Tips from the CPM ICYMI Newsletter
Every week subscribers receive the ICYMI enewsletter from the NCBA Center for Practice Management. The newsletter highlights tips, tools, trends and techniques to help your law practice. Following are a few popular quick tips from the past issues of the newsletter.
How to Help Others Pronounce Your Name Correctly on LinkedIn
If your name is frequently mispronounced, you can help people who visit your LinkedIn profile learn how to say it by adding an audio file. This is a useful feature for you and for people who would prefer not to butcher your name when you meet.
How to Use Microsoft Outlook’s New Search Box
Users of Outlook in Microsoft 365 may have noticed that the search box has moved to the top of the screen. It is a little harder to find and may cause some confusion. However, search has improved so not only can you run a search through your email, you can also get quick help and navigate to settings in Outlook with a simple search. For instance, instead of hunting around to find the settings to make a change to your signature block just type in “Signature” to be taken right to the settings.
Google My Business Has a New Attribute for Lawyers
Many law firms have a splash screen or note on their website to let clients know that the firm is operating remotely and meeting clients online. If you are now regularly meeting clients via video conferencing, you can make that known in your Google My Business profile.
How to Check for Inclusive Language in Microsoft Word
Turn on the inclusive language checker in Editor for Microsoft Word in MS 365 to help identify and correct language that indicates gender bias, age bias, and more. This article in How to Geek tells you how to get it enabled, since it is disabled by default.
How to Get Notifications for Only the Emails You Care About in Microsoft Outlook
Turning off new email notifications can free you from distractions and keep you from getting off track when you are doing deep work. However, there are some emails that you may want to be alerted about. This article shows you how to set alerts for specific emails based on sender or a domain, while notifications for all other emails are silenced.
What is Wi-Fi Calling and How Does it Work?
If you are using your personal smartphone for calls more often and find that your wifi is stronger than your cell phone signal you can switch to wifi calling on most carriers. No special apps needed, if your mobile phone is reasonably up to date you can just switch to wifi for calls. This article explains how.
Insert Images, Icons, and More in Microsoft 365
If you subscribe to Microsoft 365 (f/k/a Office 365) you now have a whole new crop of free images to put in documents, emails, and presentations – for free! Just go to the Insert tab and choose “Pictures” and click on “Stock Images” to see tons of images, cut-out people, icons and stickers to add interest to your documents and presentations.
Create Teams Quickly with Templates In Microsoft Teams
If your firm has embraced Microsoft Teams then you will be pleased that they have introduced templates. If you create a template for different kinds of matters you can quickly get up and running. Templates have to be built by the person with Teams administrator rights.
Recreate Your Noisy Office with “The Sound of Colleagues”
If you are working from home, you may have switched from office hubbub to noises that you have a harder time tuning out – like your neighbor’s TV or a strange clatter coming from your child’s room. Well, you can tune all of that out by putting in your earbuds and going to the Spotify channel “The Sounds of Colleagues” (if you don’t have Spotify, you can just go to the website). There you can turn up the sound of typing, the occasional phone ringing, and other offices sounds to enjoy a little soothing familiarity.
How to Directly Link to Text on a Web Page in Chrome
Have you ever wanted to send a web link to a client or colleague that takes them straight to a word or phrase in the text? Well, if you and your recipient use Google’s Chrome browser now you can. This feature rolled out early this year and involved you adding a bit of code to the end of a URL ( #:~:text=insertwordhere) . That is difficult to remember and use, so now there is a bookmarklet to help!
New Implicit-Bias Tool Offers Insight and Answers
Jeena Cho, writing for the ABA Journal, shares that she was surprised at her results when she took the Harvard Implicit Association Test, which measures unconscious bias. She suggests that certain types of mindfulness and meditation practices can impact implicit bias, including loving-kindness meditation
Function Keys: A List of What Those F1 – F12 Keys Do
Most keyboards have function keys, but what exactly do they do? This quick guide has tips for Windows and Mac users to make the most out of the Function keys. For Windows users, also check out these tips for the Windows key shortcuts.
Import a Word Outline into a PowerPoint
This video is short and easy to follow along. If you have written a document (using Styles) and want to quickly turn it into slides just view the Word document outline and import it into PowerPoint. No more copying and pasting!
Microsoft Word’s New Editor Pane Helps Bad Writers Write Good
If you are a Microsoft 365 user, you may have noticed a new button has appeared in the Home tab in MS Word called “Editor”. Editor goes beyond grammar and spell check to review your document for clarity, conciseness, formality, and punctuation conventions. If you want to see some artificial intelligence in the mix, check out Word Rewrite. And – Grammarly users pay attention – you can add Editor to your web browser.
An Ergonomist Shares 9 Work-from-Home Tips
If you had to leave your HermanMiller desk chair at the office and find yourself aching at the end of the day, this article has some tips for making your work from home experience more ergonomic and less painful.
31 Little-Known Settings on Your Phone and Laptop You Should Know About
Tips for Android, iOS, Mac, and Windows to make your devices work better, enhance security, increase productivity, and have a better computing experience. For instance, your macOS can announce the time in increments you choose, which might be helpful for tracking time and using the Pomodoro technique. In Windows you can turn on Focus Assist and reduce distractions from notifications. In iOS you can preset a text response to notify someone you are driving. In Android you can set up basic automations with rules. There are lots of great tips here.
How to Use, Modify, And Create Templates in Word
This excellent tutorial describes how to create templates in Word, as well as custom interactive templates and custom stylesheets.
How To Paste Text Without Formatting In Word For Office 365
While there are menu options (click click click) to paste text without formatting, this tip describes how to add a keyboard shortcut to paste as plain text into a Word document with Ctrl+Shift+V. This is especially useful when you have copied and pasted from another source and are adding it to a document. You can also set up a keyboard shortcut for pasting to match the document’s formatting if you are using a template with Styles.