In my last post I outlined how to create a list which you can use to mailmerge letters. In this post I go over creating a letter in Word 2007, using mailmerge to insert multiple addresses.  

Open Word and choose the Mailings ribbon.

Click on the button that says Start Mail Merge and select Letters. You are given an empty document.

Click on Select Recipients, and then choose Existing List. Find your Excel spreadsheet and click on Open.

Compose your letter, inserting the merge fields from the list under the button Insert Merge Field. To preview how the fields appear, click on Preview Results. This will preview just one of the records in the letter.

When you have completed your letter you can click on Finish and Merge. I always choose the first option Edit Individual Documents so that I can view and edit before I print. You can also save the letters as evidence that the letters were done, should you need proof in future.

That should save you a bit of time in future.

Most of us stick to the default settings when we use software programmes, but if you want to try a new look, experiment with these three options:

If you want a bit more document space, and less of the screen taken up by toolbars, right click over the top of the toolbar and choose 'Minimize the ribbon'.  Now you will see much more of your document. To open up one of the ribbons just click on its name across the top.  To return to the previous view, right click in the same area and choose 'Minimize the ribbon' again to deselect it.

While you were right-clicking on the toolbars you may have noticed 'Customize Quick Access Toolbar'.  Select this and you will be able to add commonly used buttons to the mini toolbar at the top left hand croner of the screen next to the Office Home button. Once in the customise area simply select the button you want in the left hand life and click on 'Add' to move it to the list on the right.

You may wish to see the whole page on the screen to make reading easier.  When you open a document in Word 2007 for the first time you may have been asked if want to open all documents in this format, and you probably chose no at the time.

To have a look at this view click on the second button in of the five view options in the bottom right hand corner:

Once in screen reading view you can click on the 'View Options' button in the top right hand corner to get a range of choices. Note that you can edit text in this view. Click on Close to return to the previous view.

Enjoy taking the time to explore these features.

When you work as a secretary or PA  you end up doing lots of letters, minutes and reports.  A great time saver is creating templates so that your documents are laid out correctly each time without putting in too much effort each time.

To create a template for Word, create your basic document with the required layout, text, page formatting and numbering. 

Go to the Office button at the top right of the screen and choose Save As - New Template.  Unlike in earlier versions of Word, you may not automatically be taken to the templates folder.  This is a new security precaution, however you have a link on the left side of the save dialogue box that says 'trusted templates'. 

Click on that, and you will be taken to the correct templates folder.  Save your template and then close the template document.

Go back to the New dialogue box and click on 'My templates' on the left and you should see it listed.  You can now select the template to open it as a document.

So what if you want to amend the template?  Go to the Office button and select New.  On the left of the dialogue box you will see 'My Templates'.  Find the file you want to amend, open it and make the desired changes.  Go to New-Save As-Template and If you want to overwrite the old file call it the same name and click yes when it asks if you want to replace the file, or merge the changes.

How do you find out where the Word templates are being saved on your computer?  Go to the Office button, and choose Word Options at the bottom of the dialogue box.  Then choose Advanced from the list.  Scroll right to the bottom and click on the button that says File Locations.  You can then click on the line that says User Templates, and click on the Modify button.  You will be able to see the templates location in the window.  I wouldn't advise changing this unless you have some IT experience.  There may be a good reason why you templates are set the way they are.  Ask first, especially if you are on a networked PC.

A tool available in all Office packages that I feel is rather under used is the alignment feature for images and objects.  If you have several objects in a document/presention you can line them up so they are evenly spaced or align to the top or bottom of the objects.  Here's how you do it.

Select all the of objects you want to align.  To do this click on one object, hold you finger down on the shift key on the keyboard, and click on the remaining objects.  They should all be selected.  If you are having trouble achieving this, select each object, right click and turn text wrapping on.  You should then be able to select them all.

In Office 2007, when you select the pictures you get the picture formatting ribbon.  You will see the align button on the right.

In Publisher if you go to the Arrange tool at the top and choose align, you will get a very similar dialogue box (left).

Then you have to simply select the desired option.  As you can see you can align all of the selected objects across the top or bottom, or down the page to the left or right.  If you have more than two objects you can also distribute them equidistant from each other across or down the page.

So, a very useful tool to improve the look of your documents and presentations.

I intended to write this post about PowerPoint, and then realised that in fact the technique is the same for Word and Excel too, so you only need to learn it once to become an expert in three programmes!!  In earlier versions of Office you needed to insert these objects from the drawing toolbar, but in more recent versions from 2007 they have come out of hiding, so to speak.

In Word, Excel and PowerPoint you go to the Insert ribbon at the top and choose SmartArt from the Illustrations segment.

You are then given a very wide range of objects to choose from.  When you single click on each one in the list you will get an explanation of what they are used for in the right hand pane of the dialogue box.

Select the object you wish to use.  I'll choose the organisation chart which is the first one in the hierarchy category.  When you double-click on the option, or click on OK the object is inserted into your document/spreadsheet/presentation.  Click where it says [Text] to type in the required text.  Note when you select the object you get some new ribbon tabs at the top of the screen called Design and Format.  If you wish to change the size, colour or style of your object just click on these and experiment with what's on offer.

The default setting of the object is to re-size the text to fit the object.  If you put too much information in the text will become too small.

Note that in PowerPoint another way of inserting a SmartArt into a slide is to click on the icon when you create a new empty slide: