Nature or Nurture? Why do I seem to think in terms of MS Office?

 It's a ongoing joke with several friends that I think in terms of powerpoint when we're talking about visuals, in excel when we're making lists or need to track things in some way, and in word when trying to compose something so I'll have proper spelling, grammar, and formatting. And it's true, I use each of those tools more often than I'd like to admit, but they really are great tools to have!

Right now, for instance, I am using powerpoint to storyboard the comic idea I mentioned in a previous post. I'm using clipart to capture a general feel for what I want in each of the panels so far. Once I get the basic ideas down, then I can go back later and draw my own versions of things, but with a good reference point to get me started. I had thought about drawing rough sketches on some paper but then I'd have to do the whole thing over when I got ready to do the real thing, and I don't know that I'd do it all over again. I'm not great at redundant work. Even in school when I was writing a paper, I would struggle with proofreading my own work. One way to force myself to do it was to handwrite the first draft and use my typing it up as an editing/proofreading opportunity. It worked for the most part. I did graduate after all.

As for excel, I'm using it to help track and organize things for an upcoming wedding. I'm one of the hosts for one of the pre-wedding parties, so we need to track who is getting invited, when the invitations are sent, and who has responded. Additionally, we need to track what is needed for the party itself in terms of decorations. And since there are several of us co-hosting, it helps to track what's been purchased so we don't have wasted money on duplicate efforts. That said, I also track gifts I purchase throughout the year so I will remember who I bought gifts for already when it gets close to Christmas or other gift-giving days like birthdays. I track my bills in excel, as well, which makes the most sense out of everything listed so far because it's numbers and formulas, etc. But at the end of the day, excel is really helpful for ordering things and making sure you have consistent information across all fields and the ability to track things with ease (no need to reformat a table like you'd need to do in word or powerpoint when you add in another row or column).

Word is where I do my big writing and capture stream of consciousness type thoughts. I like that it is more free flowing than excel or even powerpoint for this purpose. I like, too, that you can add in headings, formatting, etc. to make everything easier to manage and update. 

Apparently, though, not everyone thinks in terms of these things which is mindboggling to me sometimes, haha. They usually think in terms of more text based things like word, emails, texts, etc. All of those things are fine until you need to make sure nothing is falling through the cracks. And yes, you can make a table or have a place to mark things in word, but it's clumsy and more effort than in excel, at least in my opinion. And people who tend to favor these aren't always that great at being able to look back through their messages to find the original discussion points either, which makes things a bit more difficult. Especially in terms of texts and messages. It gets messy fast. So why not throw it an spreadsheet or tack whatever it is onto a powerpoint slide shared across the group so we all the reference AND the ability to go back to it whenever we want or need to? Call me crazy, but I just like having that ease of access and consistency.

Ah well, some of us just think in terms of MS Office, I guess. Not exactly a bragging point, but it sure is handy sometimes!

#ownit #makeexcelcount #powerpointitlikeyoumeanit #word4thought