They
are intended to be of guidance to livery clerks, especially new ones, or those
seeking advice on a particular topic. They are not prescriptive, and how
individual companies choose to conduct their affairs is, of course, entirely up
to them.
Computer
matters for clerks
The computer
might have been designed with the job of the livery company clerk in mind (especially
the one man band variety), and sensibly used can make the clerksÕ life
immeasurably easier. This note sets out a few pointers for the new clerk.
Email
Nowadays,
most liverymen have email, and most accept it as their preferred method of
communication. The trick is to use it effectively, and this is made much simpler
if you have a decent email program (eg Outlook,
rather than Hotmail).
Life is much
easier once you have taken the trouble to create some email contact address
groups: eg Master & Wardens; Court; Liverymen; Freemen etc. Check the box which says Use Bcc to hide Member information
If you do
send multiple address emails without using groups, ensure you place them in the
BCC box to prevent all recipients being listed openly (which can irritate
recipients, and make life easier for spammers).
Tip Ð if you adopt a consistent method of Headings
in all your emails, they will be far easier to find later. A suggestion is to
simply give it a date (of the event to which it refers). The great majority of
a clerkÕs emails relate to an event of some description, thus if all emails
about the dinner on 5th March are headed 5 March then they can
easily be found.
Signatures
Ð programs such as Outlook allow you to create signatures. But note plural. You can create as
many as you wish, and they can be far more than just your name, address etc.
Many standard messages can be composed eg
Accept/regret invites; refuse charity request; ack
receipt of xxx; and myriad other oft repeated messages. Of course they can then
be personalised as appropriate.
Websites
The so-called
Fishmongers website can be viewed via the A-Z List of Companies menu tab at liverycompanies.info. It is the
by far the best source of information about individual livery companies, because
it is the responsibility of individual clerks to keep their companyÕs entry
accurate and up to date. So if you are a
new clerk, the first thing you need to do is make sure your name is correctly
shown, and your photo - if youÕd like people to know who you are! You will
need help and a password to do so, and these come from Walter Gill, Clerk to
the CarmenÕs Company (if not your predecessor).
Be aware of
the bookmark or favorites facility in your browser, and then take the time to set
up the ones you frequently use. Hopefully http://www.liverycompanies.info will be one.
It is helpful to place them in subject folders, eg
for livery; charity; finance; travel etc.
Databases
The computer literate clerk will wish
to have his/her livery membership on a database. This is likely to be MS Excel,
though being a spreadsheet program, it has limitations
over a database (such as Access, but which is itself probably more complex than
you need).
Two suggestions:
First, ensure that every element of
the membersÕ data has its own discrete field. Hence Mr
Bert Smith OBE goes in four columns: salute, forename, surname, post nominals. Similarly his
address at 43 Acacia Gardens, Tooting Broadway, London SW17 1AA is best split
into each element of Add1, Add2, post town, post code. This makes sorting and
searching easy.
Second, create columns for all other information you wish to hold
on your livery. Eg dates of birth, freedom, livery,
court etc. Spouse, sponsor, diet, and much else.
Tip
Ð create columns for each event, and enter number of places booked (0 for
regrets) as the replies come in. Of course excel will add up the numbers for
you. When the event approaches, a quick sort will tell you who is coming, their
diets etc etc
MS Word
It is assumed you are familiar with
this program. But wardens who attend the Livery Committee course on after
dinner speaking will be told to know how to use Word count (to gauge the length
of their speech) and to print their text on to A5 in landscape format (to fit
all lecterns). You would be wise to know this also. And also how to print
address labels from the database mentioned above.
Your own company website
When you are asked a question (as all
clerks are the whole time!), is the answer already at your website? And if it
is not, should it be? Hopefully, the more general livery questions are answered
at http://www.liverycompanies.info
Indeed, please consider placing a
conspicuous link from your own companyÕs website to liverycompanies.info
Nigel R Pullman
Livery Committee
1st April 2015
Was this note helpful? Do you have
comment? Email nrpullman@btinternet.com