Brown & Jones’ Court Reporter Rachel Gwidt edits her transcript using a standing work station.

As a profession, court reporting has been very good to me.  I love being co-owner of Brown & Jones Reporting, hiring and mentoring reporters, and networking with new clients. I have the best work family imaginable.  I’m also lucky that I can still find time to take jobs as a reporter.  I enjoy the challenge of taking down every word, and hearing and learning new things on a daily basis.  Like many professions, however, there’s one major drawback to reporting: it’s a sedentary job.  We sit, often hours on end, in courtrooms and depositions, and then again as we edit the transcripts. To make matters worse, we spend our leisure time in front of the computer or television, checking emails, paying bills, or catching up on the latest episode of our favorite show. The toll sitting takes on our overall health is a hot topic in the media.  Amby Burfoot recently addressed the issue in Runner’s World Magazine, and offered tips to help combat the negative effects of a sedentary job:

We live in an obesigenic culture, where sedentary lifestyles, advertising, and food availability conspire to make us gain weight.  As a result, more than two thirds of American adults are overweight, leading to obesity-related diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart disease. Unfortunately, experts say dieting alone isn’t the answer- we can consume calories far more quickly than we can burn them through exercise.

So, the article goes on to say, “exercise doesn’t work.  Diets don’t work.  What does?”  The answer may be “energy flux,” where the secret is simply to move– not for a specified amount of time or intensity- just move more.

In the 1950s, Harvard nutrition professor Jean Mayer, Ph.D., studied the diet, exercise, and weight of a group of working men.  Workers were divided into five groups according to physical demands of their jobs: sedentary (1), light work (2), up to very heavy work (5). Surprisingly, groups 2 through 5 weighed roughly the same; these men achieved a natural balance between their calories consumed and calories burned, independent of their diets.

The sedentary workers in Group 1 found no such balance.  They ate more than they needed and put on more weight than the others.  The study concluded that humans have evolved to exercise a certain amount every day.  When we do, our energy flux remains in balance, but without daily exercise, the weight-control system malfunctions.

This article is not meant to depress you, rather it’s is a wake-up call. The court reporter workday is a sedentary one, and we each must make an active effort to compensate for this each day.  As far as diets go, the best diet is the one you’re most likely to stick with.  The same goes for exercise: Do whatever keeps you motivated and excited, whether it’s yoga, bootcamp, strength training, swimming, 5-Ks, or walking your dog.  If you get tired of one exercise, do another.  Just don’t stop – ever.  As Joseph S. Alpert, M.D., editor in chief of the American Journal of Medicine says, “You only have to exercise on the days that you eat.”

Move more at work.  Take the stairs, stand, stretch, schedule walking meetings.  Take advantage of every break.  “Sitting is the new smoking, and we all need to cut back”, Burfoot says.  Exercise does much more than burn calories.  It improves blood sugar, heart health, blood pressure, and mood. Remember these four words relating to diet, health, weight, and exercise:  “Food.  Feet.  Water.  Repeat.”

Jane M. Jones, RMR, CRR
Brown & Jones Reporting, Inc.
Wisconsin Court Reporters 

Realtime Reporter – Conquering Your Fears

Rachel Gwidt, RPR

To my pleasant surprise, I didn’t freeze up and write badly.  I wrote exactly the same as I would have written with nobody being able to see it.  Actually, I feel like I focused harder than if no one was watching.  Everyone was able to read it just fine.  Did I have some things in my favor?  Absolutely.  It wasn’t super fast and technical (just a nice, short, easy car accident-type case).  I thought to myself, what a stroke of luck to be able to have my first real time experience be so easy and stress free.  Do I feel this automatically qualifies me to take a real time patent case with 12 attorneys hooked up to me tomorrow?  Absolutely not, but what I got from the experience was huge to me.  It was validation of my writing skills and confirmation that I CAN do it.  Most of all, I came away with a new confidence in myself that I didn’t have yesterday (or all the days before that for that matter).  Those of you that know me fairly well know what I’m talking about! 

Smile

Court Reporters – Professionalism

Why is Email Etiquette Important?

Email Etiquette

Millions of people use email, and much of this correspondence involves business communication.  This blog pertains to business/professional email.  By that, I mean any email sent to your colleagues, clients or prospective employers.  The following are some helpful tips to consider when writing an email:

• Do not use shorthand; i.e., “can u plz send info on careers?”
• Avoid misspellings and poor grammar. 
• When possible, be direct; however, don’t leave out important details.
• Take a look at your email address.  Are you a sexymom@isp.com?  Use a more formal address.
• Use your spell checker.
• Do not use offensive language.
• Avoid using hypertext markup language or HTML.  Not every email program can interpret this, and it will not translate well.
• Avoid writing your message using all upper case letters.  It looks like you’re shouting.  Also, avoid using all lower case letters.  Some people will interpret this as mumbling.
• Use your email program’s “Reply To All” feature only when your reply will be necessary to know for the original sender and all people in the original email’s To: and CC: field.
• Do not use “Reply To All” when only the original sender needs to know your reply.
• Use AntiVirus Software on your emails.  Keep it up to date.  Scan your emails.
• Ask before you send huge attachments.
• Avoid “me too” responses.  Not enough content, but enough to annoy people with a large amount of emails.
• If your email is emotionally charged, walk away from the computer and wait to reply.
• Always acknowledge emails.
• Always end your emails with “thank you, best regards,” something.
• Many people overuse exclamation points in email.  Try to use only one exclamation point in an email message.  Remember, exclamation points can be interpreted as anger or frustration.  The recipient cannot hear the tone of your voice.

Jane M. Jones, RMR, CRR
Brown & Jones / Deposition Reporting