Today we are going to work. That's right. I'm going to show you how to work efficiently. Now let's broadly classify the work two types work which is mine, and work which I can't do on my own. So I need other people around me to help me. I will also show you what are the apps you will need. And here I am assuming that you are a part of Office 365, so you will need outlook, you will need to do app, you will need planner, and you will need teams. Now let's start with my work. Now, my work itself has two types. Why? Because some work I do myself. I'm going to sit and work. It's going to take my time. But sometimes I don't do the work myself. I'm responsible for getting it done. Now what do I do? I give it to someone, delegate it, one of which I'm doing, one of which someone else is doing. Now let me ask you a question. Where is your work listed? I'm sure there is a list. Now the problem is there is no standard method anybody has told anybody. Whatever works for us, we do even for official work. What a single company has told their staff. This is where your list of work should be. So someone is doing it on notepad, someone word, excel, sticky notes, it's all mixed up. If your work is scattered all over the place, how do you manage it properly? You can't even see it in one place. How are you going to manage it? So let's solve that problem. So now let's find the best place to keep our work. Master List, unique list and that is Outlook task folder. I know you use outlook every day, but that's inbox and. Calendar. In fact, many people make the mistake of putting tasks in calendar. That's not right. Calendar is for time, not for task. In fact, in a calendar entry there is no place to say I have finished it. That's why there is a task folder. So go to the task folder. Maybe you already have the task, but put it there again. I know it is a little bit of extra work, but let me make it simple. You just have to type the task and the deadline and press enter. A little bit of extra work, but it's absolutely worth it because now you have. One place to go to what is my pending work, go there, see it, manage it already. We are better off. But that is step one. Very good step. But next step is equally important. Why? Because you made a nice list, but who is going to execute it? There is no software to do work. We have to do it now. So that takes time. Now this is when you need to block that time. When in advance in calendar now what happens? The list gets bigger and bigger and bigger and then things get delayed. We don't want that to happen. So what you want to do is. Go to calendar make it full screen. Now you are not seeing tasks. So right click on the task folder and make that window smaller. So main window calendar, small window task. So now you can see both. Now drag and drop tasks into calendar. Not randomly you plan well in advance. Am I asking you to drag drop every task? No small task you can manage list separately important task, strategic tasks, critical task, time consuming task. Drag and drop well in advance. One common activity which we do is take notes during meetings. And obviously during meetings I'm going to note down something and then I realize, oh, this is my task now, usually we just leave it there and maybe you forget it. So I don't want that to happen. Ideally, I want all my tasks to be in Outlook tasks. You know that. How do I do this? Right click on the OneNote note and choose this flag button and then decide the deadline and now OneNote will talk to Outlook and create the task. Your job is done. But wait, maybe at that point I realized, ohh, this is what I'm not going to do. Assistant is going to no problem. Create the task from the last option and delegate it right there. Best of both worlds. Now let's look at the other part, which is delegation. Delegation is important. The more senior you are, most probably you will delegate more and more. Where is that delegation happening? Mails. I send a mail to my assistant saying do this on that date, most probably I'm going to forget to follow up and probably that person also delays it. It's a disaster. Now of course, if I'm a very senior person, I will have an admin assistant to manage that. But even that admin assistant is making another list of follow up in Excel. That's not good, that's inefficient. So let's do it. In tasks we know the task folder, but here we will go to the task button, new task button, create a new task. It's a bigger window, but the only important thing here is the assigned task button. So you put the task, put the deadline and click on the assign task button and then put the name of the. Wilson, in this case, I'm putting assistant now you send it. Now it becomes that person's task. That person is going to not get a mail. That person is going to get a task. Request, accept, decline. Now that person assistant accepts it. Now it goes into assistance task folder automatically. Very good. When assistant marks it as complete, I will be notified. Now I'm sure many of you are thinking, yeah, this sounds good, but practically what that assistant doesn't click on accept, doesn't click on decline. I'm still hanging. No. No, even then it is better. Why? Let me show you. This is your task list. Now this task is mine. That task is delegated. You can actually see the combined list. So even if the other party forgets, you are in control. When you delegate a lot of work to a lot of people, obviously you want to monitor it. Let's see how that is done. You go to the task folder, go to the View tab and choose a view called assigned. Now that shows you only the assigned task, not your own task. And if you want you can group it by person so that you can see. One person and all the tasks you have given to that person together. It's a brilliant way of monitoring execution. Towards the end of the video I'm going to show you a bonus feature which you would love. So make sure you watch it till the end. In the meantime might as well subscribe and like as well. Let me tell you about flagged emails. Stop flagging emails because nobody told us the right way to manage task. We were misusing the flag feature. Now you will ask me yes I got a mail, I know it is a task and you are telling me don't flag. Then what do I do? Don't worry. You drag and drop the mail on the task folder then what happens? It becomes a task. Now you don't want a copy of it so drag and drop using right mouse button. Then choose the option called move. That is a better option because now the task contains the mail and there is no copy in Inbox. That's how you convert a mail to task. Now even on browser you can drag and drop task to calendar. To do that go to Outlook Web access, go to calendar and there is a view called board which shows you calendar along with tasks and then simply drag drop and. Plan your time well in advance. Whatever I've described so far happens on a PC. Now what if I'm carrying a mobile? No problem, go to Microsoft to do app and install it. It's available on Android as well as iOS and it will sync outlook tasks to mobile. You can also add a task on mobile. Now while you're reading a mail on mobile in Outlook app you can go to the three dots and there also you can create a task and that will go to to do. I know it may be sounding exhaustive and complicated but trust me try this out and don't try it. Alone. Teach it to people around you and then let me know whether it works for you. I would love to see your comments and experiences. So now let's focus on teamwork. Teamwork is also of two types. One is simple teamwork, few tasks, few people involved short term. The more complex one is like a project. There is a team of people and there is a task list and everyone needs to execute that project. So let's talk about simple teamwork. I have few tasks, maybe one also, but multiple people have to do it urgently. Where do we do that? Ideally we should do it. And chant, and fortunately for us in teams chat there is a brilliant feature available called loop tasks. So add the team members to a group chat, click on the loop button and choose tasks. Now I can add the task, put the person's name and put the deadline. Now usually in a chat my message who can edit only me. But this is a special case. This task list can be edited by everyone in the group, so updates come instantly. No mail trails, no follow-ups. Now let's talk about more complex. Look, it's a project. There is a project team which is cross functional. There is a project task list and of course there is a deadline. Everyone needs to know the status and everyone needs to work in coordination. If it is a very complex project, many people use Ms Project, Artemis or Primavera. But smaller projects still need to be managed in an efficient manner. And the biggest mistake which is done here is people try to do it either on e-mail or on group chat. Both are inefficient. The correct way to do it is to create a team. Inside teams and then Add all the team members there and now manage the task list. Now you will ask me in a team what do we have? We have conversations and we have files. Where do I add tasks? Very good question. So click on that + and add task by planner. It's a shared task list. Now you can add a task, you can delegate it to people who are already a part of the project and you can give a deadline, you can have sub task, you can have color coding, you can have buckets for various kinds of. Us and so on. Other person will get a notification and anybody can see the status live. Usually we have a review meeting to understand what is happening. There's no need for that. Even on mobile, browser, desktop, wherever everyone can see this is in progress. This is not started, this is completed. You just want a Kanban view, right? So go to group by progress. That's it. If you want you can see a graphical view. But then there is one more problem which you are going to face because you will be a part of not 1234. God knows how many projects. Now the problem is each project has its own task list and in each task list you have been given some tasks. Now think what we have to do. I will go to 1 project, go to the task list, filter on my name and OK these tasks. Another project. Repeat. No even the thought is inefficient. What should we do? You don't do anything, you go to teams. On the left side we have teams menu. Click on the three dots and you will find exactly the same icon called tasks. But here the context is mine. What does that mean? When I click on it, it shows me tasks assigned to me. What does that mean? This task comes from that project. This task comes from this project. All of them are automatically consolidated so I can see my workload at a glance. Isn't that brilliant? So the same todo app which we installed earlier shows you a task assigned to me. So now I can see my work and teamwork in a single place. Outlook has AI built in, do you know that? So Outlook AI is analyzing the way we are communicating with each other, finding out things which look like commitments or follow-ups and then every day. It sends your mail called Viva Daily Briefing. I'm sure you may have noticed it but never opened it. When you go to inbox for the first time, First mail you should open is Viva daily briefing. Why? Because it has analyzed your e-mail communication and it tells you you had promised this three days back. Have you done it? If you have done it, fine, great. Click on done. If you have not done it there itself there is a button called add to task. Isn't that superb? And in case this was a mistake because this is machine learning, you can teach that machine learning. Boredom. No, not make that mistake next time by clicking on that has been icon. Now the bonus feature I promised is simple but extremely useful. Earlier I showed you how to add a task, put the subject or put the task and deadline. Now how do you put a deadline? Of course you open the calendar and choose choose choose. But that's boring when we are thinking when will I finish this task? I will say OK, five days, two weeks like that, can we type 5 days? Yes. So what if I type 5D? It will pick it up and find the. Actual date. What about weeks? Yes 2 W no problem. What about years? No problem. Three why will work? What about months? Unfortunately 2M will not work because means minutes. Its two MO then it will understand a combination also works. Two years, five months, three weeks. No problem. And as though this is not enough, if I say OK, what is this? This is the first week of the month. I want to do it on the last Friday of December. It will actually figure that out. So try using it to your advantage. And you will love it. I'm sure you found this useful. If I miss something, do put it in comments. I will cover it next time. So like share, subscribe and of course press the Bell icon so that you will know about videos coming up immediately. So see you next time. Till then happy working.
