Productivity: What the Heck is "The Cloud"?

More and more of our information is living in that remote digital destination “the cloud”. Your email, documents and website may reside in that magical destination free from the constraints of conventional data storage. So what exactly is “the cloud” and what is the benefit of storing our information there?

“The Cloud” is essentially storing and accessing our data over the internet instead of our physical hard drives. Rather than host our data locally, we essentially upload our info to a data server over the internet. The information is still saved on a physical drive (or in most cases multiple hard drives) to help protect it from the risk of damage a single server.

There are lots of benefits to cloud services for small and startup businesses. The biggest one is the scalability it offers to growing businesses. By partnering with a trusted cloud provider, it is easy to ramp up on the cloud as your business changes and grows. It allows entrepreneurs to outsource the technical aspects of their businesses and focus on activities that generate income. Finding the right cloud option(s) for your business can give you visibility to traffic sources, provide increased storage capacity, adjust to increased traffic flows, and much more.

About the author: The Business Girl is Terri Sullivan Biehn. I have been a professional business writer and management consultant for more than fifteen years. As a management consultant, I work with entrepreneurs to develop business plans and other documents. Through my consulting practice, I coach entrepreneurs and small business owners on their general start-up, marketing, financial, operational and management issues.

Productivity: The Battle of the Inbox

I started the year off with a simple goal. I wanted to have a clean inbox. I’m a bit Type-A (by a bit, I mean totally and completely). I like order. Things have places and they should be in them. All of the time.

This compulsive tendency has been a challenge living with teenage boys who live in a world of self imposed chaos. Clothes on the floor. Sports equipment discarded everywhere. Backpacks where important papers go to die. Throw in a crazy little dog and my world of order is thrown into complete disarray.

One of the few places where I used to be able to achieve simplicity and order was my inbox. Neat and orderly folders each titled with client names sat in a pristine row with emails sorted as they came in.

A few years ago, I got really busy. The kind of busy where I had to write down “eat lunch” and “take shower” on my daily to-do list just to make myself remember those routine daily tasks.. That is often the challenge of being a freelancer - your at-home life creeps into your work and your work infringes on your at-home life.

Somehow in the midst of that constant hustle, my inbox got completely out of control. Client emails mixed with a constant stream of informative newsletters and market research alerts. Emails from my family sat alongside the latest sale announcement from my favorite stores. Every day I would sit down and think, I really need to clean out my inbox. Week after week... month after month… year upon year…. until I could no longer tolerate it.

In January, I spent two full days going through email after email. Sorting. Deleting. Following up. It was liberating. I was able to finally achieve Inbox Zero. What is Inbox Zero? That special moment when your inbox is completely empty. - beautifully, wonderfully empty. The stress lifted. I felt free. It lasts about one minute. The moment it is empty you will start to hear the dreaded “bing” of a new message arriving to clutter up your world once again.

Truthfully, I have not been able keep it completely empty, but it’s no longer so full that I feel overwhelmed. Once a week I try to take the time to clean it up so I can find information that I need. Next up will be unsubscribing to stuff that I no longer find useful as it comes in to cut down the clutter. The ongoing battle allows me to focus on emails that I truly value and need rather than get bogged down in the endless stream of new messages. I doubt I will ever maintain a completely empty inbox, but I’ve found a system that works for me.

About the author:    The Business Girl is Terri Sullivan Biehn.  I have been a professional business writer and management consultant for more than fifteen years.  As a management consultant, I work with entrepreneurs to develop business plans and other documents.  Through my consulting practice, I coach entrepreneurs and small business owners on their general start-up, marketing, financial, operational and management issues.