. 24@hitmelater.com

and the email will come back to you at a time of your choosing.

Try it and see!

No more cluttering up your in-box

Work is A Four Letter Word

rjosen — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 12:00:00 +0000

Work = Toil = To work long and hard

Work = the absence of play

Work = effort

I’ve decided work is a four-letter-word.

Like most home workers, I love what I do and mostly don’t consider it work.

Some parts of my day I spend working but I keep it to a controlled minimum and get it out of the way as quickly as possible. Basically, if I’d rather be doing something else, then I am working!

Work is defined by things we don’t like doing; We don’t like dealing with miserable or incompetent people. So once we know who they are, we stamp ‘Do Not Use’ on their details.

We don’t like waiting in call centre queues so we switched suppliers.

We don’t like calling expensive phone numbers in order to spend money with those companies so we found alternatives.

We don’t like being let down.

We don’t like our calls not being returned.

All this baggage makes work of our days so we make it obsolete.

I don’t particularly like dealing with finances so I delegate as much as I can to an accountant, who loves this sort of thing and is good at it. However, I keep all my receipts and records in impeccable order so I don’t pay them to do work I can easily do myself.

Similarly, as a team, we all enjoy doing different types of tasks, usually those we are good at, so I’m careful to delegate jobs to the most effective person.

I’m sure you don’t need me to repeat all the statistics we hear about how many hours we spend working or waiting or doing mundane tasks or ironing and other household chores.

Is it worth doing something that drains our energy or makes us miserable?

What will you do with the extra 5 minutes every hour, or an afternoon per week or a week a year? Would you develop more business – if that’s what you like to do? Would you take a week’s holiday? Would you have more me-time or spend more time with family or friends. Or all of the above?

So is it worth working when you could be having fun doing business?

Business: If it feels like work, you’re not doing it right!

Tip of the Week November 28th 2008

rjosen — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 03:00:00 +0000

Do the jobs you're good at

At work and at home, concentrate on what you're good at and delegate what you can.

A more experienced person will do the other tasks in less time.

Work From Anywhere

rjosen — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 23:22:54 +0000

The Freedom to Work from Wherever You Choose

[A cautionary tale to anyone thinking of expanding out into an office and/or employing staff!]

Home or office? (The joys of working from home)

We went in reverse to most. We’ve always worked in offices for one reason only: to house staff. We’ve moved 3 times but the last one was the best move. It was when we decided we didn’t need to work from an office anymore.

Cut out the baggage (The joys of the virtual office)

In order to do this, I cut out the businesses and services that were time consuming and needed both the office and full time staff to operate. One was not enjoyable and plain and simply, didn’t work. Others, including Miss Jones were born to be run from home and are good fun to manage.

This slashed a massive overhead and more importantly an even greater headache. Of course we still have an office base but we only go there for occasional meetings. I find everyone is very happy to meet in a coffee shop, motorway location or plush city centre hotel. Now - this is a better way to work! Pretty soon, we will reduce that to a virtual address – just somewhere for our clients and suppliers to send us post.

Quality self-employed staff (The absolute joy of not having staffing issues)

Quality staff has always been the principal and most time consuming issue for me. There is enormous availability of people who want to work part–time from home but very limited (or nil) availability of quality, reliable people who come with confidence and common sense to work in the office. We had a waiting list for home-based workers and still do.

They will commit to schedules providing they can work from home and have flexible hours. They know this a very rare opportunity to do something fun, valuable and paid whilst not having to step out of their homes. When on the odd occasion, they have to run an errand, they work it around their personal commitments and errands tend to be planned in advance anyway.

Because of this flexibility, they are dedicated to us and focussed on our client’s needs. We no longer have an issue with quality of staff and can comfortably recruit anywhere in the country, indeed the world, wherever we have clients.

All the staff are now self employed. We simply altered the contracts and they just send me a weekly invoice and get paid the following week. Again, so simple that we don’t even need to use the accountant!

With self-employed and home-based colleagues, we seem to have no issues and there’s no need for time consuming weekly reviews and meetings. They don’t want them and I don’t need them – we just discuss anything as it arises and fix it.

Embrace technology (The joy of gadgets)

In order for everyone to be based from home, I decided on a web-based system so we don’t have to operate a server that needed to stay on at any particular location. Having spent a fair amount of money on databases and technology over the years, I searched high and low for several months for a web-based system similar to what we already had so there was minimal upheaval and most importantly, a company that offered support to everyone. I was delighted to come across Microsoft Office Live completely by chance – and it didn’t cost anything! I tried it myself for a few weeks, in tandem with our existing database and then rolled it out. I didn’t even need to train, it’s so simple. I choose who sees what information and when so our wonderful clients still receive the perfect service they have come to known but we have the all important security element too.

In addition to Microsoft Office Live, we have taken advantage of technology such as Blackberry’s and Skype. I had used both over the years but now to much greater extent. Everyone knows a Blackberry means you can receive your emails wherever you are so for me that means not always carrying my laptop if I’m only out for a few hours. Skype now do packages to aid budgeting on phone calls. You also no longer need to make calls via your PC but simply save a number onto your landline or mobile and you can make calls all over the world – all within a budget. It also means home-based staff don’t have to send me itemised bills to have their phone calls reimbursed. I can see it all on-line using my Skype account.

Work fewer hours (The joy of freedom)

None of us now work full time although in most people’s eyes I still do. Having gone from over 2 years of 18 hour days, including working all weekend to now working a 4 and half day week, just 6-8 hours per day, I don’t see this as full time! Most of this reduction is down to not have to operate and manage an office.

On top of this, everything we do is fun and the day just rolls by. Clients are happy and we are happy. Bliss.

All these activities add up to lots more freedom. I can attend at least one training course or seminar per month and have 2-3 leisurely meetings with suppliers and contacts per week and pretty much have Friday afternoons off; something I could have only dreamed of when working 2-3 times as many hours in the office.

However, personally, the most blissful of all, I can be based anywhere in the world, with my laptop, Blackberry, Skype and fabulous support team and nobody will ever know any different.

Why now is a good time to outsource

rjosen — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 23:20:25 +0000

Why now is a good time to outsource



Cost Saving

Outsourcing is cheaper than having employees; full time, part time or temporary and that’s not just counting the cost of advertising and recruiting. It costs to take the time out to devise effective training and deliver it successfully too. Not to mention time consuming appraisals and progress meetings and the more obvious costs of NI, holiday pay, holiday cover, bonus, sickness pay and benefits.

High Quality

Outsourced specialists know they are only as good as their last piece of work so they will produce top quality work every time to keep you as their long-term client.

Better Business

Now is the time when you should be marketing, strategising and ‘doing’.

Outsourcing means someone else does the jobs you don’t have the expertise for or the time for. It can also mean ticking off the jobs that you just don’t want to do from your to-do list!

·    Why should you be doing data entry when your best skill is to be out networking to meet new contacts?

·    Why are you chasing money when you should be maintaining an excellent working relationship with that client? Let someone else be Mr Nasty!

·    Why spend time doing administration when that time can be spent talking to new or existing clients and building the business?

·    How long does it take you to find newsletters and blogs that you need to read or to do online business networking? Will that time be better spent just reading what’s perfect for you and just responding to great on-line contacts?

·    Why organise the database when your priority is to write the new marketing plan?

Bad Hair Days

Outsourcing means there will always be someone available to support you. No sickness. No holidays. No paternity leave (but outsourcing will cover for yours). No hangovers and no bad hair days!

Access to a larger talent pool and a varied knowledge base

Outsourcing means an entire new department in your company; a team full of additional skills. If they don’t have all the answers, they are very likely to have the resources to find the answer for you so you will also have improved knowledge.

In addition, they are likely to know of other contacts and services that can also help you.

Operational Expertise

Outsourcing means you will gain access to their know-how which will save you time in the long run. For example, you can use their best practice or HR policies rather than developing your own or they can come in to teach your staff time saving tips or sales skills.

Catalyst for Change

Outsourcing can often mean a catalyst for major change that otherwise

may be very time consuming or not happen at all.

Of course, outsourcing means you can carry on working from home with no expensive office to run!

Tip of the Week November 21st 2008

rjosen — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 17:56:01 +0000

Back up often

Back up daily and then make sure you store your back-up separately. Even just backing up on a CD and keeping it a different location could save you days, weeks or months of work.

Tip of the Week November 14th 2008

rjosen — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 03:00:00 +0000

SAVE YOUR WORK OFTEN

When typing, save your work literally every few seconds using Ctrl & S. Especially every time you are interrupted, when you have a read through and when you amend

something.

If your computer freezes up, you will have retained most of your work, and you won't waste time having to do everything all over again.

Tip of the Week November 7th 2008

rjosen — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 17:42:21 +0000

Prepare for phone calls
Before you call someone, make a list of important things you want to say or ask. This way, you won't forget anything, and you won't have to waste time calling back later.

Tip of the Week October 24th 2008

rjosen — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 21:43:00 +0100

Send back the original
Rather than typing up a brand new letter, answer routine correspondence right on the original letter you received.
Make a copy for your records and mail the original back to the sender with your response.

Tip of the Week October 17th 2008

rjosen — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 18:47:22 +0100

Use PC short cuts.

A few to start with:

Ctrl + X Cut

Ctrl + C Copy

Ctrl + V Paste

Ctrl + P Print

Ctrl + S Save