Does removing the date make you a cheater?
Have you ever noticed this? You’re digging around the web, collecting advice or thoughts on a particular topic. You find interesting content, but when you try to check how current it is, you can’t find the date it was published. Sometimes, you only find a...
7 ways to improve your non-profit annual report
Non-profit organizations use annual reports to let donors know where their money goes, and ask for more support. Yet a 2013 study* shows only 26 per cent of the Canadians surveyed think charities do a good job of explaining how donations are used. So, how does a...
Push For Your Tush results are in
After almost 14 years of walking a dog three times a day, walking 5K is a piece of cake. So earlier this month I laced up my walking shoes to do the 5K Push For Your Tush in Burlington, Ontario, raising money for Colon Cancer Canada (tagline: We’re behind your...
Don’t wait for perfection; start, already
Is aiming for perfection holding you back? Sure, getting rid of typos and fixing glaring errors is important. But if you’re waiting to launch your website or start tweeting or record your first podcast until all conditions are perfect and you’ve tied...
Spending hours to save pennies on insurance
For years, I stuck with the same car insurance company. I thought being a valued customer – they assured me I was! – would mean saving money. My insurance costs should go down for all kinds of reasons: The Ontario government introduced legislation that is supposed to...
Forgive me for suspecting lawyers are paid by the word
Wills are distasteful to begin with. You don’t want to think about someone dying, let alone squabble over who gets the investments and the heirloom silver, the stamp collection and the stacks of National Geographic. (I’m joking; we’re parceling out...
Get an ‘aha’ moment with analogy
Vivid images in your writing are the fastest way to give your readers that “aha!” moment of understanding. Common tools are analogies like metaphors and similes, which compare this new thing to that quite different thing. A metaphor expresses the...
In a slump? Here’s how to dig out
The independent life has its ups and downs, but every once in a while, you hit a real slump. It gets quiet. TOO quiet. Knowing that this, too, shall pass, as it always does, you have to keep doing all the right things. During my last slump, this included — you...