Safety Consulting Corner

If you are looking for a free, unobtrusive stat counter for any website or blog, I highly recommend StatCounter. You can very easily add a visible counter, such as the one shown in this post, or add the script so that the counter is invisible. Once that part is finished, all you need to do is visit the StatCounter website to see how many hits your website has received. You can check out StatCounter at www.StatCounter.com.

What's the Best Way to Eat an Elephant?

What's the best way to eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

You have probably heard this popular expression which refers to how you should approach taking on a very large task. If you know you need to read through that pile of business books on your desk but just can't find the time, then a website called DailyLit can help. If you visit DailyLit you can sign up to receive books sent to you in smaller sections via email so instead of sitting and staring at a whole book that you want to get through, you can receive the emails (on the days and times that you want) and then only worry about getting through a small section of a book at a time. There are all types of books on this site - not just business - and many are free. I am going to try this out by getting "The Art of Getting Money" by P.T. Barnum sent to me in 26 installments. I'll let you know how it works out.

Mr. Fixit

When you work for yourself, you are often the chief accountant, salesperson, engineer, housekeeeper and repair person. If you find yourself spending way to much time trying to figure out how to get the things in your office how to work right, the FixYa site can help. Fixya provides support, manuals and troubleshooting for consumers. If you have a problem, you can most like find the manual at FixYa and better yet, a helpful answer from someone else.

Cleaning House

In anticipation of a major move I will most likely be making in the beginning of the year, I have been spending a lot of time cleaning house. I am donating boxes and boxes of books to my local library and scanning (or having scanned) hundreds of documents.  The purpose of this post is not to tell you about my move but to 1) offer someone a copy of a 2-CD set titled "Growing and Managing a Business"  and 2) to tell you about a service called Pixily. 

First things first - if you want the CDs, let me know asap (first come first served). 

Pixily, mentioned above, is a new service I am trying out to help me run a less paper intensive business. You can try Pixily free for 30 days. After that, the options range from $5 - $60/month. To me, Pixily really serves two functions. One, as a virtual storage area for important documents and two, as a company that will scan your documents, return the originals, and provide the digital (and highly searchable) pdfs online. Since there are many virtual storage sites (many free, such as Google docs), I am mainly interested in the scanning service. I could buy a scanner and scan things myself but this would take more time than I have right now. The part of Pixily I like best is the option to submit documents and send them to Pixily in postage paid envelopes. I have been slowly filling up envelopes and I am getting ready for my first "send." In about a week, I should be able to tell you more about how I like it (and if it's worth the money!) For now, much more sorting, packing and donating to do. 

Easy Slides Online

Do you have a need to create and present PowerPoint type presentations online? Here's another easy and free website that will let you do just that - 280Slides. 280Slides lets you crate and share presentations online. You can access them from anywhere. You can put your slides on the web using Slideshare if you want to share your presentation with the world. What I find very cool about 280Slides is the ability to search for and add photos and videos from sites like Flickr and YouTube right from the 280Slides site. Give it a try and get creating!

Wahoo Wufoo

If you have any need to use forms or short surveys, Wufoo may be for you. For limited use, Wufoo is free but for more forms and users, you will need to upgrade. The beauty of Wufoo is that it is so easy to use. You simply drag and drop the fields you want into a blank area and ta-da - your form is finished. Check out the one I did below (in about 1 minute).

http://safetyfundamentals.wufoo.com/forms/untitled-form/

Twiddla

If you have ever sat in on or conducted a webinar and were able to use an on screen whiteboard for others on the call to see, you will be impressed with a new program called Twiddla. Twiddla is free (always good) and lets you invite others to "whiteboard" with you. For consultants, free is nice but Twiddla is something you would want to check out even if you had to pay for it. For example, you could bring up a photo of a work area and invite others such as your clients to mark it up with you. For example, where there are hazards are other concerns could easily be highlighted. You could use the whiteboard to lead a brainstorming session where everyone could easily participate. I have just started playing around with Twiddla myself but it looks like it will be very useful. Check it out at www.twiddla.com

Web 2.0

If you have been reading this blog for awhile you know that I often write about Web 2.0 applications, mostly because I think they are pretty cool but also because many of them can be a great help to safety consultants. An article I wrote recently on Web 2.0 is now online. If you would like to read it, click here

I hope you enjoy it!

Head in the Sand?

Sure you have been hearing a lot about Facebook, myspace, linkedin, ZoomInfo and many others and you have probably gotten at least one invitation to either join or verify your informatiion on these sites. While it is very easy to stick your head in the sand and ignore these websites, you would be smart to at least establish a basic presence online. What is your online life? Do you have one? One reason you want to get out there sooner rather than later is because it is highly unlikely that you are the only person in this world with your exact name. If you get out there and add youreslf to these sites, including at least a basic current profile, it will be more difficult for others to confuse you with a similarly named person. If you have the same name of someone who has received a lot of bad press, and someone searches on that name, how are they going to know that you are the professional and not that axe-murderer? By adding yourself to the sites and keeping your profile current, you are helping to make sure that the real listing for the real you comes up in the search results.

A few places to stake your claim include:
www.LinkedIn.com
www.spoke.com
www.claimid.com
www.zoominfo.com
www.myspace.com
www.facebook.com
www.multiply.com

Just a suggestion - but you might want to type up the basic profile info in Word and then cut and paste it into the different websites. It will save you some finger strain! Go ahead - Get Out There!

Get It Done!

If you are constantly floating in a sea of post-it notes reminding you of all of the things you have to get done, you might want to consider an online program for keeping those lists organized. Many of these let you email a new task directly to your online list so you don't have to worry about scribbling on that little post-it note again and taking it back to your coputer to enter to the online list. There are a variety of options out there - some free and some not - but most of them do the same basic thing with a few bells and whistles here and there. Check out the following options: (add it to your to-do list:)

Ta-da List
Todoist
Nozbe
voo2do
Vitalist
Remember the Milk
Toodledo
Listigator

If you prefer a non-technical aid to help you get your projects done, I would recommend a book that came out a few years ago called "Eat That Frog" by Brian Tracy. The main message that I got from that book is that you should do the worse part of a project or the thing on your to-do list that you are dreading - first. One of the best books I ever read on productivity was written for creative types (artists, writers, etc.) but it truly is a great "kick-in the-butt" type of book. It is called "The War of Art" by Steven Pressfield. Even though this book is written for artists, I highly recommend it for all consultants. It is quick read and should definitely be on your to-do list, whatever list you decide to use.