The Problem: Getting Bigger All the Time

A recent study conducted by Duke University found that the “hidden” cost of obesity on productivity was around $73 billion in the U.S. And that’s above and beyond the healthcare costs related to being very overweight.

According to the researchers conducting the study, “[o]besity’s hidden costs… stem from the fact that obese people tend to be less productive than normal-weight people while at work — simply accounting for the extra sick days they take misses a big part of the picture.”

Obesity isn’t the only health issue that can lead to less-than-optimal work performance. Smoking, eating poorly, and not getting enough exercise have also been linked to decreased productivity.

The trend in the U.S. is increasingly toward larger waistlines and more sedentary lifestyles, which, in turn, is leading to a drop in the ability of workers to do work. For at-home workers, who tend to be within easy reach of the fridge and at a computer for eight or more hours a day, the effect can be even more pronounced.

Web workers also tend to miss out on some benefits that encourage an active lifestyle, like subsidized gym memberships, so it can be hard to encourage worker health at home. But if you’re having trouble motivating yourself, think about it this way: greater health equals greater productivity.

The Solution: Exploit Your Freedom

Web workers have an advantage over traditional office workers. When you work from home, generally speaking, you have a degree of flexibility built into your day. If there’s a gym nearby, you can get out to that for a half-an-hour each day. Even if you have to pay for your own membership, the increase in energy you’ll get back as a result should make up the cost thanks to your ability to work longer and harder. If you’re lucky, you might even have a gym in your building, or in your own home, in which case not using it just can’t be justified from a cost/benefit perspective. Getting out during the day at least a few times even just to walk should help stave off more serious problems like obesity, too.

Use an exercise ball as your office chair for a portion of the day, if you feel you can’t peel yourself away from the desk. Crunches and push-ups in quick sets between tasks is another great way to get a little bit of exercise throughout the day with relatively low impact. It might draw some funny stares if you were in a traditional office setting, but that’s the beauty of working from home.

You can eat what you want when you work from home, but here again it can really be an advantage. You won’t be tempted to just be lazy and eat out every single day for lunch. Instead, you can save time, money and help yourself feel better by preparing healthy meals in advance to be eaten during the week.

There are some great tips for how you can eat more healthily at work, and the same logic applies when working from home. And you have less of an excuse than your office-bound colleagues because healthier ingredients should be ready to hand if you’re being smart about your grocery shopping.

The Benefit: Better Work, Done More Quickly

If you’re healthy, you’ll produce in a healthy manner. That means you won’t have to work as hard to get things done, and the quality of your work will be more consistent. I find that I’m much more focused and able to concentrate when I’m being active regularly and eating the right things. A good work out will clear your head, and might help you come up with a solution to a tricky problem.

It can be hard to keep active, but now studies are emerging that say you should do so, not just for the sake of your own health, which isn’t reason enough for many, but for the sake of your wallet. When it comes to the bottom line, many are much less willing to let things slide. I know I’m more likely to stay fit when I think about it as a matter of being professional versus not. Maybe that’s the kick in the pants you need, too.

Want to learn more about the health impacts of a virtual workforce? Check out our Net:Work conference in San Francisco in December.

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How best to approach the issue, though? I’ve found that some people can very easily get their back up when attempts are made to point out their spelling and grammar weaknesses. Maybe it feels too much like being reprimanded in school. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, as the famous flying nanny once said, and the same sentiment applies with grammar, too.

Start Early

If you establish a precedent early on of just accepting the work someone’s handing you, and then making corrections yourself before handing it off to someone else (assuming this isn’t part of your job description, of course), then it will be much, much harder to break this bad habit down the road.

If it isn’t too late, then start sending work back immediately. This can be hard to do when there are significant time constraints on a project, or when there’s pressure from the next link in the chain to get their hands on something, but if you can build in a revision loop early on in the cycle, higher-ups will ultimately be happier, and those before you in the process might actually improve with time, rather than repeating errors to a degree that’s absolutely maddening.

Be Direct

You won’t help anyone by being passive aggressive about spelling and grammar problems. Chances are that the offending party is fully aware that they need help, but they’ve never before encountered anyone willing to address the problem head on, and have managed to coast by accordingly.

After an initial period of discomfort, most people will actually respond positively to constructive criticism about their flaws in this area. Most likely, these problems have plagued them for a long time, and they haven’t ever been told how to go about fixing them, they’ve just been told they’re doing it wrong. Pairing criticism with helpful advice about how to improve is key.

There are also numerous Internet resources you can point people to, which can act as crib sheets. Perhaps most painless among these tools, since they’re also pretty funny, are The Oatmeal‘s comics. Some of the comics deal specifically with common errors in spelling and punctuation, and as an added bonus the rest of the site is pretty hilarious, too, so even though you’ll be chastising someone by sending out a link, you’ll also sort of be rewarding them.

Explain

Being told that something is wrong will make you aware of your error in that instance, but it won’t necessarily do anything to curb future bad behavior and repeated mistakes. If people know why a mistake they are making is wrong, then it becomes much easier to avoid it in the future, since it will make sense not to do it.

I still have to expand the contraction “it’s” to ensure that I’m using it right. Pointing out that it’s only correct to use it when you can substitute “it is” without changing the meaning of the sentence will go a long way to helping people avoid that specific error. Likewise, explaining the logic behind other common grammar and spelling errors will also prove helpful.

Results Take Time

None of the above are quick fixes, and you’ll have to feel out how far you can take things with specific individuals. The important thing with correcting these kinds of common mistakes is staying consistent, and not letting things slide. Once you begin just accepting that cleaning up flaws will be your job, it will become your job, even if it’s not something you’re being paid to do.

How do you go about getting others to improve their spelling and grammar?

Photo by Flickr user alkruse24, licensed under CC BY 2.0

I saw Mel Gibson on a talk show last night. He was there to promote a new action flick he has coming out, and the host asked him about his “Three E” approach to movie making. He responded that there are three things he tries to achieve with his movies: first entertain, then educate, and then, if possible, elevate.

I instantly thought these were admirable objectives to shoot for in almost any kind of communication, though the order of priority would vary depending on the type of communication and its purpose. It may seem like I’m stating the obvious, but what came to my mind right away was how appropriate these three objectives would be for a content development strategy.

Then it occurred to me that in this context, there has to be a fourth “E,” one that is pretty critical in the social Web: engage.

I wrote about content strategy not too long ago. It’s a hot topic and a rising career field. So if you create content (and who doesn’t these days?), you might want to ask yourself if your content satisfies any of these four criteria. Think of them as a kind of quality control standard.

The content you create — from animated demos to blogs to tweets to videos on YouTube — all influence your clients’ and peers’ perception of you. As a professional, you understand the importance of the quality of your product, and you should consider your content as one of your products.

Think about the people you follow on Twitter or whose blogs you read. Chances are your favorites provide a lot of Es. I looked at the tweets of one of the people I enjoy following, and found that most of his tweets qualified:

Just for fun, take a look at what you put out there and do a quick analysis to assess the quality of your content based on the four Es. What do you see?

If you want to learn more about content strategy, don’t miss “Content Strategy Forum 2010,” two days devoted to the topic in Paris in April.

What guidelines do you use for the content you create?

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Here I go again, writing about organization. This time, though, it’s not because I’ve found a great new app to help me. You see that picture? It’s my inbox, aka my “to-be-dealt-with” pile. And there are two more like it. If only there were an app that could help me!

It’s so much easier to stay organized when everything is virtual. Or, if the files on your hard drive aren’t organized, at least you’re not tripping over them on your way to the kitchen. The moment I have to deal with something tangible these days, I seem to get in trouble. I used to be organized, but my life changed. So I need to get re-organized.

Part of the problem is that when I came to Paris from the U.S., the physical space I could use was drastically reduced. Another part of the problem was adjusting to the organizational methods — if they can be called that — of my office mate (husband).

Just as I was reaching the point where I could no longer tune out the chaos around me, when it was getting really oppressive, I discovered the 5S methodology. You may have heard of it if you’ve ever worked in a place with lots of equipment and people. It’s a five-step program that originated in Japan and was designed to get a work environment organized and keep it that way, all in the interest of maximum efficiency. I’m going to see if I can apply it to the occupational hazard I currently call my office.

The 5S Process

The five steps of 5S, and their approximate English translations are: seiri (sort), seiton (straighten), seiso (shine), seiketsu (systemize), and shitsuke (sustain).

1. Seiri (Sort): Get rid of anything in your work space that is not absolutely necessary for your work.

This first step is supposed to enable you to simplify tasks and use space effectively. It’s also supposed to help you be more selective about what you introduce into your work space and keep the number of work-related items around you to a minimum.

Frankly, for a personal office, I think this is a little extreme and bad for morale in any circumstances. I have a couple of things on my desk that are just there to give me something fun to look at. They’re staying. But the rest can go: the Advil, CDs, business cards (the bane of my existence), masking tape, Christmas postcards I meant to send to the two people I know who haven’t discovered email… There are a few other trouble spots I need to hit too, like the top of the filing cabinet, and that box of cables taking up space I could use. Step one is going to take me a full day at least.

2. Seiton (Straighten): A place for everything, and everything in its place

This step is about efficiency. It encourages you to make optimum use of your work area and to outfit your space with functional storage. It is also important for everything you use for work to have a convenient and appropriate home to which it is returned when you’re done using it.

This is how I used to operate, back when I had a lot of space. Once upon a time, I knew where everything I owned was. The fact that I couldn’t find a recipe last night, despite having paper files for my old, pre-computer recipes, may be the very reason why I’m writing this today. (Getting them onto the computer is on my to-do list. I have gotten as far as comparing recipe management software.)

3. Seiso (Shine): Clean up after yourself

This third step is about being responsible for keeping your own space neat. Most importantly, it doesn’t work unless everyone who shares the space does the same. The idea is to treat your office as if you might have a client drop in at any moment.

OK, once I get all the junk off of my surfaces, I will clean them. Regularly. There’s no way I can begin to do seiso without getting through the first two steps. Until then, no clients allowed.

4. Seiketsu (Systemize): Make it a habit

This fourth step is about establishing standards and a system for organization, and integrating them into your workflow in order to maintain a high level of neatness.

Some time last year, I stumbled across the concept of the “unpleasant task day” on the blog of a management consultant, and thought this would be a good way to approach this step. Michael Wade, the author of that blog, suggests you pick one day a month to do the things you hate to do. But since the 5S process is about neatness and efficiency, I’m thinking it should be more frequent. Maybe I’ll have a weekly “terrible task afternoon” for cleaning up and filing instead.

5. Shitsuke (Sustain): Prevention of backsliding

This last step is more accurately translated as “discipline.” It’s about making yourself maintain the neatness standards and system you’ve put in place.

Because I was once very organized, it shouldn’t be too hard for me to get back in the habit. I’m not so sure my husband is going to like this whole 5S thing though, even though he has the most organized hard drive I’ve ever seen.

The Reality

Clearly it’s unlikely that any of us could strictly adhere to a system like this, especially given the constantly changing nature of our work. Plus there may be uncontrollable factors (like husbands) that can toss a wrench into the works. But I’ve always found that a little structure never hurts when it’s used as a guideline, so I will try it out and see how it goes. Then I’ll try to apply it to my computer files, emails, etc. Anyway, it’ll be fun to say “Seiton!” the next time my husband puts the pliers down on the corner of my desk.

How do you stay organized outside of your computer?

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That’s not all I get from the experience, though. Dedicated gym-goers use some tried and tested methods to make their workouts more efficient and effective. As usual, what’s good for the goose is also good for the gander, and a lot of these same strategies can apply quite well to professional workflows, too. What is work, after all, besides a prolonged workout of your professional muscles?

Super-sets

It’s understood that after a set of one type of exercise, you’ll take a short break before doing another. But that’s time-consuming, and it’s almost always possible to do another kind of exercise that emphasizes different muscles in between sets in order to be more efficient with your workout. This also has the benefit of keeping your heart rate up, which will help your weight training provide some cardio advantages, too.

Applying the super-set principle to your web working routine will help you make the most out of your working hours, minimize downtime, and open up larger chunks of usable free time for you to really enjoy yourself. To do it, break up your work into smaller, more manageable chunks. Work out small units of tasks and plan ahead, interspersing different types of work together. Block tasks you dislike back-to-back with those you do enjoy in order to keep your motivation level high, and try to ensure that things that are placed next to each other are different enough that you won’t become bored by repetition.

Plan Your Pace

People who are very used to doing extended cardio workouts know what their limits are, and are very good at planning how to pace themselves to make it to their time or distance goal. Marathon runners are a perfect example of this kind of energy conservation. Likewise, if you have 30 minutes to do a weights session, you’ll probably do it differently than if you had a whole hour.

Work is the same. If you don’t take the time to accurately anticipate how long a project or project component will take to complete, you’ll be much more likely to burn yourself out early by working too hard and then becoming frustrated when it takes longer than you’d imagined. Get a better idea of how long things take by monitoring your experiences as you go and logging them, and then do comparisons with your past projects when you take on new ones so that you can then pace yourself accordingly.

Journaling

Many workout addicts are also obsessive record-keepers. They track their progress with every visit to the gym, carrying around notebooks or clipboards for the purpose, or just using an iPhone app to log things. It helps you make sure you’re moving forward instead of back, and you won’t be doing the same work on the same muscles over again by accident.

Keeping a detailed record of the work you do will have the same effect with your online professional activity. It’ll help you make sure you don’t ever redo any work you’ve already done, and it’ll make sure you learn from your mistakes and grow and improve as a web worker over time.

Just like working out your body will help you live a longer, happier life, so too will working out your professional side allow you to enjoy a much more fulfilling and long-lasting working life.

What tips from the gym can you apply to your professional life?

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Web work can be an unstable ride. Since we are all independent, we have varying ways of dealing with challenges and opportunities that arise in our work. I don’t think there’s one strategy that fits us all, but there are four aspects of our careers  —I think of them as pillars — that need to be established to create a sense of security. If you’re lacking any of these pillars, any unexpected event can be damaging.

So what are my four pillars of web working?

Productivity

The first thing we often have to grasp as web workers is the ability to manage our time and tasks well. Having the freedom to schedule your workday sounds like a dream to most people, but it’s actually a big responsibility. We need to find our time sinks and make them more manageable. Idle distractions are OK, but not when you spend five hours a day on them.

Conversely, be aware of “too much” productivity. While there are many of us web workers who truly love and enjoy our jobs, there might be some more important things that we sacrifice for it. These may include our health, relationships — even the necessary time to relax. Yes, it’s good to be productive, but the things we do are only as good as how we are when we do them.

Finance

One of the common impressions that people have about web working is that it’s financially unstable. This is often true. We all know that income from freelancing or contractual work fluctuates. Even if you’re a regular employee working from home, there are still those supervisors who judge employees on the basis of their presence rather than their performance. That’s why it’s essential for all web workers to keep their finances straight.

Another financial issue that many web workers face is the lack of separation between personal and professional expenses. While the line is more blurry with freelancers, even telecommuting employees may need to consider it, especially if there’s an overlap in their personal and work resources (such as equipment, subscriptions, etc.).

Also, do you have a web working expansion fund? This is meant to pay for any work related emergencies such as equipment repair and replacement. You could also use it to purchase books and tools that will help boost your career.

While you’re at it, set up ways to protect your income as well, in case you won’t be able to work. You can do this by saving up for an emergency fund that covers a few months of your living expenses. Don’t forget to make sure that you have adequate insurance coverage for medical emergencies as well. That type of emergency tends to eat up any savings you have tucked away.

Job Security

A pillar that is somewhat related to your finances is your job security. Apart from being a source of income, job security is also essential since it’s your track record. You need to be able to explain any large gaps in your resume to future prospects. Plus, if you’re passionate about your work you probably want to keep doing it.

For employees, do you feel like your company is stable enough to keep you for as long as you want to work there? According to Jonathan Fields, author of Career Renegade, you need to be a creator-operator to be indispensable at work. You need to have the ability to create new solutions and innovations, as well as have the stamina to execute them.

For freelancers, how can you ensure that you’ll have regular work? You can use some ideas from this long list from Freelance Switch. It might also make sense to review what promotion or sales techniques have worked for you in the past and try to replicate or refine them.

Passion and Purpose

Apart from the pragmatic side of things, there are other aspects of our work that need to be there even if they aren’t as measurable. We need to feel a sense of fulfillment to keep the engine running. This doesn’t necessarily have to come from every task you do. Even side projects and hobbies can be a good source. Without it, everything else will seem empty.

How are you doing with each of these pillars? Are you satisfied with what you’ve achieved in this areas or is there room for improvement?

Image by winjohn from sxc.hu

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During those long months, when you can’t remember what the sun looks like and are slightly surprised at its appearance in films and on television, productivity can take a major nosedive, along with mood and attitude. As a long veteran of Canadian winters, I like to think that I’m prepared for the changes that major weather upheavals can cause in a person, but I never cease to be shocked by the strength of the effects. Accordingly, I’ve put together a list of ways to either get over — or work through — the funk. 

Take a Vacation

As mentioned above, I’ve been less than active here during the past few weeks. That’s partly because my cup was temporarily running over with work elsewhere, but it’s also because I decided to step back and take a significant chunk of time off for the first time in about a year. Making a decision about stepping back from work for a while is far preferable to the alternative, which is continuing to try to maintain a regular schedule, and having the quantity and quality of your work suffer as a result.

Planned time off, with a definite ending, will help you feel focused and eager when you do eventually get back to work. If you love what you do, that is. If you still find yourself dragging your heels, you might want to take a long hard look at what it is you’re doing that isn’t satisfying any longer.

Lower Your Expectations

A big part of the problem of trying to fight the winter doldrums is that people are often their own worst critics. Getting into a blame cycle with yourself won’t help you get work done any faster. In fact, you’ll probably get a lot less done, and just give up on days where you could otherwise have gotten at least a little bit ahead.

If you are perennially cursed by a lower work ethic as the thermometer mercury dips lower, then acknowledge and prepare for that eventuality. The best way to do that is to work more during the months that you feel more productive, and generally behave like a squirrel getting ready for the lean winter months. That way, when you’re doing less than your maximum potential output, you won’t feel nearly as guilty about it, and you’re less likely to get caught in negative attribution patterns. Believe me, if I could actually hibernate, I probably would, but this is the next best thing.

Stay Fit, Active and Healthy

As at-home workers, we’re already severely at risk of falling into a sedentary lifestyle, and that risk is amplified a hundred fold when the outside environment seems intent on killing us. Go out of your way to counter the impulse to stay inside and remain immobile, and I promise that after a few days you’ll feel much, much better for having done so.

Make sure your fruit and vegetable intake stays high, at least on par with what you normally take in during the summer. My registered dietitian friend couldn’t stress this enough. She also recommended taking Vitamin D supplements to make up for the absence of sunlight that normally provides this much-needed nutrient to our systems.

Sign up for a gym near enough to your house that you won’t be discouraged from going by the weather. Failing that, invest in a good Tai Chi or yoga DVD and treat it as a necessary part of your work day, akin to filling out invoices or checking your email.

It’s Only a Season

My parting advice for those of you plagued with a long cold winter, Canadian or otherwise, is to remember that it doesn’t last forever, despite sometimes appearing to. Keep that always in mind, and strap on some skates or grab a toboggan and remember that the cruelest season does have some advantages over its gentler cousins.

How do you work through — or avoid — the winter work lull?

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The intrusive things that can affect your ability to get work done include instant message alerts, according to the study, which was conducted by Helen Hodgetts at the University of Cardiff in the UK. Even, apparently, if you only give these things a moment of your attention before returning to your primary task, you still lose a fairly significant amount of potentially productive time over the course of a day.

Speaking to LiveScience.com, Hodgetts had this to say about the study’s findings:

“Email notifications and instant messages all cause a break in focus of the task in hand, even if they are attended to only very briefly. We might find ourselves needing a few moments to regather our thoughts, and remember what it was that we were about to do before we switched our attention to the interrupting on-screen notification.”

Instead of using visual cues, Hodgetts suggests opting for auditory indicators of new mail, messages and content. If a chime sounds indicating a new message on Adium, my preferred messaging client, I can acknowledge it and continue working without breaking pace. Not only does that save me time, but it also helps make sure I maintain my train of thought, and less valuable information is lost as a result.

I’ve dropped Growl (visual notifications for pretty much any good program on the Mac), and after reading this, I’m going to disable dock bounce and menu bar item visual cues, too. Attention span is my No. 1 challenge as a web worker, and I’ll do anything that might help improve mine.

Do you find visual alerts distracting?

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Some of these are things that I know and have known I should be doing already, but haven’t seem to be able to implement. Others are tips passed on to me by coworkers and other professionals. No matter the source, there’s no shortage of productivity tips to be had, so I’m trying to pare down and refine the list to a manageable few, since I’ll have a better chance of actually following through come the new year.

Common Sense

A few of the proposed resolutions fall under the blanket category of common sense, which is to say I should already be doing them, but am not, for whatever reason (laziness is a definite possibility). Here are some prime examples of things that fall under this category:

1. Work Longer Hours

I’m not going to lie, one of the reasons I became a remote worker was the opportunity to set my own hours. Coming from a consulting background, where twelve hour days and frequent weekend work weren’t that rare of an occurrence, I think it’s perfectly understandable and a good thing that one of the first things I did was shorten my average working day.

Over time, however, as I’ve gotten better at my job (I hope, anyways), I can do the same amount of work in less time. What I should’ve done was do more work in the time I’d originally allotted for it, but instead, I’ve shortened my days further still. The result is that revenue stays roughly the same, but I have more time off. Too much time, in fact. My resolution here would be to double my output and work a bit longer.

2. Set Up a Twitter Schedule

Nothing is worse for (or better suited to) a terribly short attention span like the one I’ve been cursed (or blessed) with than Twitter. Currently, I have it running 24 hours a day via Tweetie on my Mac desktop, on a third screen set up only to monitor it and my email.

It’s a great way to keep abreast of the news cycle, which is important for some of my work, but when that’s out of the way, it’s a tremendous distraction. I suffer from a chronic inability to browse YouTube or blogs unguided, so I click on pretty much every link that comes my way via Twitter that promises humor or something interesting. In the New Year, I want to keep a strict Twitter schedule, outside the boundaries of which Tweetie remains unopened.

3. Find a GTD/To-Do App I Will Actually Use

I’ve been an avid fan of quite a few to-do apps in my time, both for the computer and for my iPhone. Even the most promising, though, haven’t stuck, and I remain without a consistent GTD process. My quest continues, but maybe I should focus more on the usage, and less on the tool.

Not-so-common Sense

Not quite out of left field, but things I want to try that might not necessarily be immediately apparent as productivity boosters.

1. Cut the Cable Subscription

I don’t really need you anymore, cable, so why do I cling to the belief that I do? I consume almost all of my media digitally these days, via things like iTunes and Amazon. Most of the time, I don’t even bother with video and stick to reading on my Kindle.

Here’s the purpose cable serves: I can put it on when I’m bored and can’t think of anything else to do. You know what else I could do, though? Work.

2. Prepare Meals in Advance

This is another area where my usual habits are awful. Not only do I never have leftovers in the fridge to heat up, but I also can’t bring myself to shop beyond the current day. I honestly go out to the grocery store every other day, at least, and buy just enough food to last me one or two days. Delivery fills in the gaps.

So much time would be saved in food prep and grocery shopping if I sat down and took the time to plan out a week’s worth of meals in advance, and made many portions of things that I could then freeze or refrigerate and reheat. This is one of the biggies on this list for me.

3. Expand Photography Hobby

I love cameras, and taking pictures, and I update my entry-level Canon DSLR whenever one strikes my fancy in a particular way (the latest was the T1i, which stole my heart with its HD video abilities), but I never take it much further than that.

My plan in the new year is to start at least putting some photo work on stock image sites, in the hopes of turning the hobby into a revenue stream. It worked well for writing, so why not for photography, too?

Your Turn

That’s my working list. I’ll probably end up picking about three of those items listed above for my actual list of resolutions going into 2010. I’m interested in what you have to say, though, both about my proposed resolutions, and about your own plans for boosting productivity in the new year, so offer up any suggestions/insights you may have.

Image credit: Marcelo Marfil on deviantART

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I was taught how to write in a world in which print media still dominated the written word. Much has changed since those pre-Internet days, the practice of writing not least of all. As a result, some things that were once considered big no-nos are now standard practice. Here’s a few old chestnuts you should think about tossing out as you transition to online writing. You may even take joy in doing so, if you’re the rebellious sort.

1. Write What You Know

Even when I was a much younger writer, and a big fan of science fiction writing, I found this rule to be rather limiting. The fact is, now that I’m doing various kinds of online writing that differ greatly depending on the contract, it’s become downright anti-productive.

A much better and more applicable rule for today’s provider of online content is know what you write, as quickly and efficiently as you can. That means doing research to gain a sense of familiarity with your topic, and to quickly find out what kind of tone and tenor is acceptable for the genre. Honestly, your goal as a writer is to be able to fool an expert into thinking the content was created by someone with at least a comfortable grasp and lengthy history with the subject at hand.

2. Don’t Use Contractions

Contractions like “I’ll” and “They’re” may have been completely against all good sense back when you were writing essays for school, but they’re completely acceptable in almost all online writing (see what I just did there?). In fact, when I work as an editor for blog content, I often insert contractions where they belong.

What many people don’t realize when they make the jump from print to online writing is that web content has as much do with spoken English as it does written English, in terms of what’s considered acceptable (see, I did it again!). Contractions more accurately emulate a conversational tone, which is something many blogs, marketing departments and community builders are aiming for with their online publications. If you do not use contractions in your writing, it is liable to sound awkward and stilted to a seasoned Internet media consumer.

3. Revise, Revise, Revise

Revision is terrific, don’t get me wrong (I can see editors all over the world glaring at me menacingly). It’s terrific and necessary, when you have the luxury of time. The fact is, with a lot of Internet writing, you just don’t have that luxury. Taking time to meticulously revise a piece could result in something that was current becoming old news, especially now that Twitter delivers news in real time.

Read over what you’ve written, always, but try to practice producing publication-quality prose on a first draft basis. Part of that means editing as you go, but part of it is just writing with a high degree of frequency. It helps if you can identify your common errors in advance, because that way you’ll be attuned to those areas as you write them, which should make you more likely to catch a mistake as it happens.

Those are the three big rules I break every day. And every time I do, I can still hear my tenth grade English teacher uncapping his red Sharpie. Do what you will, Mr. Marchand, but the Internet demands an entirely new set of rules, and she’s the only English teacher I have to please now.

What writing “rules” do you break regularly?

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1. E-reader

This isn’t a product placement spot, but I currently use a Sony Reader Pocket Edition. I live in Canada, and even though the Kindle (a amzn) just went international, we still got left out in the cold.

Regardless of what type of reader you’re using, whether it’s your iPhone or iPod Touch, your notebook or desktop, or a dedicated device like the Sony or the Kindle, an e-reader is a great tool for someone who works online. Especially if your job involves writing. If you write a lot for your online work, you should also be reading a lot, and not just other online content.

But wait, you say, why bother with an e-reader when I have perfectly good traditional print books? For me, it’s a question of the rate of consumption, convenience, and efficient use of space. With my reader, I can get e-books from the local library, download public domain titles from Feedbooks and other sources, and keep it all close at hand without stuffing my small apartment full of traditional paper tomes. It’s always on hand for when I’m feeling less than inspired or have some downtime.

2. Web Radio

When you have unfettered access to your entire music collection twenty-four hours a day, no matter how large your library is, you’ll eventually crave some additional variety. I need music in the background while I’m working, and when I grow tired of my own stuff, I turn to internet radio for sustenance. Luckily, these days I don’t have to venture far before I find a wealth of different stations playing an infinite variety of music.

My current favorite web radio stations to frequent are the recently relaunched CBC Radio 3 streams. You can listen to live hows and music, or choose from Pop, Rock, Hip Hop and Electronic streams, or build your own playlist by tagging songs that you hear. And it’s all commercial-free because it’s a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation product, which means it’s publicly funded.

iTunes has a lovely selection of various kinds of web radio streams, many of which are also public stations and therefore ad-free.

3. Gym Membership

Or Wii Fit, or a daily walking route, or whatever excuse to stop looking at the computer for a while and get some exercise (Dawn uses iPhone app RunKeeper, for example). For me, that means a membership at the local YMCA, which is conveniently located one short alley away from my apartment building.

Once a day during the week, at about the same time, I put all my work on hold and go out for a 25 minute session on the treadmill. If it’s nice outside, I sometimes run around a local park instead. It replenishes my energy, prevents me from going stir crazy, and has the excellent side benefit of helping to keep me healthy.

Work is work, except when it isn’t. Being successful in a chosen career has as much to do with putting yourself in the right mindset and creating a lifestyle that best complements said career as it does with having the tools and skill sets necessary for the job itself. It can be awfully hard to identify what sort of leisure activities and contextual devices and services have a positive effect on your productivity, but by paying attention to what else is contributing to your good and bad days, you should be able to identify more things like those I’ve mentioned above.

What non-web working tools are essential in your daily life?

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But regardless of which end of the clutter spectrum you fall on, too much clutter can cause your productivity to take a powder. No, really; it’s true. According to one poll conducted by About.com, over a third of respondents avoid going home because of the overwhelming mess. So if you work from home full-time or telecommute part-time, clutter can have a noticeable impact on your productivity. Another research project from Pricewaterhouse Coopers found that businesses spend 150 hours a year looking for incorrectly filed documents.

At this point in the post, you should be feeling an urgent desire to declare a new day and clean out your office. If so, what better time than the coming change of seasons to start anew. It’s never too late to become a recovering pack rat or join the ranks of us neat freaks. OK, if you don’t want to go that far, at least consider this expert advice on four simple ways to organize your office for fall.

Ask the right questions. Janet L. Hall, of www.overhall.com, says the key to conquering clutter in your workspace is to ask yourself some basic questions about each item you have sitting on or near your desk including: Do I actually use this? Do I really want this? And where does this really belong?

Hall says that once you’ve honestly answered these questions, you can take action to eliminate the clutter in your workspace. When you get ready to sort through your piles, drawers, filing cabinets, bookcases, briefcases and anything else that needs to be sorted through, be ruthless, determined and honest, using these questions as a guideline to help you decide whether you should keep it or chuck it. With a few tweaks, you can apply this process to cleaning out your email inbox as well.

Use the 15-Minute Rule. Regina Leeds, who bills herself as The Zen Organizer, suggests setting a timer for 15 minutes and then doing a blitz through your office with two large, green garbage bags in tow. In particular, be on the lookout for anything that is outdated. Some likely candidates might include: old trade publications and magazines; flyers to seminars that have passed; swag picked up at conferences and white papers that — let’s face it — you won’t ever get around to reading.

Learn to label. Lisa Zaslow of Gotham Organizers says that labeling is one of the easiest changes you can make to get your office organized. “While this may seem obvious,” says Zaslow, “it is amazing how many offices I visit where the lack of labels and inaccurate labels leads to wasted time, misspent money and unnecessary stress.” Zaslow suggests labeling the following so you can easily identify their contents and purpose: file folders; boxes (especially if they are stored on a high shelf); binders; keys; switches; cords, cables and chargers; shelves; drawers and file cabinets. She even suggests putting a label on your cell phone or PDA with “reward for return” and a different phone number so you can be contacted if it’s lost.

Manage your manuals. Web workers seem to collect all manner of technical and reference manuals, many of which are out of date or rarely used. Monica Ricci, author of “Organize Your Office in No Time,” suggests freeing up precious storage space by removing those manuals that are rarely used from your immediate workspace and storing them elsewhere. In addition, go through and throw away any outdated or old manuals. Consider keeping only frequently referenced titles on — or near — your desktop.

Spending just 15 minutes a day over the next week working on these items can net you a clutter-free office and get you ready to rush headlong (and organized) into the coming holidays. Don’t you feel the strain of clutter and stress of mess leaving your shoulders already?

Share your office decluttering tips in the comments.

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Those thoughts can be as simple as “don’t forget to email Pete about that invoice” or as intricate as a new angle on an idea I’d been working on before. They’re basically the random things my brain spews out while I’m trying to focus on something else. I know I’m not alone — a lot of people experience the same thing.

Through a long process of trial and error, I’ve found that the best way to deal with these random thoughts — thoughts that are important and valuable, but unrelated to the task I’m working on — is to note them down. This way, I can be sure I won’t forget them, but I also reduce their interruption into my focus on other tasks.

For this reason, the handiest tool in my home office is a pen and paper. I’ve tried using online tools to note down my ideas, but I find that going online to add a task to my to-do list is like opening a door to the world: The temptation to check the news, weather, or my email is often too great to resist.

The problem with noting these random — but important — tasks in something as simple as my text editor is that, as a result of my scattered approach to work, I usually end up with so many apps open, and so many things going on, that I can forget I have my list hidden behind five other panes. Sometimes, I have trouble finding it at all.

My pen and paper are always at my elbow, so I don’t have any difficulty finding them. I like the fact that they’re physically separate from my computer: the place where I do my work. That physical separation helps me mentally divorce these thoughts from what I’m doing, which prevents them from distracting me from the task at hand.

My notepad is my “random thoughts” area, so I treat it as such; my tasks lists are online, well-planned and carefully formulated. But my notepad is a space that’s dedicated to shards of thoughts, germs of ideas that I know need more work and attention before I can do something with them.

And I do give them that attention — sooner or later. Usually, I try to take a look at my list when I get to a break point in what I’m doing. I can take the easy-to-do stuff, prioritize it, and add it to my task list immediately. And I can check my schedule to see when I can set aside half an hour for thinking more about the new angle for that previously concepted idea. Perhaps I’ll also take the opportunity to find my brainstorming notes for that idea and add the new thought to them, ensuring that I keep all the thoughts about that project together.

Once I’ve sorted through the items on my page, I turn it over and start a new page: a clean slate for new random thoughts that may occur in the next work period. So, my pen and notepad are the handiest tools in my home office.

What about you? What remote working tool do you value most?

Photo credit: stock.xchng user RAWKU5.

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It’s easy to lose track of time and get confused about when you signed that new client and how many jobs you’ve had this month or this year.

Tracking key metrics for your business can help you see exactly how well your business is doing. It can help you make improvements, forecast income and set goals for your future.

But what should you track? The answer really depends on your business. What’s important to one won’t be important for another. In most cases, though, it’s best to keep it simple and not overthink it.

Track Your Income

The most important thing you must know at all times is if you’re making money. Time can pass more quickly or slowly than you believe, making you think you’ve made more or less than you actually have, so it’s important to have regular check-ins to see where you are financially. A good rule of thumb is to check in weekly to see how much you’ve made and where you are in relation to your monthly goal.

Track Your Pending Income

It may seem like you’re coming up a bit short one week, but money in the pipeline may put you back on track. Always keep an eye on the horizon so that you have a better idea of what’s to come for your business.

Track Your Clients, Customers, Jobs or Projects

You need to be able to average your income by client or project so that you can make projections and adjustments for your business and know roughly how many clients or projects you need to meet your income goals. This is also a helpful performance metric. You might see that it took you twelve projects to make the same amount of money as eight projects this time last year.

Track the Sources of Your Business

Are clients finding you through your web site, or are they being referred to you by past clients? Knowing the source of your customers and clients can help you fine-tune your marketing and lead generation plans to make the most of your resources.

Of course, there are a variety of metrics that can be tracked aside from those mentioned here, including your website traffic and subscriber counts, so you’ll need to figure out what’s most important to your business.

Keep it simple, or you’ll be less likely to keep up the tracking. Pay attention to the numbers driving your business, and then figure out how to improve or maintain them.

How do you make metric-tracking easy and painless? What have you found to be the most important things to track for your business?

Flickr image by net_efekt

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Time is our most precious resource, and how we spend it ultimately determines how successful we are in life and business.

There are many things that we can do in a day’s time — check our email relentlessly, scour the news and blog feeds, surf the Internet, browse the latest Twitter updates. Most of the things we do eat away at our time in small increments, almost undetectably. We begin doing one task, and before we realize it, an hour (or three) has passed.

We must find ways to firewall our time and, at all times, guard our attention. But how?

First Line of Defense: Two-hour Full Guard

I like a tip from Julie Morgenstern’s book, “Never Check E-Mail in the Morning,” which is to “earn your paycheck by 10 AM.” At least for the first hour or two of the day, completely guard your time (100 percent, no interruptions). Close your browser, do not open your email, and do not visit the social networks. Turn off all alerts, as well as your phones. For just one or two hours a day, you’re on attention lockdown.

Next, write down the most important three tasks that you absolutely must, at a minimum, accomplish today. Then, within this guarded block of time, try to get through those tasks as completely as possible.

Now, if the rest of the day is a wash, at least you’ve had some really focused time and, hopefully, checked a few things off the to-do list (ideally, the things that pay the bills).

Second Line of Defense: Email Guard

When you come out of lockdown, ideally, you shouldn’t immediately jump full force into the major distractions (email, social networks, feeds), but you may need to respond to a few important emails, so you can make an exception here (a quick exception, say 15 minutes). Check your email, but only open those that truly need your attention (quote requests, customer inquiries, important emails from clients/assistants, etc.). Leave everything else to be read later. Shut your email program again. It’s time for another focused work session.

Third Line of Defense: Protect the Mothership

If there’s one thing we all tend to neglect, it’s our blogs. The content we put on our own sites is what helps search engines find us and what new visitors explore when they’re first deciding whether or not to follow us (or give us their precious time and attention). It’s important to add high-quality content to our sites on a very regular basis if we hope to move up in the Internet world.

For the next hour of your day, focus on writing something timely and relevant that will help your target audience. If nothing else goes right today, at least you’ve posted one good article to your blog. (If you do that every working day, assuming you work five days a week and 48 weeks a year, and you’ll post 240 new articles to your site over the coming year.)

Final Line of Defense: Set a Wrap-Up Alarm

This is another tip from Julie Morgenstern, and I’ve found it to be especially helpful for maintaining balance between my personal and professional lives. Set an alarm (on your computer or cell phone) to go off an hour before you want to be out of the office. When it goes off, it’s time to start shutting it down. Respond to any last-minute important emails, write your upcoming to-do list, check your calendar, clear your desk and do any other quick tasks that will set you up to succeed tomorrow.

That’s it! The rest of your day can be used however you’d like, and no matter how you spend your remaining time, you can feel good knowing that you’ve made some progress toward your goals.

What lines of defense do you have in place to safeguard your time? In a time when our attention is being pulled in a thousand different directions, how do you make sure the important things get done?

Image from Flickr by snappED_up

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This is an important thing to keep in mind when marketing your business online. There are tons of ways to build a web presence, including a variety of social media and networking sites, but nothing is as important as your blog.

Maintained correctly, your blog is the one tool that will get you the most traffic, and it’s the tool over which you have the most control. If you set out with the intention of posting three to five times per week, within a year, you will begin seeing significant activity around your site. Within two to three years, you could easily be an authority in your particular niche.

So, how can you make sure that you don’t neglect your blog (or your “mothership”)?

1. Spend time there. Visit your site or blog frequently (ideally, several times per day). This helps you stay connected with your vision for your business, and it also helps you stay in tune with the usability of your site, as well as find ways to improve it.
2. Keep it updated.It’s very easy to allow a month to go by without posting a single blog entry. Naturally, the frequency of your posts will depend on a number of factors, most important being your own goals for your site, but you should post on a regular and consistent schedule so that your site content remains fresh.
3. Engage your audience. Ask questions, make thought-provoking posts, and most importantly, monitor the comments on your blog. If someone replies to one of your posts, take the time to respond, and if you really want to impress the person, email him or her with a thoughtful “thank you for following” message.
4. Give it some thought. Don’t just post “filler content” to make an arbitrary quota. Really think about what your audience wants to hear. What do they want to know more about? How can you help them? Find ways to provide greater value for your readers. You’ll know you’re providing benefit when you hear clients and customers say things like, “I’m trying that idea you mentioned on your blog.”
5. Find ways to improve. Organize your archives a little better, add links to your social networking profiles, or spruce up your “About” page. Find ways to regularly improve your site, making it more visually appealing and more user-friendly.

Your blog is the most direct line to you and your business. It’s what new followers and visitors read to determine if you’re someone they’d like to get to know better or if you can provide value to their lives or businesses. Don’t neglect it. Consider it to be your “mothership” and take care of it as such.

In what ways do you take care of your blog? How do you make sure that it represents you in the best light possible to visitors of your site?

Image from stock.xchng by zizzy0104

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