Emily Blackmore

Resist the Urge to Answer the Email Now

It’s so easy to quickly reply to email as soon as you receive it. Consider scheduling times to process email throughout the day. Otherwise, you may end up buried in your inbox! If you are working on a critical project, consider using an Outlook Alert to let others know you won’t be processing email until a specific time. Here are tips to consider when processing email.

Delete It
Delegate It – Can this be assigned as a task or forwarded?
Do It – Will it only take a few minutes to process? Do it now.
Delay It – Calendar the item or put on your task list, so you will remember it later.

Interested in learning more about Outlook?

Outlook Productivity Webinar

Wednesday, Feb 4 from 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Register

Do you ever feel like you are drowning in email and need some strategies to reduce inbox clutter? The Outlook Productivity session will help you beef up your inbox and calendar skills at the start of the new year! In this session, we will cover a number of time saving tips in Outlook 2013 to manage your electronic communications more effectively.

Learn how to:

Create quick steps to process mail in a timely manner
Minimize distractions by creating rules and alerts
Utilize task features including: categories, custom fields, view settings and more…

Tips for Using Student Email at SMU

Navigate your email with ease

With Office 365, your email is even smarter. Find important messages, communicate confidently, and collaborate with others in real time.

Quickly view your important messages

Take control of your inbox. People View lets you read important messages first—from those you communicate with most often. Expand or collapse this view depending on your needs.

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Avoid common mistakes

Have you ever selected Reply All to a large group? MailTips warns you about common mistakes before you send an email. Turn MailTips on or off or customize which tips appear.

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Always share the latest file

Your email is now fully integrated with OneDrive for Business, allowing you to easily share your work with others while always maintaining just one version.

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Search your email

Find exactly what you’re looking while on the go for by searching your email directly from Outlook Web App. You can search by sender and date and filter to get what you want quickly.

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Locker.SMU: Migrate Personal Files before March 1

By Rachel Mulry

Locker.SMU will be decommissioned as a service in August 2015. This file storage and sharing application is being replaced by two other services: Microsoft OneDrive and one that is still to be determined. The current locker service has several limitations in storage allocation and cross platform functionality. Therefore, it will be replaced by other services that can address these deficiencies in a cost effective manner.

Project Timeline

January 2015: Stop provisioning new accounts in Locker.SMU
December 2014-February 2015: Communication and migration assistance for personal storage
March 31, 2015: Eliminate personal storage
April-June 2015: Migrate Organization storage to new service
August 2015: Locker.SMU taken offline

At this time, we are encouraging individuals to begin migrating their personal files off of Locker.SMU. The migration process for your personal files can be done in several ways. Step-by-step instructions are located here.

There are a number of applications that you may choose to use to continue storing and sharing the files online. All faculty, staff, and active students have access to Microsoft OneDrive through Office 365. OneDrive provides unlimited data storage and files can easily be shared as well. For more information on using OneDrive or to login, click here.

Please note, the OneDrive license is only available while you are an active faculty, staff, or student. Once you leave the University, the license will expire, and the data will be unavailable.

Microsoft OneDrive is not the recommended solution for Departmental or Organizational storage. We will provide more details for organizational storage once the new service has been selected.

Tips for Better Calendar Use in Office 365

Simplify your scheduling

A busy day means a complicated calendar. With Office 365, students at SMU can easily set up and manage your meetings–saving you time to get more done.

See other people’s calendars

Add a team member directly to your calendar view to see their availability whenever you want. Overlay their calendar with yours or hide it as needed.

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Quickly set up a meeting

See the availability of all attendees and nearby conference rooms without leaving your meeting invitation.

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Search your calendar

Need to find an event on your calendar but don’t know when it occurred? Whether you’re using Outlook or Outlook Web App, you can quickly search your calendar, or other people’s calendars, to find a particular event.

Learn more

For more information on Office 365 at SMU, please visit our webpage http://www.smu.edu/BusinessFinance/OIT/Services/o365.

Tips for Using OneNote in Office 365

Keep your notes close at hand

Stay organized and collaborate with teammates using OneNote in Office 365 on all your devices. Your notes are saved automatically as you make them—just like a paper notebook. They go with you everywhere too and, unlike paper notebooks, you don’t have to worry about losing them.

Get OneNote on your devices

Draw, sketch, or handwrite notes

Use your finger, stylus, or mouse on any Touch-capable device—and automatically convert your handwriting to text.

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Record your notes

Don’t miss important information when you video- and audio- record your notes during important meetings.

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Work together from anywhere

Share your OneNote notebooks with others, so that everyone can edit and share notes in the same place. Your notes are synced to OneDrive for Business, giving everyone access to them from wherever they are.

Learn more

For more information on Office 365 at SMU, please visit our webpage http://www.smu.edu/BusinessFinance/OIT/Services/o365.