Evernote is a Cloud productivity tool and digital notebook that allows you to store various types of content, and access your content seamlessly from various devices—whether it be a smartphone, a PC, or a tablet. If you’ve ever wished you could quickly capture, store, or categorize all your conference business cards, or share your brainstorming notes with a team before meeting, Evernote may be the business solution for you.

In our new set of Evernote courses, Up and Running with Evernote for Mac and Up and Running with Evernote for Windows,  author David Rivers teaches you how to use the application’s productivity tools to become more productive yourself.

In this video from chapter X of the Up and Running with Evernote for Windows course, David introduces Evernote, and gives an overview of its functionality to help you get a feel for how you might see yourself using the digital notebook.

Evernote has a very extensive list of features, and applications. Here are a few stand-out functions:

1. You can sync your Evernote account across multiple devices, including your PC, Mac, tablet, and smartphone, and have complete access to all your stored data, notes, and other items from all places.
2. You can create notebooks to share collections of notes with certain teams. For example, your Marketing Ideas notebook can be a joint collaboration with the marketing team while your Recipes to Try notebook might just be one you share with your spouse so you’re both inspired when it’s time to plan meals.
3. Thanks to Evernote’s Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology, you can snap a picture that includes text, signage, or other lettering, and Evernote will recognize and store that data along with your picture, making it easy for you to search a keyword term and find the photo you’re looking for later.
4. Advanced tagging features let you associate data with each note and notebook, so you can easily create a personal library of well-tagged notes that can be searched by keyword.
5. Evernote’s Web Clipper, a new alternative to bookmarks in your browser, lets you save your favorite links easily for later perusal.

Evernote has made it easy for me to collect business course requests, jot and tag notes about inspiring business people, and keep running lists of multiple tasks. I also love being able to snap a quick photo of a white board with planning notes knowing I will be able to search for the image with keywords later on.

What do you use Evernote for? Please share with us in the comments section.

Tags: Evernote

If you’ve recently switched jobs, changed industries, or taken up creative endeavors on the side, you may be faced with the critical question: How do I go about switching from Windows to Mac?

In the most recent update to the Switching from Windows to Mac course, author David Rivers shows you how to switch from Windows to Mac OS X Lion, and he demonstrates smart ways to use files, folders, search, and applications in your new Mac interface. If you’re a Windows user ready to discover the Mac interface, efficient ways to get your work done, and new Mac shortcuts and tips that will save you time, David’s course is a good place to start.

In this tutorial from chapter one of the course, David discusses Mac terminology, and shows you how to understand, and refer to, the Mac equivalents of the Windows tools you may be used to using:

Here are a few of David’s favorite tips to help you switch from Windows to Mac:

1.  PC and Mac files have never been more compatible! If you currently use Microsoft Office on a PC, you can save your Office files to a DVD or a USB drive and work on those same files with Microsoft Office 2008 or 2011 for the Mac. No conversion necessary—the file formats are compatible. You’ll also find the same easy compatibility within other applications like FileMaker Pro, Quicken, QuickBooks, and many more.

2.  You may already be familiar with Windows Explorer as a tool for finding things on your computer. Once you switch, Mac’s Quick Look feature allows you to preview files you’re browsing before opening them. The Quick Look feature can be found by opening any file folder, and then clicking on the eye-shaped icon at the top of the window (see the image below for a visual). Clicking the Quick Look icon allows you to preview your files in a Quick Look pop-up, an instant slideshow, or full-screen. If you are a keyboard shortcut user, you can also highlight the item within your folder you want to preview, and press Command + Y on your keyboard to call up a Quick Look preview.

The Quick Look button can be found when you open any folder, or the Finder window.

Previewing an image with Quick Look.

If you found these highlights helpful, check out the full Switching from Windows to Mac course for more tips and tricks to help you make your transition as seamless as possible.

Interested in more?
• The full Switching from Windows to Mac (2012) course on lynda.com
• All business courses on lynda.com
• All courses from David Rivers on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• Mac OS X Lion Essential Training
• Small Office Networking to Connect, Share, and Print
• Word for Mac 2011 Essential Training
• Excel for Mac 2011 Essential Training

Tags: Mac, mac tutorials, switching to mac, Windows

Microsoft Excel is well-known as the industry-standard spreadsheet program, and it is really a veritable Swiss Army knife of an application. It can be used for anything from making a quick structured chart to a reasonably powerful database. The fact that it’s hard to pin down just how people want to use Excel—anything from managing finances to data presentation—is the precise reason our library is full of specialized Excel courses. So how do you find the courses that will suit your particular Excel needs best?

What if you’re not a math wiz and you just want to learn how to manage the deluge of data that’s coming your way? You could be trying to makes sense of painstaking measurements you’ve documented for your own personal goals, or you could be trying to wrangle a collection of raw numbers from your latest auto-generated sales report. Which of the lynda.com Excel courses are going to help you analyze those numbers so that you can communicate trends, build strategies, and create the justification for a call to action? In this learning path, I’ll take you through some key Excel courses designed specifically to help you manage your data so that it is accessible and useful to you in your life, your work, and your community.

1. Starting from square one: I just need to learn the core Excel features and where they live in my version of the program.
First things first, you need to know what Excel can do and how to access the tools that might help your project. Whether you’ve never used Excel before or you’ve only touched it when you absolutely had to, the best place to get started is with Excel portion of our Essential Training series. If you’re using the most current version of Excel, start with Excel 2010 Essential Training, or Excel for Mac 2011 Essential Training, depending on your platform. If you haven’t updated to the latest version of Excel, we also have Excel 2007 Essential Training and Excel 2003 Essential Training available. Regardless of which course you choose, you’ll find everything you need to know to get started efficiently creating your first spreadsheet.

2. Sorting basics: I know how to create a spreadsheet, but I haven’t ever explored the key sorting features.
If you’ve only performed the most basic of A>Z sorts, then our course on Managing and Analyzing Data in Excel will help you understand Excel’s quick and sophisticated options for sorting your numbers. For instance, you can teach Excel to recognize non-numerical information like months, days, or other human-centered data. Here’s a movie from the course on sorting based on the order of data in custom lists:

3. Investigating new perspectives: I know how to perform basic ranking and sorting functions, but I need to quickly see the data from different angles.
When you have data that needs to be quickly analyzed from different perspectives, by year, by company, or against some other variable, a pivot table helps you dynamically rearrange your table data to find the answer you need. Our Excel 2010 course on Pivot Tables In Depth shows you how this powerful feature works. Even if you’ve never created a pivot table before, this course will walk you through the process. Check out this movie to see how they work and why they are so powerful for data analysis:

4. Preparing data for efficient and accurate analysis: I know how to use the tools, but the raw data I’m getting is inconsistent and in multiple formats.
Sometimes you get handed automatically generated, or humanly created information that comes in formats that Excel doesn’t quite know how to read efficiently, if at all. To get some important tips and workarounds for making sure this data is consistent enough to sort, check out Cleaning up Your Excel Data. Here’s a great example on how to create Excel-readable dates from an inefficient mixture of raw date formats:

5. Ensuring valid results: I can perform all the key analysis functions, but my file is huge and I don’t have a way to check my results.
Our Excel: Data Validation in Depth course is designed to reveal the various ways you can command Excel to double-check your results for accuracy. In this course, you’ll see how to use features within the program to perform validation on your outcomes. Check out this introductory video from the course to see what Excel tricks you can learn from Dennis Taylor:

Of course, beyond these five jumping-off points, there’s still an incredible amount to be learned about Excel, and we have a wide variety of courses to help you take your next steps. In the library, you’ll find that courses also have alternate options that coincide with earlier versions of Excel, so there’s a little bit of something for everyone. Speaking from personal experience, even as a Mac user, I know that sections of these courses have come to my own number-crunching rescue many times.

What sorts of tasks do you want to do in Excel? How can we help clear a path for you to get to that knowledge?

Interested in more?
• See all the Microsoft Excel courses available on lynda.com.

Tags: business skills, excel

We just launched Insights from a Business Coach and are eager to hear how you like its interview format. In the course, veteran business coach and author Dave Crenshaw answers common questions about starting and growing a business, including the basics of entrepreneurship, ways to foster great customer relationships, social media marketing tips, pitching to investors, and planning ahead.

Which tips did you find most helpful? What kinds of questions would you ask a business coach? We look forward to your comments and feedback!

Tags: business skills, Dave Crenshaw

What would you do if you knew you’d be a success? Perhaps ask for a promotion? Brush up on your Photoshop skills? Start a business? Find balance between life and work?

In Achieving Your Goals, one of our March 2012 Business-segment releases, author Dave Crenshaw offers smart ways to envision and develop a quantifiable goal, turn your goal into actions, and share your commitment publicly to establish accountability. One tool Dave offers is a process called dividing to conquer, which focuses on tackling a big problem one small step at a time. Using the dividing to conquer technique, most projects can be broken down into two planning phases:

1. Set a vision for yourself and then determine how you’ll measure its success. For example, if my goal is to become an advanced Excel user, I may measure my success in minutes, knowing I’ve realized my vision when I’m able to cut report interpretation time from 20 to 10 minutes.

2. Break that measure of success into six-, three-, and one-month goals. For example, in six months, I’ll aim to be halfway there—having cut my Excel processing time from 20 to 15 minutes. Breaking it down further, at the one month mark, I’ll aim to have completed Excel 2010 Power Shortcuts, and in three months, I’ll aim to have completed several advanced Excel courses.

What are you going to achieve this year? Please let us know in the comments section.

Interested in more?
• The full Achieving Your Goals course on lynda.com
• All business courses on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• Insights from a Business Coach
• Time Management Fundamentals
• Creating an Effective Resume
• Invaluable: Unlocking Your Abilities

Tags: Dave Crenshaw

Evernote is one example of a popular cloud tool being used by businesses.

In 2012 lynda.com will be investing more time exploring the way both individuals and businesses are migrating to the cloud. Office 365, Gmail, Google Docs, Evernote, and Salesforce are only a few popular cloud tools finding permanent homes in businesses worldwide.

We’d love to know what matters to you as you consider integrating or migrating to cloud tools. What questions do you have about cloud computing? Which tools are you interested in? What do you and your business need to know?

Please leave us a comment to let us know what’s important to you and your business and which technologies hold the most promise for your daily workflow.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Interested in more?
• All business courses on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• Up and Running with Office 365
• Gmail Essential Training
• Google Docs Essential Training
• Gmail for Power Users

Tags: migrating to the cloud, the cloud

I’m particularly excited to help you take the next step in your journey to becoming invaluable to your industry in 2012. Once you’ve determined your passion, skills, and most valuable activities, the logical next step is to apply this knowledge to develop your business savvy.

Since the release of our first course, Invaluable: Unlocking Your Abilities, I’ve been inspired by the feedback we’ve received. It makes my day when I hear about ways that we’ve helped you succeed!

Our lynda.com courses are a massive team effort and we’re constantly refining the message in order to deliver what we believe is the best possible learning experience.

In order to make our courses the best they can be, and to serve you better as individuals, I’d like to hear from you. I’d appreciate anything you have to offer. To give you some ideas, here are some questions I’d love to get your thoughts on as you go about unlocking your abilities and developing your savvy:

1. What are the biggest challenges in your career right now?
2. What do you love about your current job? What do you hate about it?
3. What motivates you at work every day?
4. How entrepreneurial are you? Are you considering breaking out on your own?
5. What keeps you awake at night about your work?
6. What would you like to change about your professional future?

I’ll be monitoring this blog post and replying directly to your comments, so please, be as specific as you’re willing to be. I look forward to hearing from you!

Interested in more?
• The full Invaluable: Developing Your Business Savvy course
• All business courses on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• Time Management Fundamentals
• Creating an Effective Resume
• Project Management Fundamentals
• Invaluable: Unlocking Your Abilities

Tags: career management, Dave Crenshaw, Invaluable, professional development

Have you ever wished you knew the keys to excelling at your job, understanding your market, or connecting meaningfully with your customers? In our second course in the Invaluable series, Invaluable: Developing Your Business Savvy, Dave Crenshaw teaches you how to become a student of your company, your market, and your customers.

Business savvy is surely something we all intend to develop as we go about our daily jobs. But in the bustle of heavy workloads and demanding responsibilities, it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of the things that define long term excellence, customer connections, and a clear picture of the market.

For example, how would you answer the following questions?

1. What does my company want from me?
2. Where is my company headed, and how do I fit with its direction?
3. What’s happening in my field, and how does that affect me?
4. What’s my competition up to?
5. Who is my customer, and how can I serve that customer?

When I took some time to ponder these questions, I was pleasantly surprised by the volume of insights I gleaned in a short amount of time. Whether you’re beginning a new career or hoping to grow in your current role, you’ll find that Invaluable: Developing Your Business Savvy is full of practical tips to help you explore questions like these.

The quest to become an invaluable professional is one that’s full of self-discovery, tough questions, and big rewards. Please let us know how you’re enjoying your journey in the comments section.

Tags: business skills, Dave Crenshaw, Invaluable

If your year is shaping up to include a lot of business presentations, PowerPoint Tips and Tricks for Business Presentations offers practical insider advice that will help you build painless presentations that convey your message in a way that is clear, meaningful, and engaging.

Author David Diskin starts the course with five quick tips you can use to make your PowerPoint presentations more effective, and continues throughout to offer his insights on ways to compose powerful, cohesive messages that resonate throughout your presentation. David also discusses how to apply successful slide design practices, ways to incorporate gestures, and suggestions for managing question-and-answer sessions. He closes the course with  a look at presentation skills, delivery tactics, and bonus tips to make your presentations run even more smoothly.

One of David’s favorite PowerPoint presentation tips is to add white space to your slides in order to make text more easily distinguishable and memorable.

For a sneak peek at this course, check out Sharing data with charts from chapter three (Successful Slide Design).

With David’s help and the right tips and tricks to guide you, you may be surprised by how fun a business presentation can be.

Interested in more?
• The full PowerPoint Tips and Tricks for Business Presentations course
• All business courses on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• PowerPoint 2010 Essential Training
• PowerPoint 2010: Audio and Video in Depth
• Keynote ’09 Essential Training
• Duarte Design, Presentation Design Studio

Tags: PowerPoint, PowerPoint for business, PowerPoint quick tips

Time management may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you open your inbox, but our two new courses, Outlook 2010: Time Management with Calendars and Tasks and Outlook 2007: Time Management with Calendars and Tasks, suggest that email productivity is well within your grasp.

These courses are designed to help you create appointments and meetings with ease, use flagging and categories to corral all your inbox email, manage tasks and to-dos, and use Outlook Task List options.

Outlook 2007 users will appreciate author Gini Courter’s quick tip on how to create a task from an email (from chapter two of Outlook 2007: Time Management with Calendars and Tasks):

And if you’re using Outlook 2010, check out this handy method of viewing the task list and to-do list (from chapter three of Outlook 2010: Time Management with Calendars and Tasks) :

If your inbox gets a steady stream of email every day, you’ll also appreciate these courses’ solid tips for capturing work in Outlook. Another suggestion from Gini Courter is to sort the items that require your action by priority and the amount of time each will take. This sorting then determines whether you set up a task or a calendar appointment and how you take next steps. For more on this, lynda.com members should check out the Capturing work in Outlook movie in the introduction chapter of both Outlook 2010 and Outlook 2007 time management courses.

My new productivity motto: Enjoy your email, and make your calendar and tasks work for you in the new year!

Interested in more?
• The full Outlook 2007: Time Management with Calendars and Tasks
• The full Outlook 2010: Time Management with Calendars and Tasks
• All business courses on lynda.com
• All courses from Gini Courter on lynda.com

Suggested courses to watch next:
• Outlook 2010 Power Shortcuts
• Outlook 2010: Effective Email Management
• Outlook 2007: Effective Email Management
• Time Management Fundamentals
• LinkedIn Essential Training

Tags: email management, Outlook 2007, Outlook 2010, time management