Genuine Curiosity

A deal on NitroPDF Professional through May 7 (or maybe a bit longer?)

For a long time now, NitroPDF Professional has been my top recommendation for creating, editing, annotating, and combining PDF files. I reviewed NitroPDF in full a couple of years back, and I like their latest version (v5) even more than when I started using it back in the day.

I just got an email offer from V-Com/Avanquest to get NitroPDF Professional at a special price of $49 (that's the price I originally paid, as mentioned in my review). The email invited me to pass it on to my friends, so I figured I'd share the link to the offer and the promo code (NITRO30) here -- just in case you're interested in picking up a copy of this excellent tool.

Don't sit on this too long -- according to the email, this offer is only valid for one week.

Note from May 10: I just tried the link to see if it was expired, and it looks like it still gets you the same discount - pretty cool, but I don't think it will last forever...

Here are some of the feature highlights from the email (and there are more details on their site):

• Easy PDF Creation: Create PDF files from more than 300 file types and use our one-click functionality to quickly convert commonly-used file types such as Microsoft® Word, Excel®, PowerPoint®, WordPerfect and more.
• Convert PDFs: Quickly convert PDF files for reuse in Microsoft Word, WordPerfect, OpenOffice and more. Extract all text and images in the one process
• Edit PDF Files. Use intuitive editing tools to directly insert or edit text and images in PDF files.
• Secure Your Work. The built-in security features give you exceptional control over the PDF files you create: encrypt files to prevent unauthorized access, restrict sensitive operations, and more.
• Intuitive Commenting and Review. Add feedback in familiar and intuitive ways with sticky notes, highlighters, underlines, and more. Comments and feedback are attached directly to the material being commented on, so nothing gets lost.
• Fill In and Create PDF Forms: With its form design tools, you can easily turn flat PDF documents into fillable, interactive PDF forms that contain text fields, buttons, checkboxes, JavaScript and more

Enjoy!

Tools for connecting in business

I've been a little quiet this week due to a hectic schedule, but wanted to let you know that I posted about LinkedIn and Plaxo on the Joyful Jubilant Learning blog yesterday. If you haven't already seen it, and are interested in tools that can help you with your business and (to some degree) social connections, check out the post.

I have a backlog of book reviews to be written - look for them to start showing up in the next few days, carrying through to next week.

A few for Friday (18-April-08)

Here are a few of the good links and fun items I've run across this past week.

The "Now Defunct Museum"

The Now Defunct Museum is a Squidoo lens dedicated to remembering some of the things that once seemed everywhere, but now have vanished from our everyday lives. Very entertaining - I like the picture of the old-school NBA uniforms (at right), for example.

How to Create a 15 minute Presentation in 1 Hour or Less

Cliff Atkinson, author of Beyond Bullet Points, has posted an excellent walk-through post showing how to create a 15 minute presentation very efficiently.

i-Lighter now has a Mac version

A few weeks back, I wrote about i-Lighter as a wonder tool. Good news - they now have a Mac version available! Check it out at the i-Lighter home page and download a free copy.

Can you hear me now?

I was thumbing through the SkyMall catalog on a flight home this week, and saw something I just had to tear out and post here. It's a hearing aid disguised as a Bluetooth headset - I love the way they spin the value in the ad (click the thumbnail at left to read it yourself).

I just wonder what people will think when you have this in one ear and are holding your phone up to the other ear when someone calls you?

If you want one, head over to SkyMall.

The business of time auditing

I was in an intersting discussion the other day about time auditing since I've written a good bit about this topic (see "Related items" at the end of this post). The gist of the discussion was, "Time auditing seems like a lot of work and I end up thinking a lot about minutiae - why should I do it?" I can see why folks might feel that way. After all, time audits require an investment from you - of time, attention, and effort.

I'm a certified IT auditor, and I tried to explain the value using analogies from business audits.I'm not sure I entirely succeeded, but wanted to share some of my thinking here to get your thoughts on the concepts. They're very rough, but may be useful.

Don't audit everything equally

• In a business audit, not every control or process is equally important. You tend to start with a top-down, risk based audit to identify your most important processes and most significant risks. You then spend your audit efforts on things that have the most risk / potential to screw up the important results.
• In time audits, not all your activities are equally important. Try to think about the important activities (those most closely tied to your success), or your most risky activities (those activities most likely to chew up too much time on the clock, those most likely to sabotage your results, etc). Then, you can audit / scrutinize those areas most since they'll be where you get ROI from the time spent on your audits.

Keep records of the evidence you've gathered

• In business audits, you keep "work papers" to record what you've observed, what people have told you, what metrics are in place, what controls are in place, reports to substantiate control effectiveness, etc. These are crucial so your findings are fact-based, specific, and accurate.
• In time audits, you should keep "evidence" of what you've done and try to make the details accurate enough so your findings are based on data and not your fuzzy memory. This is also where some of the best a-ha's come from, like "Oh - if I leave at 6:55 instead of 7:15 in the morning, that cuts 40 minutes off my morning commute..."

Write up your findings

• In business audits, audit reports are your means of communicating what you've seen, what's effective, and where the organization is deficient in its controls or practices. This forms the backbone of how you communicate the issues to others and formulate an action plan. You can also review the findings from previous audits to find out if any of the old problems have improved or worsened.
• In time audits, you need not be so formal, but I have found it helpful to write up a "report" at the end of your time audit with key themes, problems, and good things you've learned from analyzing your evidence. You can keep these as a record of your progres for comparison in future time audits.

Create a follow-up plan

• In a business audit, you work with management to come up with a plan to address deficiencies, and track to that plan. This process ensures that management takes responsibility for the controls and their effectiveness and helps set explanations for the timely resolution of significant issues.
• In a time audit, you can do something similar by identifying your most significant issues and creating a written plan (with targets) to improve them. This gives you something you can track against to help drive improvements. Part of the plan should be to review your progress against the plan at some point in the future.

These are just a few ideas to help apply some of the principles of business auditing to your time audits. What do you think? Does this thinking hold up for you? Why or why not? And what other principles do you propose for more effective time audits?

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Related items

• Go audit yourself (8/4/2007)
• Keeping a running tab of what you've done (5/6/2007)
• Audit time! (2/28/2006)
• Fresh Gear: Where does all the time go? (7/29/2006)
• Dusting off a classic procrastinator's toolkit (4/4/2005)

A few new resources to share

Here are a few items I've found or found out about recently that I thought would be interesting to you:

New "Feedables" feed on Efficiency

Feedables is an RSS aggregation service I really like. I have been following their "Gadgets Feed" for a while, and really like it. I just found out they have added an Efficiency feeds page. Good stuff - check it out.

5x5: Five Things for Five Minutes

An oldie but a goodie, rediscovered. Tim Milburn's "5x5 Worksheets" are an awesome approach to getting more done in 5 minutes than most people do all day. I'm glad Tim's teaching people - he's got the knack.

Wrike is better than before

I have written about Wrike as a GTD application before. It's good for group collaboration and project management. They've recently added time tracking for tasks, among a number of other useful features. The time tracking is great for time auditing. Wrike is also a good, low cost alternative to products like Groove.

Got attention?

I love it when things connect. Recently, a couple of connections materialized from a couple of good friends.

First: Ariane Benefit sent me an inspiring post on how she overcame the challenges of Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and learned to thrive.

Second: My office-mate Gene shared a book review at Joyful Jubilant Learning (the book was The Head Trip) and began talking about how he was going to delve into neurofeedback as a way to become more focused and productive, and compensate for ADD-like tendencies.

Maybe the first step is to wonder whether you have a problem?

As someone who is peternaturally curious, I've often wondered if my tendency to flit from one interesting topic or another was normal or not. I still have a tough time drawing the line between "classic ADD" and "easily bored."

Ariane's story is very interesting. She shared her thoughts and doubts prior to being diagnosed with ADD in a very coherent, rational way - and I think her philosophy applies to just about anyone struggling to overcome a personal challenge.

So, what does ADD look like? General characteristics¹ include: (a) difficulty staying focused, easily distracted, not completing tasks (except in some cases "hyperfocusing" on something like a project due tomorrow or fast-moving video game); (b) restlessness/impulsivity/impatience, e.g., can't sit still, blurting/interrupting; (c) problems organizing, planning, prioritizing (often late and hurried); (d) starting projects and not finishing them.

These traits can impact your relationships, self-esteem, and career -- but they are not insurmountable.

Taking responsibility for your own well being

Ariane has taken the bull by the horns and is actively capitalizing on her strengths, rather than falling into the "glass half empty" trap and limiting her aspirations. She shares a bunch of cool stories that provide a glimpse into how she's playing to her strengths.

Gene identified with some of the symptoms he read about in The Head Trip and is exploring neurofeedback, one of the techniques described in the book, to maximize his focus and overcome distractions.

The cool thing I learned from Arian and Gene is that they both used their natural intellectual curiosity to fuel their actions, and weren't satisfied with the status quo. I also learned a lot about ADD, how chronic disorganization may be an indicator of ADD, and how you can cope (and thrive) with ADD.

Still wondering?

Not sure if you have ADD or not? Check out this great article shared by Ariane, "What's it like to have ADD?" to find out more.

Got ADD? Don't worry - you're not alone. Fantastic people like Ariane and Gene have helped me understand some of the differences in how people with ADD engage with the world, and have pointed me to resources to help people with ADD capitalize on their gifts.

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Related items

• Series of awesome posts on dealing with ADD

¹ "How Do I Know if I Have ADD? Is There a Self-Test?"

How about a Trackberry?

A while back I wrote about SameCell as a way to find out when you're near your friends, and SameCell's addition of a FaceBook app. The folks at SameCell have been steadily improving their service (I use it all the time and I like it) and have recently added a new twist. You see, they rely on cell tower locations to determine when you are close to other users. This can be a challenge when you're on different carriers or if you're bouncing off a cell tower that SameCell hasn't mapped yet.

To solve this problem, they've created a small mapping application for use on phones with GPS's (like my Blackberry 8310). The app "watches" the cells you connect to and correlates it with your GPS data to help SameCell build its database of cell towers and locations.

Money - for good or for yourself

What's in it for you? You could make a little money for yourself or your designated charity. SameCell tracks the new cells you've discovered and pays you a few cents for each unique one you've found.

The money may not be enough to change your life, but you'll certainly be helping improve their service (and, as an avid user, you'll improve my experience with that service). So, if you have a GPS in your phone, just click here in your mobile phone's browser to head over to SameCell (or navigate to http://www.samecell.com/cells), and start helping them map the wireless world.

Eliminate procrastination - the high tech way

The folks at Fruitful Time have launched an interesting product called Fruitful Time TaskManager Electro, and it promises to eliminate procrastination. Yes, you heard me - it eliminates procrastination.

The product functionality is very intriguing - as Fruitful Time declares, "Trying to use programs which hinder your productivity is automatically detected and blocked through an innovative way... " And the results are no less impressive - they cite an independent research study which determined that use of this product "...increased productivity ranging from 50% to 75%." Wow.

Apparently, their advanced algorithms can detect when you are doing things that are in conflict with your next actions on your task list, such as "Loading up a game or randomly browsing instead of finishing off a paper due in two days time..."

The method seems a little unorthodox (and sounds a little dangerous) but according to the FAQ's it is completely safe.

The product is available now as a free download.