While the reality is that most of our New Years Resolutions
have already gone out the window, many of us still have businesses to run and
jobs that we’d like to keep. Most of us have great hopes and dreams to
continually stay organized, but it is difficult to know where to start.
Luckily, I have some suggestions for you. SmartDraw is a great tool to reduce
the extra time and steps to stay organized, yet still achieve your goals of
organization and efficiency. Here are some of the ways SmartDraw can help:
Real Time Information
Capture
The secret to short, effective, and interactive meetings is
to capture the decisions and action items assigned during the meeting in a
common document that each person can see as changes are made. You can do this
by displaying a SmartDraw meeting template live to the entire group on a
projector or via a shared desktop using an online meeting platform such as
Webex or GoToMeeting. Typically, people attending meetings take their own
private notes. Sometimes minutes of the meeting are published by one of the
note takers, but not until later. This means any miscommunications or omissions
do not surface until after the meeting is over or perhaps not at all. SmartDraw
leads to truly interactive hands-on collaboration sessions. Even better, with
the format of the meetings template, project planners can easily turn the mind
map agenda into a project chart with just a click of a button. Learn more about
how to run meetings with SmartDraw in this article.
Instant
Accountability
SmartDraw’s meeting template allows you create instant
accountability with the Assignment View. This is a view with the people as the
topics and the tasks they are to perform as sub-topics. Doing this live so that
everyone in the meeting can see what tasks they are being assigned and see what
tasks others are being assigned results in clear communication and creates
accountability. Plus, when you update anything in the Assignment View,
including assignments, percentages complete, or even the renaming of tasks, the
Project Chart is dynamically updated. This saves you time and limits
inconsistencies in items discussed in meetings and results in projects.
Compelling
Presentations
How often do you walk away from a presentation without any
memory of what was presented? This is common because most presentations are
just a compilation of slides with boring bullet points. Visual presentations are
much more likely to leave a lasting, clear impression. SmartDraw allows you to
import your data from Excel (or other data sources) to create impactful charts
and graphs, plus reveal your visuals in a series of steps. Even the best visual
can be ineffective if displayed in the wrong way in your presentation. Showing
a visual to your audience all at once can be overwhelming, so it’s better to
reveal the visual by sequencing it.
When you have more compelling presentations, you are more
likely to make the impact that you are hoping to. Check
out some of the tips we’ve put together here.
Increased Process
Efficiency
Despite many benefits of business process documentation,
many organizations resist documenting their processes because of the pain that
traditional methods inflict. Many companies desire the benefits of documented
processes without the pain, which is why Visual Process Management (VPM) is the
best solution. VPM boasts all the gain and none of the pain. VPM boosts process
efficiency by helping companies identify who performs what tasks and how these
tasks can be improved. A VPM Collection is a complete digital model of an
organization’s structure and business processes. In a VPM Collection every
process is linked with the position responsible for executing and managing it.
Information is presented visually instead of text alone. Interested in learning
more and how to get started? Check out this article
with just a few simple steps.
Not sure how to get started with business process
documentation facilitation? Check
out this article with some tips from SmartDraw’s Training and Development
Manager.
Keeping it all
Together
How long do you typically spend finding that one document
that you never seem to be able to find, but always seem to need? SmartDraw’s
hub template is great for a quick and easy way to organize your documents,
links, and other SmartDraw files. Plus, it is also a great tool for your team
or even to help train new employees. Instead of giving your new employee a
thick binder full of information or a long laundry list of links, hubs allow
you to communicate a wealth of information organized into logical,
easily-digestible groupings.
Check out these simple
instructions for making your own hub and some quick tips.
Better Communication
= More Success
Everyone wants to be running and a part of a successful
company, which means they should focus on improving communication within the
organization. If everyone in the company has SmartDraw, the company strategic
goal of “improving communication” can be addressed at the same time and by
everyone.
If you have not tried out SmartDraw yet, be sure to download
a trial today.
