The Ministry Partner Giving Analysis Report

Are you preparing MPD goals for the coming year?  One thing you should do is print your MPGA report before February 7th, even if you won’t look it over right away.  You can see this report any time in the Staff Services area on the Staff Web for a detailed look at your ministry partners (with your actual reimbursement expenses to help you in your planning for next year and also lots of helpful graphs about distribution, frequencies, and more).

I can think of two times when you might want to download a hard copy:

1. any time before taking an extended MPD trip (see below about MPD trips) or
2. after the January 10th paycheck and before February 7th, when the report reflects a complete year.

The MPGA report is a moving window into your current MPD information on our servers for any twelve-month period.  Therefore, between the January 10th and February 10th paychecks is the perfect time to get a copy of your MPGA report.  During this time period...

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I like using a particular password, but after I was almost snared by a phishing attempt, I needed to change a lot of my accounts because they shared the same password.  This was a secure password and easy to remember, however, it’s not really a good idea to use the same password for multiple accounts, so I decided this was a good opportunity to create unique passwords.

I stored the new passwords in a spreadsheet (see What You Need to Know about Passwords), but then I was constantly needing to look up the new passwords.  I had made such a variety, I couldn’t remember which password went with which account!

I finally found the solution from a suggestion I found on the internet.  I’m now using my “favorite” password (let’s call it strongfavorite) and then add a unique identifier, depending on the account.  For instance, my password for Facebook could be strongfavoriteface or strongfavoriteFB.  Now all I have to do is remember my favorite password and my identifiers: like hoot for HootSuite or TD for Twee...

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I like using a particular password, but after I was almost snared by a phishing attempt, I needed to change a lot of my accounts because they shared the same password.  This was a secure password and easy to remember, however, it’s not really a good idea to use the same password for multiple accounts, so I decided this was a good opportunity to create unique passwords.

I stored the new passwords in a spreadsheet (see What You Need to Know about Passwords), but then I was constantly needing to look up the new passwords.  I had made such a variety, I couldn’t remember which password went with which account!

I finally found the solution from a suggestion I found on the internet.  I’m now using my “favorite” password (let’s call it strongfavorite) and then add a unique identifier, depending on the account.  For instance, my password for Facebook could be strongfavoriteface or strongfavoriteFB.  Now all I have to do is remember my favorite password and my identifiers: like hoot for HootSuite or TD for Twee...

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A PDF, portable document format, is a great format to save documents  before sending to someone else because  a PDF file is basically a picture of a file that you have created.  Without converting to PDF, if you send a document directly, such as a .doc, you assume the recipient has Word installed on their computer and exactly the same fonts that you have used as well.  (If they don’t have the font, their computer will choose a replacement font).

Actually, the easiest solution for creating PDF files is under the last heading on converting files, so skip to the end of this post if you like. (You’ll also learn how to edit PDF files under that heading.)

Creating and Editing PDF Files Using Microsoft Office

Probably the most straight-forward solution for a PC is to download the add-on for Microsoft Office 2007.   After downloading you will have a Save As… PDF option in your Office software.  I also like this option best because the hyperlinks work within the document.

If you don’t have Microsoft Office ...

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I’ve found pinning a very helpful way to find quickly what I use often. (No, I’m not referring to the latest popular social site, Pinterest, which allows you to “pin” your favorite images to a virtual “corkboard”.)

• Windows 7 allows me to pin programs to the taskbar, along the bottom of my monitor screen, so I can readily open Outlook, Excel, Mozilla Firefox, TntMPD, and other programs I use daily.  (Read how…)
• I especially like pinning files in the “recent document list” in Word 2007, Excel 2007, or Powerpoint 2007.  (Read how…)
• You can also pin specific web pages to the taskbar with Internet Explorer 9. (Read how…)
• If I prefer not to have a lot of icons in my taskbar, I can pin programs in the Start Menu.  (Read how…)

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