AI and automation are getting all the glory right now. They are amazing for productivity; there’s no doubt about that.

But our apps' batch (bulk), filter, and sort features rarely get their moment in the sun. Individually or a combination of them is one of the things I look for when choosing new technology.

I made a playlist for hiking; it has music from Peanuts, The Cranberries, and Eminem.

I call it my Trail Mix.

My husband, Jeff Parks, crafts the most awesome playlists. We have a fun little cabin filled with family, friends, and music. Lots of music. Our 1,200 sqft home has 17 connected Sonos devices, and almost always, one of Jeff’s playlists is running. People love his playlists and are constantly asking him to share them, which is easy to do from one Spotify account to another.

Unless you don’t have a consistent naming pattern - naming convention - for your lists.

According to the fortune-cookie logic most people live by, the best things in life are free. That's crap. I have a gold-plated robot that scratches the exact part of my back where my hands can't reach, and it certainly wasn't free.

- Josh Lieb

I was invited to be on The Appy Hour earlier this week.

It was so fun to be hanging out with two of my dear APIAs*, Heather Satterly and Liz Scott. They are super bright, forward thinking, collaborating women. I love being in their presence!

The topic was discussing my app stack: how I choose it and what it does for me.

I had an Doc outline of what we were going to discuss, and I copied my thoughts into the chat as we were going through the webbie. Then this morning I realized it would be of value to share that outline here on my blog.

It’s point form, it’s somewhat messy, it’s incomplete in the scope of choosing your tech stack - but “done is better than perfect”!

don’t know about you, but I find adding a link to text in docs, sheets, emails, slide decks… tedious.

Soooo tedious…

And I do it often. So I looked up the keyboard shortcut - who doesn’t love shortcuts? Now I’m sharing it with you

I still need to do a RightTool deep dive, but I already love the few features I use.

And I want to share with all of you, in two parts, my RightTool journey.

I have barely scratched what this magical Chrome browser extension can do.

I have not taken the time to do a deep dive review on RightTool yet, as I’ve had a lot going on since it came out. I had to move playing with it quite far down on my to-do list.

My accounting friends and colleagues were raving about it, though, and I heard it solved a few QBO issues. I decided I could install the RightTool extension and implement only the issue solvers from which I knew I could benefit. I could put off the heavy lift to explore all the features.

If you are disorganized in the physical world, you will be disorganized in the cloud one.

Sure, you can search for many things in many ways in the cloud. But even the most robust of search options get dodgy if you don’t have systems in place to organize your digital world.

Operating digitally is as inefficient as operating physically if there isn’t an organized system for it.

It’s a frustrating, time-sucking dog’s breakfast either way.

Especially in the workplace.

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

- Arthur C Clark 1962 - Hazards of Prophecy: The Failure of Imagination

And magic is undeniably fun.

I don’t do payroll.

Well, actually the true story is I didn’t do payroll. I do now.

My clients have either been big enough to look after it start-to-finish or they used a service. But I now have 2 clients whose payroll I manage and I’ve learned a few things along this journey.

The most enlightening being you can never be too clear.

I am doing the T4 (you Americans would call this the W-2) reconciliations for my clients right now. This involves sharing a copy with each of their team members and having them double-check them for names, Social Insurance Numbers (Social Security Numbers), addresses, anticipated earnings and the like.

I am astounded at the changes that I am needing to make to these!

Unsubscribing.

So make your one thing for this week relentless unsubscribing!

Except for this newsletter of course!

Using tech to create 5 Star Client Experiences

We have had many renovations done over the years. Some went better than others.

The one thing that was consistent with the great experiences were great processes that were clearly communicated.

We have another one coming up in January and we are using a contractor that we used previously. We loved our experience with them and are happy to be having them do the work again.

Our coffee maker is shot

I was tempted to get a wifi coffee maker. Of course, that would add more smart tech to my home - which usually I am all about.

But I had a stern conversation with myself (and conducted a consult with my dogs of course) to decide what I really needed in a machine that brews my morning magic.

And it wasn’t a smart coffee maker.

Even though I love new tech at home and in my business there is a limit to what will actually suit how I live and work.

I don’t profess to be a life coach - I can barely manage my own life.

But I am one of the calmest, truly happiest, least overwhelmed people I know. That’s why I’m pecking out a few thoughts on creating healthy habits and calm in your day. Not because I’m an expert, but because I want everyone to have the rewarding days I do.

Before I launch into my favourite systems and automation that have changed the way I work and live I need to preface with three key things you must do before you create any automation.

And I want to emphasize that systems, routines and processes are as powerful as automation.

Not everything needs to be automated - in fact automation can wreak havoc if not thought through properly.

It doesn’t take much to move your day from the monotony of mundane tasks and manual systems to the magic of efficiency.

By changing up your tech stack with three simple adoptions, you will find yourself thinking of your day as rewarding rather than busy!

“Stop overthinking. Just do three things.”

The short strokes of 17Hats is that this is a great program for lead vetting & follow-up (on-boarding and engagement), as well as CRM, calendar, project and workflow management.

Last was a year of personal chaos. Some good some challenging.

There are a million reasons to create and implement standardized bookkeeping workflows.

Creating efficient bookkeeping workflows is critical to running a successful bookkeeping practice.