You routinely add websites to your Favorites folder for quick retrieval later, but did you know you can also add currently open Word files to the Favorites folder?

To do so, use the following simple steps.

1. Make sure the Web toolbar is displayed in Word.

2. If not, select View | Toolbars | Web from the menu bar.

3. Now, click the Favorites button on the Web toolbar followed by the Add to Favorites option from the displayed list.

4. Click on the Add button in the Add To Favorites dialog box.

Now you can add your frequently used documents to the Favorites folder so that you don’t have to try to remember where you’ve saved them. Also, you can open the document from inside Internet Explorer without having to start Microsoft Word first.

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Not all criticism is bad, but taking it is sometimes difficult. Use these tips to stay upbeat in the face of constructive criticism.

Nobody likes criticism, but learning how to accept constructive criticism will help you to succeed in your future career goals. If you find it difficult to maintain your self-esteem when criticism comes your way, use these three tips to help you cope:

1. Ask for specifics. Don’t be bogged down simply because you don’t have all the needed answers. If someone is criticizing you, ask for the facts before you jump to conclusions. “Continue to ask for details until you understand what the other person is saying,” states Annette Richmond in her article “How to make criticism constructive not destructive.” You can try to ask questions like, “What part of the report didn’t you like?” or, “What didn’t you like about the way I handled the account?”
2. Own your mistakes. If you have truly done something wrong, it’s best to own up to your mistakes so that you can begin to learn from them. Never take one mistake and dwell on it to the point where you feel like you’re making mistakes all the time. Chances are you’re not doing something wrong all the time, but it is just one slip up. No one is perfect, so don’t beat yourself up over it. Learning from your mistakes will help you avoid those situations and cut down on the criticism that you receive overall.
3. Recognize the positives. Likewise, try to focus on the positives for every negative criticism that you receive. Focus on the praises that you hear and not just the one criticism that you encountered. This will allow you to keep your self-esteem intact and enable you to handle future criticism. You should always be aware of when others criticize constructively or destructively by noting what they’re trying to get across to you and how. If they are criticizing you in an unprofessional manner, then chances are the criticism is not to your benefit and you should blow it off.

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Part of your job as a supervisor is to know what tasks you should do yourself and which ones you should delegate to your employees. It seems like a simple concept, but many supervisors struggle with letting go of any aspect of their job.

If you’re one who struggles with delegating tasks, ask yourself the following questions:

• Am I afraid that my employees will be able to do the job better than I can? This isn’t an uncommon thought. If you never share the knowledge, you’ll be the only one with the skill. While that may bring you a false sense of job security, think again. That train of thought really hinders your own growth as a supervisor.
• Am I worried that another employee can’t do the job as well as I can? This is another common thought many supervisors have. If you’re afraid that you will look like a failure if your employee messes up a task, think again. Mistakes can be remedied and you should give your employees the chance to rise to a challenge.

One way to break the do-it-yourself mentality is to prioritize your workload. Make a list of the tasks you feel are most important to your job and set those aside for yourself to tackle. Then, make another list of the tasks that need to get done but that are mostly busy work for you, and delegate those responsibilities to some of your employees.

Delegating some of your tasks to other employees will benefit both you and your employees in a variety of ways, including:

• It will free up some of your time to really focus on the important aspects of your job.
• It will show your employees that you trust them to handle some of your responsibilities (just make sure that you aren’t dumping all of your work on them).
• It will enable you to take some much-needed time off. While you are out, you will have peace of mind knowing that things can run smoothly when you’re not around, and that’s okay.

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Check boxes are a helpful form control when a user needs to make true/false (yes/no) decisions. However, you may not want them hanging around for a printout. If the user makes selections in an Excel invoice and you want to print the completed invoice, the check boxes just take up unnecessary space. They no longer serve a purpose. Fortunately, you can exclude form controls from your printouts. To prevent a check box from printing:

1. Right-click on the check box and choose Format Control from the resulting shortcut menu.
2. Click on the Properties tab and deselect the Print Object check box.
3. Click OK to apply the setting.

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One of the tricky things to do in a customer service department is plan a department function that everybody can attend. After all, who’s going to help the customers while all your service reps are at a picnic?

While it often goes unnoticed when other departments in your organization cut out of work for an afternoon function, customers will recognize when the service reps are gone and nobody is there to help them. But that doesn’t mean you can’t get your team out for an afternoon. Whether it’s a teambuilding retreat or spring picnic, if you follow these tips, you’ll be able to get everyone on your team involved in the fun:

• Stagger the shifts. One way to get everyone involved in a team activity is to stagger the workload. Keep a few of your reps available for helping customers, and rotate that shift each hour or half hour. This way, each employee will miss only a small portion of the activity. Keep in mind that this works best when your activity is taking place onsite.
• Enlist some help. Check around with other department heads to see if any of them or their employees might be able to staff the phones or the floor for a few hours while your team gets out for an activity. Equip them with light training a few days before the event, and provide them with a cheat sheet for anything urgent. If a situation arises that they can’t handle specifically, instruct them to take a detailed message and let the customer know somebody will get back to them within 24 hours.
• Plan ahead. Be sure to take care of any arrangements well in advance of the function. Be courteous of people who work in other departments who may be pitching in, and realize that they will have to juggle their workload to help. If necessary, post a sign the day of the event or change your voice mail to let customers know that there may be a longer wait time with fewer customer service reps on duty.

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