Outlook FAQ
1) How do I send something from my computer “from” my manager?
Open your Outlook Inbox.
Open a new email. In the “from” box, enter your manager’s name.
If your “from” box is not showing:
Create a message.
Do one of the following:
If you are using the Microsoft Outlook e-mail editor:
On the View menu, click From Field.
If you are using Microsoft Word as your e-mail editor:
Click the down arrow next to the Options button.
The email will appear in the recipients’ inboxes as coming from your manager. When they open it, it will say that it is from you on behalf of your manager.
If you have an automatic signature, it will appear – you must manually remove it from the email – it will appear.
The only way to keep your name out of it completely is to send it from your manager’s computer.
2) Why does the email say it’s from me even though I was in his inbox when I started a new email?
Outlook sees you as you no matter where you are when you start a new email. The only way to make it appear to come from your manager is to follow the steps above.
3) How do I keep my manager’s mailbox from being deluged with responses to big meetings?
Under “Tools” in the menu bar is a choice you can uncheck: “Request Responses.” You can do this for one meeting only.
The other choice is to reset your permissions in your manager’s Outlook:
From the inbox or calendar, choose Tools>Options>Delegates
Check the box “Send meeting requests and responses only to my delegates, not to me.” This will apply to all delegates and all meetings.
4) Why does my executive’s inbox keeps getting overloaded even though s/he is using personal folders?
Sometimes new executives are set up either without a G drive, or with personal folders that point to their inboxes, which does absolutely nothing for their memory usage. See the subject Managing eMail Storage Limits. If there is no G Drive, you need to contact your IT support.
5) Sometimes I open a distribution list or copy a long list of names into the “To” box. When I hit “Send,” Outlook checks the addresses against my company directory and gives me the opportunity to choose a name if it can’t identify it. If the name isn’t there, I have to close out of the window, take the name out of the “To” box and start all over! Is there a way to avoid this?
There’s not a preference to set, but there is a workaround. Many company directories have a listing at the beginning or the end of their global directory that’s something like “**.” If yours doesn’t, you can enter one in your personal directory. When you come across an invalid name, just choose ** for the name. When you finished the entire list, cut and paste it into a Word table (see tips for changing the list to a table) and sort the list alphabetically. Delete all the ** addresses, and cut and paste the remaining addresses back into the “To” box. Of course it doesn’t have to be “**.” You can choose any name in the directory that isn’t on the list and once you’ve sorted, eliminate all instances of that name. A little bit of a “to”-do, but worth it if it’s a long list.
6) Why is an appointment suddenly appearing as nonsense text (”Greek” or gibberish)?
Someone accepted or otherwise altered the meeting from a Blackberry. This may not have been your manager – any invitee within your intranet could have done it and had this affect on all of the other invitees’ calendars.This is a flaw in the Blackberry software that is mostly resolved and you won’t see it often; still, encourage people not to do it.
You can probably fix the meeting by retyping the information if it originated from a calendar that you control. It doesn’t always work, and if it was a meeting that was sent to your manager, it’s a poor idea. Updates may not be recognized. Try accepting the original invitation again. If that doesn’t work, ask that it be recreated and re-sent.
7) How do I decline a meeting without having the meeting notice disappear? I changed my mind later and the invitation was GONE!
If you have a newer version of Outlook, the invitation is in your trash and you can retrieve it. If you have an older version, however, it’s just gone. The way to avoid this is to open the calendar, open or right click on the meeting, and decline from there. The invitation will remain in your inbox where you can accept it again, thereby putting it back into the calendar.
If you want to the invitation to remain on the calendar but not show as busy, you’ll need to “reply to” the originator saying that you won’t be able to attend, then change the “show time as” option to “free.” If you choose “decline” it will be removed from the calendar.
Tip: I like to make a personal folder for declined invitations so that I can quickly review what I’ve turned down if the conflict changes.
Can I set a different time zone in advance for just one day ?
No. Sorry. You can only set your calendar one time zone at a time. You can list another time zone on a strip next to your current time for easy reference to another time zone. See how in managing time zones in Outlook. In 2007, you can list the time zone for a particular meeting. Say you want to set up a lunch meeting at noon eastern standard time and you’re in Pacific time. Choose eastern time in the meeting notice:
In case the image isn’t loading for you, the selection is on the appointments tab, third pane from the left, under “recurrence.”
Your meeting will show up at 9 a.m. on your calendar and noon on the eastern attendees’ calendars. This does not change your time zone for the day!
11. One of my recurring meetings has shifted by an hour. I am an invitee, not the meeting creator.
This can happen if one of you is in an area that recognizes daylight savings time and the other is not. The meeting will always shift to remain at the same time for its originator. If you are the originator and need to accommodate an attendee in the time zone without DST, you’ll need to manually change the meeting unless you have, as in the example above, set up the meeting for that attendee’s time zone to begin with.
Best Practices for Invitations
Cannot Access Personal Contact from eMail
How to Avoid Disappearing Meetings
How to Avoid Double Booked Resources
Managing Time Zones in Outlook
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