June 25th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
Updates to my blog are going to be a bit more sporadic over the next few weeks. Tomorrow I’m headed to Los Angeles to attend Ken Zahn’s live review course for the CFP® Certification Exam.
I’ll be there through Monday the 30th and then spend a short week managing the end of the second quarter quarterly reports. Hopefully the quarterly reports will go as smoothly as they did last quarter.
I imagine lots of my time will be spent studying leading up to the exam on July 18th and 19th. Until then, I imagine I’ll find time to post quick updates on Twitter.
See you on the other side.
Posted in Professional Development | 3 Comments »
June 20th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
Year after year more taxpayers potentially become subject to the separate tax system otherwise known as the Alternative Minimum Tax, or AMT.
It wasn’t until late in 2007 that Congress passed the Tax Increase Prevention Act of 2007 as a one-year patch to AMT. This bill caused many headaches in the IRS due to its late approval and effect on many IRS tax forms (blogged about here and here).
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June 19th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
Previously I wrote about creating a desktop shortcut icon to open an Outlook email window to avoid opening the entire Outlook program. My instructions included a switch option ( /c ipm.note ) to invoke the message window.
The /c switch is just one of many command line options when running Outlook. I found a nice concise list of the various command line switch options to perform specific tasks using Outlook.
While most are not nearly as useful as the new message window switch, I like having a reference to this kind of information just in case I need it in the future.
Click here for the list of Outlook command line switch options (opens in new window)
Posted in Efficiency, Software | No Comments »
June 17th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
In my previous post today I blogged about only accessing Outlook three times during my day to reduce distractions. Then I realized that even though I want to keep the program closed, I want to be able to send messages to clients and coworkers.
On a side note, let me say that I try to keep the messages I send to others concise and relevant for the recipients. Nevertheless, my role and responsibilities require that I send out confirmations and notifications on internal matters such as security transactions, fund receipts and disbursements, and the occasional status update.
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Posted in Efficiency, Software | 1 Comment »
June 17th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
Today begins a new personal experiment. As I posted on Twitter, I will attempt to only access my Outlook email just three times throughout the day today.
The impetus is an evolution of my reading over the last few weeks and the discovery of “email bankruptcy” on Tim Ferriss’ blog. If you have 7-10 minutes available, view the related video and read the New York Times article about the subject.
So I will update periodically on my Outlook habits and determine whether or not the decision to reduce its use increases my productivity through the day. You might want to give the experiment a try as well.
Posted in Professional Development | 1 Comment »
June 10th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
Part of what I have been working on over the last week is a presentation I’m going to deliver in July to a group of specialty physicians. Since I consider myself technologically savvy and a creative user of presentation software (ok, yes, I still use PowerPoint due to my history with it), I’ve looked for resources on how to design and deliver effective presentations.
Most of us are very familiar with the common characteristics that plague most one hour presentations. There’s a title slide, introduction, an outline overview, all followed by a gratuitous spray of bullet points, hard-to-read graphs, and concluded with yet more bullet points. Thank you, the end!
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June 4th, 2008 Bill Winterberg
Increased Internet bandwidth, webcams, and conference technology has definitely impacted an adviser’s ability to engage clients that may be located in another state, country, or even continent. Cisco has taken video conferencing technology even further with its introduction of On-Stage TelePresence.
I watched a seamless presentation of this technology here.
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June 3rd, 2008 Bill Winterberg
In the event that you have not been contacted by Schwab, 2008 IMPACT Award® nominations can be made through June 13.
Nominations for firms can be submitted by visiting the following link: http://www.impactawards.schwab.com/
IMPACT Awards are available for three categories: Best-in-Business, Best-in-Tech, and Pacesetter Award.
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