Monthly Archive for February, 2016

Article: How Music can Boost Productivity

How many of us put a music on whilst we are working? I certainly do when I work in a kitchen, whether I do dishes or cook a feast for my friends and family. Music puts me in a better mood and as a result makes me so productive.

 

However, a cognitive neuroscientist Daniel Levitin has a different opinion, which is described in his book ‘This is Your Brain on Music’. He believes that listening to music whilst working making us less productive since it negatively affects our memory and attentional capacity. However, for repetitive or monotonous tasks it has a positive effect since music helps to get rid of boredom. Looks like he is right with my kitchen work there.

Love Music

 

 

Levitin explains that listening to music makes us less productive while working because we have fewer resources left for the task we are working on.

 

So what shall we do?

 

Levitin suggests listening to music for 10 to 15 minutes before we start working, like for studying or writing, and then work in a quiet environment with regular breaks. However for boring tasks, we should put the music on whilst we are working.

 

What is your experience with music whilst you are working? Leave us a comment and why not also let us know what type of music you listen when you work.

 

Remember follow us on Facebook and Twitterand check out our Blog for more great articles.

Visual Basic Tip: Recycling Code

If you are new to Visual Basic, and want to start writing Macros for various MS application (most popular are Word and Excel), there are several ways in which you can utilize VB code without the need to spend time writing it from scratch. As with anything code and software related, while following our tips remember to test, test and test again to eliminate any problems, errors and to ensure quality and code is not causing any further problems or clashes when applied.

 

This is the No.1 tip I give whenever I conduct one of our Visual Basic Courses for Excel. Use code that has been written before and adapt it to your own uses. Google is great for such things, but you may spend a bit of time looking for the right code or website.

 

I always suggest checking out the Microsoft Developers Network (MSDN.com) for ideas on code when conducting of one our VBA courses (MSDN). You can always use their forums or Facebook and Twitter pages for a few hints and tips and exchanging code. You can also use the MSDN’s extensive knowledge base, documentation and help pages on a variety of VB related stuff as well as further your own knowledge. A brilliant tool for developers and programmers at any stage of experience.

 

recycle

 

 

We hope you found this tip helpful. If you want more information, check out our VBA Courses or our other Visual Basic Application Hints and Tips.

 

Was this tip helpful? Let us know, we would love to hear. Find us on Facebook and Twitter

Office 365 Tip: Creating Sites

Office 365 Sites are a good way of creating social pages for your business and creating spaces where various departments can share, interact and store information that only they can access. So here is how to create one.

 

 

To create a Site, Log on to your Office 365 account and if you are an administrator, find the Admin Tab.

 

Picture1
Under Admin, Click on SharePoint and under site collection a new Ribbon will appear.

 

 

Picture1

 

 

Click on New then Private Site Collection as per picture below and a pop up Site Wizard window will appear, fill out all the spaces. You will need to give your site a unique name. I would consider naming by Department or Function of the site to make it easy to find.

 

 

 

Picture1Picture1

 

Picture1

 

 

Add a person as a Administrator to help control what happens on the site and allow for a person to be responsible for adding documents, other employees….etc to the site.

 

Picture1
Once you have created your Site, it will look something similar to this:

 

Picture1

 

 

Sites can be very useful especially if certain individuals are constantly moving or traveling, or want to access certain documents and contact other individuals without the need to access files remotely. Like much of Office 365, Sites can also be accessed via a tablet, smart phone or ay hand held device with Internet connectivity.

 

 

Found this tip helpful? then let us know via our Facebook and Twitter pages.

 

 

 

Article: To Succeed With Great First Impressions

Competence and Trust are the key factors that people look for when they first meet you. According to Harvard Psychologist Amy Cuddy, people ask two questions when they meet you, they are:

 

  • Can I trust this person?
  • Can I respect this person?

 

Unfortunately, most of the time in the business world, we focus our energies on Competence. In her Book “Presence”, Cuddy says that most of us want to be seen as able to do the job at hand. After all, to move up in a business environment, you have to prove that you are smart and talented enough to do the job.

 

friends-1027867_960_720

 

However, according to Cuddy, trust or warmth should the most important factors we focus on. We base a lot of our decisions on whether or not we can trust someone enough for them to the job at hand, and this is no different in the business sector.

 

 

Although competence is important, focusing too much on showing how strong you are can lead people to mistrusting you. “If someone you’re trying to influence doesn’t trust you, you’re not going to get very far; in fact, you might even elicit suspicion because you come across as manipulative,” Cuddy says. “A warm, trustworthy person who is also strong elicits admiration, but only after you’ve established trust does your strength become a gift rather than a threat.”

 

 

There are ways to establish Credibility at business meetings and presentations. In our Effective Presentation Course, we focus on persuasive techniques and how to establish credibility. Positive attitude and effectiveness are just two easy ways to establish trust, warmth and credibility. However, explaining your background and emphasizing similarities between yourself and the client you are meeting or even at a job interview could help establish a connection with the person or people you are meeting.

 

 

We hope this article was insightful and can help benefit your business. For any other business related information that could boost your business , check out the business courses we offer.

 

 

Don’t forget to follow and like us on Facebook and Twitter

News: Valentine’s Day Offer

Valentine’s Day is nearly upon us, and here at Infero, we are feeling the love. We got a heart felt offer that no one can refuse. We want everyone to enjoy Valentines Day so why not treat yourself or your colleagues and receive a free gift!

 

chocolates-491165_960_720

 

 

Throughout the whole of February we are offering a free box of specialized chocolates when you book on any of our courses. Just call us to book a course and quote ‘Valentine’s day’ to receive a box of special chocolates. What is a better way to learn than in a love-filled environment? So don’t miss out on a fantastic offer and book today.

 

Don’t forget to let us know what you think about our offer, and get social on our Facebook and Twitter pages

Microsoft Access Tip: Creating Relationships

A great tool in Access is Relationship; which is used to combine information between two or more tables. You need more than one table to do this. So the first step would be to create two or more tables relative to your database.

 

To start, you need to Select the Database Tools tab in the Ribbon, in the Relationships command group and click Relationships.

 

 

 

 

If you haven’t yet defined any relationships between your tables, the Show Table dialog box will appear automatically. To find Show Table dialog box however, all you have to do is click on the Design contextual tab, in the Relationships group click Show Table.

 

 

 

Once the Show Table dialog box appears, it will display all of the tables and queries in the database. To see only tables, click Tables tab.

 

 

 

Select one or more tables, and then click Add. For this example, we are looking at creating a relationship between Customers and Employees tables. Click Close when you are done.

 

 

 

 

Drag a field (typically the primary key) from one table to the common field (the foreign key) in the other table. You can drag multiple fields by pressing the Ctrl key on your keyboard and click each field you want, and then drag them. You can do this between Multiple Tables to any field required.

 

Dragging from one field to the other is the easiest way of creating instant relationships.

 

 

 

The Edit Relationships dialog box appears.

 

 

Verify that the field names shown are the common fields for the relationship. If you want to edit it or if a field name is incorrect or you have changed your mind, simply click on the field name and select the appropriate field from the list.

 

To enforce referential integrity for this relationship, select the Enforce Referential Integrity box. Note that Relationship Type appears at the bottom. Click Create New button to create more relationship and add the details in the Create New dialog box

 

 

And if can set the Join Type by click the relevant button:

 

 

 

When you are finished in the Relationships window, click Save to save your relationship layout changes.

 

We hope that you found this tip insightful and helpful, if you would like any more access tip’scheck out our others.

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter