AutoCorrect  

A lot of users think of Word’s AutoCorrect feature as just a tool for poor spellers or clumsy typists, which describes all of us at one time or another.  It can also be a great source of embarrassment, if it "corrects" something unintentionally and you don't catch it before your job is submitted.  

However, AutoCorrect, if used correctly, can dramatically increase the speed of your typing, and thus your effective rate of pay, by decreasing the number of keystrokes to achieve what you want to type.  Word comes with many frequently misspelled or mistyped words built in that you can use, or not use, at your discretion (if you don't want any of them, they're easy to delete).  

For example, if you often type seh for she, you might not even notice Word correcting it automatically, and most of the time you won't even mind, except for the rare occasion when you may actually want to type seh (let's say it's a client-spelled name).  There's always Ctrl+Z to undo that automatic correction.  

Personal "Glitches":  We all have them – those pesky words we just cannot type correctly if our lives depended on it.  When you run Spellcheck and Word marks a word as misspelled, if the correct version is shown in the Spellcheck Suggestions list, highlight it and choose AutoCorrect instead.  The correction will be added to your AutoCorrect list, and you’ll never again have to manually correct that mistyped word.   

For Word 2016 users, when you see Word suggest the correct spelling, click on the arrow pointing to the right, and you'll see an option to add this to AutoCorrect.   

But AutoCorrect can do much more than correct misspelling or mistyping.  You can also use it to type in "shorthand" (i.e., you type in abbreviations or acronyms, and Word expands your shortcuts to multiple words, or even sentences).

 Suppose you are typing a lot of letters that end with the closing Very truly yours,.  Typing something where you have to use capital letters and punctuation slows your typing rhythm.  The next time you type this, select it (only include from "Very" through to the comma), and go to Word Options, Proofing, AutoCorrect Options.   

The text will already be inserted in the “With” box.  In the “Replace” box, type the abbreviation you’d like to use for this entry, such as vty.  From now on, every time you press the keys vty followed by the space key, Word will expand that to Very truly yours, including the comma, if you copied it correctly.  The possibilities are virtually endless!  

Make sure your abbreviations are not real words or even the beginnings of words, and make sure you choose abbreviations that you can actually remember, or they become useless.  

Many users prefer to prefix their AutoCorrect entries with something that they can be relatively sure won't occur in any job, such as xj, or even punctuation, such as a comma.  This allows you to use actual words rather than "acronyms" you invent, since it would be very unlikely that a comma, no space, followed by a word would appear in anything you type.  For example, instead of using vty, you might choose ,very, which you could choose to expand to Very truly yours,. Another advantage to using punctuation to start your AutoCorrect entries is that these entries will be placed near the top of Word's AutoCorrect list, enabling you to easily distinguish your entries from most of the built-in ones.  

Let's say you frequently find yourself typing Please don't hesitate to email if you have any further questions or concerns.  You could create an entry ,please.  Every time you type ,please, Word will expand it to Please don't hesitate to email if you have any further questions or concerns.  Get the idea?  

Used correctly, AutoCorrect can make you more productive by allowing you to quickly type frequently used long words and phrases.  However, AutoCorrect entries that are not well thought out and properly set up will not only end up slowing you down, but they can result in unintentional expansions, which means low job ratings, not to mention client complaints.  

The best way to create your library of AutoCorrects is to do so once you've become comfortable and acclimated to SW typing policies and procedures, SW clients, and the type of work that you can expect to receive from SW clients.  Once you find yourself typing something over and over, consider adding an AutoCorrect entry for it.  Don't get too specific on very lengthy sentences, because clients always find a way to dictate something a dozen different ways, and you may have too many, or not enough words in your entry, which results in you having to edit your AutoCorrect expansions, which totally defeats the purpose.  

Once you’ve pretty much perfected your list to your personal typing habits (remember, what works for one person may not work for the next), then you'll want to save your AutoCorrect entries.  They are stored in your Normal.dotm file, but there is also a utility for backing up (and restoring) your Word AutoCorrect entries that is available for free online.  The utility will allow you to back up and save your entries, and then they can be restored/installed on any computer running Word.   

In the next few weeks, be on the lookout for an article explaining how to use the AutoCorrect utility to back up or restore your AutoCorrect entries, as well as another future article explaining how to use the utility to ensure all of your AutoCorrect entries use straight apostrophes!

We hope this helps you increase your productivity! As always, we appreciate your feedback.