#14 Trello - the perfect tool for project management

Looking for a tool to help manage your projects effectively? Trello is a tool you definitely don't want to miss! Trello is a collaboration tool that organizes your projects into boards. In one glance, Trello tells you what's being worked on, who's working on what, and where something is in a process.



As a Drag & Drop Task Management Tool Trello is one of the best tool for team-based projects. Not only does it enable you to easily see the state of all the parts of a project, it also lets you easily assign tasks to team members, add checklists, attach files, and do other cool stuff. Trello is also a great tool for personal use. As you can see from the screenshot above I've been using Trello to keep track of my assignments. Each list represents a subject that I'm studying and each card represents the assignments that needs to be done. One feature that I really appreciate about Trello is its flexible tagging and labeling as I have created specific color codes based on priority (eg. red means very urgent tasks, and green means completed etc.)

Give it a try - you'll love it. Whether you're using it for team-based projects or for personal chores, you'll certainly benefit from Trello's intuitive and simple interface.

#13 5 Ways to search smarter online

1) Finding the URL of an image that you saved on your computer but forgot to write it down

 

Go to Google Images and click the camera icon that is directly next to the search button (magnifying glass).

 

Select ‘Upload an image’ and click ‘Upload’ once you have selected the image you saved.

 

The search result will come up with similar images.

 

 

NOTE: If you do not mind which website you cite as a reference, then select any of the URLs that show an image that is as close to the one you saved on your computer. Otherwise go through each search result and look for the URL of the website you know you got it from (if you forget the name of the website, you will most likely recognise the website URL when you come across it)
 

2) Finding content from 1 source only

If you wish to see articles about a certain topic from only one specific website, and excluding other websites from the search results, type ‘site:’ and then the URL, along with the topic you are searching for.

E.g. site:docs.google.com "Windows 7"

Note: Using ‘docs.google.com’ as a filter will allow you to view documents that you would normally not be able to view on Google Docs without the use of the filter.

3) Searching a topic (and excluding certain sub-topics at the same time)

Sometimes you will want to find content on a specific topic without wanting to read content about a sub-topic within that topic. For example, you want to find content about ‘inbound marketing’ and not show any search results that bring ‘advertising’ into the articles. To achieve this, type in the topic you want to find content about and then add ‘-‘ along with the certain sub-topic(s) you wish to exclude from your search results.

E.g. inbound marketing -advertising  

4) Searching for specific document types

You may think that the majority of least thought about ideas and concepts would be found on   scientific websites and the like, however not many students realise the least thought about ideas and concepts are raised in research papers written by scientists the world over. To be able to find research papers online (and the research papers as the only search result document type), type whatever topic you are searching for in Google and add ‘filetype:ppt’ after it to only see search results that are ‘PowerPoint Presentations’. Not all but most research papers are in the form of a PDF format, so use ‘pdf’ instead.

E.g. "inbound marketing" filetype:pdf 

 

5) Non-personalised search results

When you use any search engine, the results of your search are automatically displayed by how popular the site ranks against other sites, where the most popular result (because it might be the most helpful or any other reason) is displayed as the first search result and so on. However, if in an essay you want to bring up other ideas or concepts that no other student would think to bring up, this is the number one way to achieve that as 99.99% of students will be finding essay content from popular and high ranking sites (meaning everyone of those 99.99% will be talking about the same points as each other – you will be part of the 0.01% without somewhat ‘original’ points).

To do this, once the search results are shown click on ‘Search Tools’ shown beneath the search bar and click ‘Verbatim’.

- Aaron S

#12 Different firms

There are many different firms you can look into working at when at university, or even better when you graduate. I work in an accounting firm while at university, which can be bad in a way because the pay is not great and there is a high turnover rate for Cadets, meaning a lot of people quit.

All accounting firms require or highly recommend employees to go to university. One of the main reasons to go to university is to get a better job really. I work at Deloitte. The way I got there is through having a Cadetship at a Mid Tier firm called Moore Stephens. They merged with Deloitte. That was kind of lucky for me because it is very hard to get into one of the big 4 accounting firms (PWC, EY, Deloitte and KPMG). I have heard some partners have even said they would not be able to get accepted into getting a job in the big 4 right now because the application process is so difficult and competitive.

If your in University and looking at getting a job in an accounting firm but don't get accepted into a big 4 firm, do not be concerned. Big 4 might sound good but really they pay the least because there is a higher demand for your job. Also when I was working at Moore Stephens everything seemed a bit more relaxed but at Deloitte there is so much work to do there is no time to relax.

What I'm trying to say is, it doesn't matter which firm you get a job in, there are always going to be positives and negatives, just try and look towards the positives :).

- Jon Barnitt


http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Deloitte.svg

#11 Bullet Journal - How to organise your life with one simple journal!

Bullet Journal is an analog note-taking system for organising your to-dos, ideas and appointments in one simple but powerful paper notebook. The video above shows you how it's done in a nut shell.

One thing I really like about the Bullet Journal system is its heavy use of shorthand notations and bullet points, as opposed to the longer entries we write in our traditional journals. By sorting entries into three categories: tasks, notes and events, you can virtually capture anything that life throws at you in this handy notebook (as seen below).

While this is just a quick guide, there's actually a lot more to the Bullet Journal system than you might think. There are ways to organise related bullets, tasks, notes, and events into a single organized theme, which is great for managing your projects. There's even a method for moving your items from one "month" to another "month" inside your journal seamlessly. So have a go and see how the Bullet Journal can greatly boost your productivity!

- Michael Wu

#10 Textbooks - other alternatives

Generally, uni students aren't known for being made of money yet university textbooks are ridiculously expensive. Most of the textbooks are excess of $100, with some being closer to $200. For full time students multiply this by 4 and you are looking at spending roughly $500 per semester, very pricey.

There are other alternatives to purchasing brand new textbooks for each class each semester. There is a usually a couple of copies reserved in the library which are available to be used however they cannot be removed from the library, a slight inconvenience. Another option is to look at purchasing a textbook with a friend, that way you can both share it and not spend an excessive amount of money. Also, there are second hand books out there which can be hard to find but check out eBay, gumtree, face book groups, and notices around the campus. Of course you can always try and go without a textbook if you feel you don’t need it, and the lecture materials provided are to your satisfaction. With the increase in eBooks, most textbooks have a purely online version available which is cheaper so have a look around the internet and you might even find you can download it for free...

Aaron H

#9 A modified approach to an existing studying method - remember content easier and quicker

A few days ago, that is, the day before I had a quiz, I knew I needed to study. It was one of those days that I started to over think my grades and what it would mean for all my units.  I was spending my time on Facebook and talking to one of my friends that I met two weeks ago. What a "productive" way that was to spend my time (NOT!), which I could have used to review more content. In the end she motivated me to study, which got me thinking once I finished studying… What is the quickest yet most effective way to study? 

#8 Email etiquette: how to communicate with academics effectively

As a student you often need to email your lecturers or tutors to ask them something about a subject or to make an appointment with them. It's very important be professional and polite when emailing your academics. To do this you should:

• use your student email
• say why you're emailing
• be precise in your request 
• avoid long sentences and use paragraphs if appropriate
• be courteous in your language
• use proper grammar and spelling
• avoid using slang or abbreviations 
• proof read your email before you send it

Here's an example of an effective email to a lecturer:

This is how not to email your lecturer:

- Michael Wu