Product Reviews

I've spent a disproportionate amount of my time recently chasing a client who's trying to migrate from an old version of one of our software packages to a new one. They've been going round in circles for over a month. Every week I visit and leave a list of things to do and by the next week, if I'm lucky, they've achieved 10 per cent of it. A lot of effort goes into completing very little. There's no focus on what's important and what's not so everybody involved

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gets very frustrated.

To try and help them out, I'll be sending them a copy of Sally McGhee's Take Back Your Life. They use Outlook, and the book is about using Outlook to get organised. You might think that any fool can use Outlook, but this isn't just about the features you'll find in the program. It examines the thought processes and actions you need to get organised, and uses Outlook as one of the means of getting there. For instance, there's a short but very useful section on dealing with interruptions, a major reason why people get nothing done.

There's a CD inside the back cover. I'd rather the publishers had got rid of the CD and charged a fiver less for the book, but that's Microsoft for you. If you're feeling flush or are really disorganised and determined to reform your ways, you should also look at www.skillpath.co.uk. Its Managing Multiple Projects, Objectives and Deadlines seminar costs £116 per person and is well worth it. Think of it as taking time to save time.