Software Tips & Tricks Adding an Access Object to the Desktop

By Laura Noble

If you have a particular form or report that you consistently open in Access you can add this object to your desktop as a shortcut. When the shortcut is opened, it opens the Access database to the object linked to the shortcut.

1. Open Database.
   
   
2. Locate object.
   
   
3. Right-mouse click on object that requires the shortcut.
   
   
   
   
   
4. A Create Shortcut box will open, click OK to close.
   
   
5. Close Access.
   
   
6. Go to Desktop and double-click on new shortcut icon linked to database object.
   
   
7. Access will open to the linked object.
   

Laura Noble is the owner of Noble Software Solutions. Laura can be contacted at 519-680-2689 or by e-mail at lnoble@noblesoftwaresolutions.com. www.noblesoftwaresolutions.com

Published in Networking Today, June 2003.

How to Motivate the Motivator: 8 Step Success System

By Karen Susman

Maybe you’ve just been laid off, downsized, right sized, reorganized, or just plain fired. Maybe you still have your job, but you don’t know how long it will be before you have to turn in your key to the executive washroom. Perhaps you decided a year ago to beat the boot to the punch and leave your employer to start your own business. In any event, you need to keep yourself motivated. How do you do that in the face of numerous obstacles, threats, doom, gloom, and way off in the distance boom?

Try this 8 Step Success System:

1. Discover your passion: Determine what you’re passionate about. What is the favourite part of your work? What would you do even if you weren’t paid? Do more of these things. If you loved writing in your old job, write right now. Living with passion improves attitude and builds your immune system. Living with passion fights depression and energizes you. These are all elements you need to make a sale or solve a problem.
   
   
2. Identify your impact: No matter what your position or current situation, how does what you do make a positive impact on you, your company, your family, your neighbourhood, your community, and the world? What would be missing without you and your talents?
   
   
3. Adopt orphans and seek trouble: Take on projects, challenges, accounts, and tasks that others don’t want or have abandoned. Seek the undesirable. These are opportunities left behind. Look for the trouble; the needs of the world and find solutions. Rev. Robert Schuller said, “Find a need and fill it. Find a hurt and heal it. Find a problem and solve it. Find an obstacle and tear it down.”
   
   
4. Begin. What ever it is you want to do, start now. Don’t play the when/then game. “When I move, lose 25 pounds, get and advanced degree, then...” Jump in right now. Throw your coat over the fence and then go after it.
   
   
5. Build your momentum; don’t quit while you’re ahead or on a roll. Learn how to build momentum in yourself and others. Encourage exuberance. Generate excitement. Act motivated. If you intend to accomplish your goals, you have to want to. You have to want to want to even when you don’t want to.
   
   
6. Use experts and share expertise: You don’t have to know everything. You just have to know who knows. Or, you have to know who knows who knows. Ask for help. Be specific. Share your expertise. Don’t under value your knowledge. Be visible. Be helpful. Be known as an expert.
   
   
7. Be optimistic and energetic: Take care of your mental and physical health. Many things may be out of your control, but you still can control your attitude. You can’t control Wall Street, but you can walk up and down the street. You can’t control the job market, but you can control what foods you buy at the market. By taking care of your physical and mental well being, you are better able to handle the ups and downs of 2003.
   
   
8. Take risks: Take calculated, well thought out risks. There is an expression, “Dance while the music is in town.” Don’t wait for the music to arrive. If you want to dance, make your own music. Edward Burke said, “The past should be a springboard not a hammock.” You can indulge in nostalgia about the past or you can build on all your talent, experience, and skills, and excitedly embrace the future.
   

These are challenging times. In reality, all times are challenging times. So, work this 8-step system (much faster than 12 steps), and you’ll keep yourself and those around you motivated.

Karen Susman is a Speaker, Trainer, Coach, and Author of 102 Top Dog Networking Secrets. Karen works with organizations that want to maximize performance. Programs include Humour at Work; Balance In Life; Networking Skills; Presentation Skills; and Building Community Involvement. Order new guidebooks on humour, networking, time management, and community involvement by calling 1-888-678-8818 or e-mail Karen@KarenSusman.com.. www.KarenSusman.com. P


ublished in Networking Today, June, 2003.

When in Doubt, Communicate!

By Mike Chatelain

You may remember being told as a child, "Keep quiet!" "Children should be seen, not heard," and "You talk too much." You were a "good" kid if you kept quiet. However, being quiet when you are little causes big problems later in life.

As an adult, you may have been punished for communicating. For example, if you admit you committed a crime and are sorry about it, no one cares. You still go to jail. If you honestly tell your spouse you are thinking about an affair, your marriage suffers if your spouse is not very understanding. If you tell someone you feel a little crazy, who knows what might happen. So you learn to keep your mouth shut.

However, businesses fail when managers do not talk to employees or employees do not talk to customers. Everyone mistakenly believes telepathy is working. "I thought you knew I was unhappy with your performance." "You should have known I was overworked."

Marriages are ruined by poor communication. Rather than openly discuss sex, money, body problems, or whatever, couples hint about their concerns or simply say nothing. But without support and understanding from your primary teammate, you do not go as far. In fact, a bad marriage can ruin everything in your life. Both parties in a successful marriage are able to give and receive communication from his or her spouse on any subject.

Life is miserable if you have no one to openly communicate with. Friendships are based on communication. The lack of friends or a spouse to communicate with often leads to mental problems.

So the first communication skill you need is to get out there and talk.

Unfortunately, on some topics, you’ve learned to watch what you say, to keep it under your hat, to zip it up.

"So that is the basic lesson that anybody learns in this universe. They learn to keep their mouth shut, and it’s the wrong lesson. When in doubt, talk. When in doubt, communicate."
— L. Ron Hubbard

Whenever you have doubts about something, COMMUNICATE! Talk, talk, talk until the problem resolves. When you feel stress, disagreement, or resistance between you and someone near you, the wrong thing to do is ignore the problem. Instead, start communicating.

When you know you should say something, say it! For example, an employee knows another employee is embezzling money and so says something to the employee and/or boss. A doctor knows he must talk to a patient about the patient’s rude behavior to the office staff. An employer knows she must discuss poor performance issues with some employees.

Take the bull by the horns. Move ahead in life. Spit it out.

If you’re worried about the consequences of saying something, you can ask first. Examples:

"Lisa, I want to say something about your driving to help keep you out of accidents, but I don’t want to upset you. Can I tell you what I think or should I keep my mouth shut?"

"Boss, should I tell you if I think you are giving me bad advice?”

"Mike, our marriage means so much to me I don’t want to say anything that would jeopardize it. But I have done something wrong and I’m sorry I did it. I think it would be good for our relationship if I told you. Don’t you think it’s best if we are 100% honest with each other?"

"Can you listen to something unfortunate I have to say and remain calm? Are you ready?"

In the long run, you are always better off by communicating. Take responsibility and talk. Staying silent solves nothing.

Mike Chatelain is the director of Tips for Success. Phone: (209) 755-2702. Email: director@tipsforsuccess.org www.TipsForSuccess.org Copyright © 2002 TipsForSuccess.org. All rights reserved. Grateful acknowledgment is made to L. Ron Hubbard Library for permission to reproduce selections from the copyrighted works of L. Ron Hubbard. Programmed in the United States.

Published in Networking Today, June 2003.

Defending Your Client Base in Perilous Times …Ten Steps to Take Today

By Andrew Sobel

I recently asked a friend how business was going, and he emailed me the following: "I think it’s gone from truly horrible to just plain bad." Yes, things could hardly be more uncertain around us, but it's possible to keep your head above water – if not thrive – by focusing renewed energy on building and sustaining your client relationships. Here are ten strategies that will help you to defend and nurture your client base in these perilous times:

1. Increase your face-time immediately with your top clients. Treat your longstanding clients as if they were brand new by reaching out to them in person and by phone with the same energy, enthusiasm, new ideas, and conviction that you had when you were wooing them at the start of the relationship. Ask thoughtful, provocative questions, and then listen deeply as they talk about their concerns and needs.
   
   
2. List the top ten to twenty contacts in your network and get in touch with every single one over the next thirty days. Don't ask for business, but rather offer up an idea, a suggestion, an article or book, an introduction, a business opportunity – anything that might help improve that person's business.
   
   
3. Redefine – in one sentence – what you do for clients, expressing it as the specific, top- or bottom-line benefit that clients derive from your service or product. Start using this description in all of your sales and marketing communications. (Example: "I help sales executives dramatically increase the success rate of their proposals." versus "I teach communications skills.")
   
   
4. Consider raising rather than cutting your price – especially if some or all of the following conditions apply: you are well-known for what you do; you have published on your area of expertise; you have one or more established competitors who are higher-priced than you; and you are able to articulate the specific value that clients receive from your services. In clients' minds, high fees are equated with high value. (Example: in the last two years, despite a wretched economy, sales of high-priced luxury products have grown.)
   
   
5. Pretend you are a competitor, and devise a strategy to steal away one of your best clients; e.g., your competitor might develop a value-added idea or proposal, an innovative contracting approach, a new bundle of services, etc. Now, implement that strategy yourself, with your own client.
   
   
6. Ask your best, most established clients for a referral – but only after you’ve helped them with something. Most professionals hesitate to ask their clients for other introductions. If you believe in what you do, you shouldn't hesitate to do this. And if your clients believe in the value of your work, they won't hesitate, either.
   
   
7. Trim your expenses – and reinvest the savings in strengthening current relationships and growing your sales and marketing. Many companies have cut back on their market presence. Now is the time for the strong to get stronger. Look at PC maker Dell, which has grown and increased its market share in a terrible environment. Many large professional service firms are thriving as well, by focusing on key client issues and flexibly delivering service offerings to areas of greatest need.
   
   
8. Reduce your client's uncertainty and risk. A dozen factors are conspiring to slow investment and postpone client purchases. Do your share to reduce this uncertainty by over-investing upfront to get to know new clients and their organizations; offering product-style guarantees for your work; showing flexibility in structuring projects and deals; offering twice as many references as usual; and creating programs with incremental stages and frequent checkpoints.
   
   
9. Help past clients who are in need. All of us know past or prospective clients who may be in-between jobs or otherwise down-and-out, but we gravitate toward the winners – the executives who are riding high. You build your long-term network, however, by being helpful to all your contacts and clients. Help a client in need by reviewing his résumé, or perhaps by making some introductions to prospective employers and headhunters. Check in every so often to see how he’s doing and to offer your personal help.
   
   
10. Sharpen – and shorten – your communications to clients. We are bombarded by hundreds of messages every day. Voice mail, email, and internal meetings have hijacked our time for reflection. Whatever document you're writing, or message you're crafting for a client, cut it by 50%. Then cut it again by 20%. Your clarity and directness will seem refreshing and different.
    

Andrew Sobel is the leading authority on client relationships and the skills and strategies required to earn enduring client and customer loyalty. He is coauthor of Clients for Life: How Great Professionals Development Breakthrough Relationships (Simon & Schuster). He can be reached at (505) 982-0211 or by e-mail at andrew@andrewsobel.com www.andrewsobel.com

Published in Networking Today, June 2003.

How to Brand an Illusion

By Barbara Bartlein

Nothing is more humbling than shopping for a bathing suit in Spring. I know. I just went through the annual ritual of tugging, pulling, inhaling, and swearing. Completely dejected and defeated, I complained to my sister-in-law, “There just aren’t suits and clothes designed for women my age. I’m looking for some summer attire somewhere between the low-cut ‘show the pierced naval’ and a baggy muumuu. Isn’t there anything for someone over 21 and younger than 80?”

She quickly guided me into a store called Chico’s. Established in 1983 on Sanibel Island in Florida, it currently has over 400 stores nationwide. A private label store, they design coordinated fashions with vibrant colours and unique accessories.

A sales clerk immediately introduced herself and insisted that she was available to help in any way. Calling me by name, she helped me pick out a stack of tops, jackets, and pants that were trendy, flattering, and interchangeable. But here was the best part: the sizes.

Chico does not label their clothes with traditional sizes of 8-10-12, etc. Nor do they feature the awful ‘plus” sizes that make it clear to the shopper that a stomach stapling is only months away. No, they size clothes with a 0-1-2-3. Imagine my surprise to find that I was a “1.” That’s right a “1.” I smiled with joy as I tried on the new outfits only to discover that for some cuts I was actually a “0” – smaller than I ever dreamed. I could hear the delighted customers in the other changing rooms discussing their small sizes. With my sister-in-law insisting, “you simply must put some meat on your bones,” I purchased over two hundred dollars of new clothes.

Now I am not completely delusional. I don’t think I was a size “1” even in first grade. But it made my day. Chico’s has branded an illusion and judging by what I saw, the customers love it. What kind of excitement is in your brand? Some things to remember:

1. Show me the money. Yes, everyone is tired of hearing about baby boomers. But they now have more wealth than any generation in history. While so many clothing stores were catering to teens and young adults, Chico’s has carved a niche for a clientele with enormous buying power. Are there any additional products or services that you could brand and market to the older adult?
   
   
2. Find a need. Take a look at your existing customer base. What problems are they complaining about? These are opportunities to expand your product lines and offer new goods and services. Even more importantly, your efforts will increase customer loyalty.
   
   
3. Love the illusion. People like to believe good things, even when they know they aren’t true. They want to believe that they will travel in the outback with their SUV’s, have more fun drinking Pepsi, and have fewer wrinkles with a new cosmetic cream. Smart companies sell more than just a product or brand. They sell an illusion that allows people to believe in their solution. How do your products and services solve problems for your customers?
   
   
4. Build a brand that’s unique. You’re not selling a Volvo – you’re selling safety. You’re not promoting financial services, you provide piece of mind. Use your brand in everything that you do and have it stand for something important to the customer. Remember; sell the sizzle, not the steak.
   

Sign up for Barbara's FREE email newsletter at www.barbbartlein.com.

Barbara Bartlein is the PeoplePro™. She helps businesses sell more goods and services by developing people. She can be reached at 888-747-9953, by email at: barb@barbbartlein.com or visit her Web site at www.ThePeoplePro.com.

Published in Networking Today, June 2003.